Keynote speaker, consultant, and author Donna Serdula has almost 30,000 first-degree LinkedIn connections. Serdula, who joined the platform in 2005 and ramped up her usage when she started a job search a year later, does not necessarily recommend that many. But back then, it was common practice to “collect” connections, she shares in the “Professional Photographer” podcast episode, “Building a Powerful LinkedIn Presence for Photographers.” Users interact with the platform in a more strategic way today: as a premier platform for building your business. Part of her own business, which she started in 2009, is helping clients understand how.
“A lot of people think of LinkedIn as a place to go when you’re looking for a job. And that is an issue. This isn’t a place that you get on when you’re looking. It’s a place that you should always be on because it’s your network,” Serdula says. “It is a place to go to, to not only build a network, but to network with people, to be seen, to get heard, to demonstrate your expertise.”
LinkedIn is, in a word, professional, she explains. “And because of that, the people that are on it are also like you. They’re professionals. They’re entrepreneurs. They’re businesspeople. So, it’s a great audience to tap into.”
LinkedIn was founded in 2002 and launched in 2003. While it is considered a social media network, its purpose is to develop business contacts. Photographers can do well with ramping up their LinkedIn profiles and usage, Serdula explains, to introduce themselves to potential clients and tell their stories.
DIGITAL INTRODUCTION
LinkedIn is not a site to copy and paste your bio and resume, she stresses. It’s a place to share your authentic personality and what you represent, to find like-minded clients. “Think of it more as that first impression, that digital introduction…more as a manifesto [of] who you are, why you do what you do and how it makes a difference,” Serdula says. “That’s something people are hungry for; they want to know who they’re working with.” Using the right keywords to describe yourself and your business is crucial because LinkedIn also is used as a search engine, she adds. “If you want to get found by people who are looking for someone like you, just make sure that when you tell [your] story, you include those keywords that a person might be using.” These could be your genre or your location or words specific to your specialty or philosophy.
Recommendations are another way to introduce clients to your work. Earlier in LinkedIn’s history, it was common to seek recommendations and write them for others, Serdula says. But most of the recommendations on people’s LinkedIn profiles are more than a decade old, and it’s time for fresh ones, she adds. “I would challenge everyone … LinkedIn is a great place for recommendations. And even though they’re not pushing it,” she says, “even though it’s not something I’m seeing a lot of people doing, I think we should reverse that.”
As a photographer, you want to showcase your images on LinkedIn. There are several ways to do that, according to Serdula. Use a strong, professional headshot for your main photo and multiple images (or one) for your background photo. In the “featured” section, you can add some images and a link to your website and portfolio. The “activity” section is your feed, where you can create posts such as behind-the-scenes videos of photo sessions and then the best accompanying images. If you are a headshot photographer, for example, you can post some of your favorites and tag your subjects (with their permission), Serdula suggests. “Once you tag that person you’ve just [photographed], their network is going to see it. And what a great commercial, right?” she says. “Before you know it, you’re going to find that your phone is ringing because their friends and their family and their colleagues need exactly the same thing.”
“It is a place to go to, to not only build a network, but to network with people, to be seen, to get heard, to demonstrate your expertise.”
Donna Serdula, LinkedIn expert, business consultant, speaker
DWELL TIME
Though LinkedIn does not publicize it, the platform measures “dwell time,” the length of time someone interacts with a post, Serdula says. Do users pause and read your post or watch your video? Think about how you can get them to do so.
A post with a longer dwell time “conveys to LinkedIn that there’s some quality here,” she explains, as does someone sharing your post, bookmarking it and/or commenting. “That’s what LinkedIn wants. It wants quality. Whatever you can do to make that post something people want to engage with, that’s when you’re going to start to see more and more eyeballs finding and looking at the post.”
Networking goes both ways: potential clients and contacts find you and you search for people you want to connect with who could help your business. Since Serdula collected her 30,000 contacts, LinkedIn has rolled out a feature in which you can “follow” an influencer or high-profile person. So, for example, if you are a business headshot photographer looking to connect with CEOs, you could follow those you don’t know personally rather than attempt to connect with someone who doesn’t know you, she explains. If you offer meaningful comments on their posts, they may notice and connect with you organically. So, while you post your own compelling content, follow people you’re interested in and post comments to them as well. LinkedIn is all about networking and building your professional persona through multiple channels. “If you have a message, if you have something to say, definitely make sure that you’re on LinkedIn and you’re posting [quality content],” Serdula says. “When you’re doing that, and you’re doing that regularly, good things start to happen because the right people will start to notice, and your phone will ring.”
Melanie Lasoff Levs is director of publications.
Tags: marketing
