Is Your Company on LinkedIn? It Should Be.

Stop what you're doing right now and do a search for your company on LinkedIn. Does your company have a company page on LinkedIn? If not, make sure you send your head of marketing, social media, or HR a note and tell them that Brenda said you NEED to get your company on LinkedIn. It's free to do so and fairly easy to do.

Here are the instructions from LinkedIn on setting up a company page: http://help.linkedin.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/710

Keep in mind that there are a few requirements you need to have before setting up a company page, as outlined here: http://help.linkedin.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/1594

At a high level,

1. You must be a current employee of the company to set up your company page.
2. Your email address must match your company. Ex: my work email is bmeller@walshcollege.edu and my company's webpage is www.walshcollege.edu 
3. There cannot be a company page already created using that web address, such as subsidiaries or franchises. 
4. You must be rated "intermediate" or "all star" by LinkedIn. 
5. You must have "several" connections says LinkedIn. Once upon a time I heard the minimum was 50 connections. This may have changed. 

WHY HAVE A COMPANY PAGE, you ask?

Several reasons. 

• People aren't going to your website to learn about your company as much as they used to. Sorry, but it's true. Now, people find information on your company on social and professional networking sites, which tend to be more current, active, and visited frequently.
• It's free to set up a company page on LinkedIn. Really.

  

  "Your competition has a company page
  on LinkedIn," says Brenda Meller. 

• You can set up product descriptions on LinkedIn through your company page and ask your customers to recommend those products. 
• You can post on behalf of your company: news, announcements, general messages, etc. 
• Every Fortune 500 company has employees on LinkedIn. I.e., it's kind of a big deal.
• LinkedIn provides you analytics for people who "like" your page. Again, this is free. (I'm big on free)
• Because your competition is on LinkedIn. Don't believe me? Go ahead and check. 
• Because I think it's a smart thing to do. I call 'em like I see 'em. 

Like this post? Please click to share on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, or wherever your network may be found. And then send me an invite to connect: www.linkedin.com/in/brendameller and mention this post. 

Recruiting candidates on LinkedIn

Another question from a network contact and my response. 

Q: Brenda – I know you are a marketing guru.

We have a job position available at our company and I want to figure out a way to post it on LinkedIn but don’t want to post it on a global board. Do you know of a way to post a job to just your contacts? (We would like to have a referral source to go along with the candidate.)

A: A wise man (I think it was David Benjamin) once told me that any self-respecting marketing professional who is referred to as a "marketing guru" and doesn't wince should be ashamed. He went on to explain that the use of the word "guru" is widely overused, and I think implies some super power or insight that's impossible to achieve. 

But I digress. 

Yes. There are several ways you can share a job posting on LinkedIn without posting it on a global board. 

• Post as a status update on your LinkedIn profile. And mention referrals are appreciated. Your first level connections will read it. And they can share it forward to their first level contacts, too. (these are your second level contacts). 

• Post as a status update on your company page on LinkedIn. And mention referrals are appreciated. (What, you don't have a company page? Stop everything and set one up. Now. I'll wait.)

• Post as a status update within industry groups. And mention referrals are appreciated. Read more about sharing job postings on discussion boards on LinkedIn here.

• Share with connections who work in the industry. And mention referrals are appreciated. (keep in mind you can export your LinkedIn connections list, review to determine who you'd like to target, then email them with info on the job posting. If you go this route, I'd recommend a BCC list mentioning you're sending it to several contacts at once, or personalizing each email.)

Was this tip helpful? Share your comments and experience. 

Review Your LinkedIn Company Page Lately? You Should

A reminder for anyone whose company has a page on LinkedIn. According to LinkedIn, you can list up to 25 products or services on your LinkedIn company page.

Keep in mind, though, that this might require periodic maintenance on your part. Perhaps there are specials that you're promoting that have expired. Or like me, perhaps you've promoted an event (in our case, a webinar) that occurs once per quarter.

Learn more during an upcoming MBA webinar.
Details at www.walshcollege.edu/Webinars 

Here are the step by step instructions from LinkedIn on updating your product / service pages on your LinkedIn Company Page: http://help.linkedin.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/4652

Hope this helps and serves as a good reminder.