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304
[00:00:45] April Beach: Hi, you guys. And welcome back to the show. This is episode number 304. So if you’ve been a long time listener, you know that all the show notes and everything we’re going to share with you can be found by visiting SweetLife.
[00:00:57] April Beach: Simply click on the podcast and you can search episode number 304. I’m April Beach, host here on the show, and I’m really glad that you’ve tuned into this episode. I can tell you that I really needed to hear and learn what today’s guest brought to the table for us. If you have been trying to grow your business on LinkedIn and maybe you’re like me, I’ve had no idea, honestly.
[00:01:19] April Beach: Raise your hand. How to use LinkedIn company pages. Yes, we use them, but there really wasn’t a big strategy behind it. And LinkedIn didn’t have a huge reach. Well, if you’re like me and you actually want to know how to utilize your company page to build your brand, increase your sales, gain followers, and build relationships with important people.
[00:01:41] April Beach: That are going to grow and scale your business. Then this episode is for you. Today’s guest literally wrote the book, the first ever book on LinkedIn company pages. And in today’s episode, she’s going to share with you and me how much we are leaving on the table. Literally how many things that we could be doing that are simple tweaks to your business page that we’re just walking away from.
[00:02:04] April Beach: It’s like burning cash. You’re going to be blown away by the strategies you hear on today’s show. And what you’re going to walk away with is a simple process to know how to use your LinkedIn company page to build your brand, increase sales, gain recognition for your company and become more known. In addition to that, we even talk about the connection between your company page and your LinkedIn personal page and why that’s important.
[00:02:27] April Beach: So if you’re looking to grow your business on LinkedIn to gain recognition and to have a strategy that’s actually so simple, you can actually. Hand of the strategy that you get here on the show today to a team member to implement for you. It’s amazing. Or if you’re flying solo, this is a very simple strategy that you should be able to easily implement on your own for your LinkedIn company page following the steps that our guest is diving into today here.
[00:02:56] April Beach: So we have Michelle J. Raymond on the show. She’s amazing. I was introduced to Michelle by a mutual friend, and if you aren’t yet, Please cruise over and follow Michelle on LinkedIn. Again, it’s Michelle J. Raymond. Let her know that you heard this episode. You’re going to want to connect with her for sure after this.
[00:03:13] April Beach: It’s just an amazing amount of information that is truly going to be able to be implemented in your business and make a significant difference today. So if that’s what you’re looking for, you’re in the right place. Let’s go ahead and dive into today’s episode.
[00:03:27] April Beach: Hi everybody and welcome back to the show. I’m here with my new friend, Michelle, and Michelle was introduced to me by another new friend, which is not always the way we meet, like the coolest people is introductions from other people. And. Michelle and I are going to dive into all things LinkedIn company pages. And one of the, one of the most amazing things that has happened since I’ve been connecting with Michelle is that I realized that our company page is really lacking.
[00:03:56] April Beach: One of the biggest reality check is basically, I really didn’t know what I was doing with LinkedIn company pages. Like I knew I didn’t know. And then I just talked to Michelle and tapped into all of her genius and realize how much I’m really leaving on the table because of my lack of understanding. So I’m really excited that, that you are here to help me and all of our listeners really understand how to dive in and utilize LinkedIn company pages more. So welcome to the SweetLife Entrepreneur podcast and thank you for being here and sharing your wisdom.
[00:04:25] Michelle J Raymond: It is my absolute pleasure and if it makes you feel any better, don’t worry, you’re in the majority, not the minority. They are vastly understood and put it this way, I wrote the world’s first book on it just three years ago.
[00:04:39] Michelle J Raymond: Now think about that. LinkedIn has been around for 20 years. There’s been no resources. It’s at all up until three years ago, which is just ludicrous. So hopefully we can help your listeners here today with some actionable tips that they can take away and move a little bit more into the, you do know some things about company pages that you can implement and help grow your business.
[00:04:58] April Beach: Absolutely. I’m so excited. So tell everybody a little bit how you said you wrote the first book on LinkedIn company pages. I mean, that is pretty crazy that nobody had actually figured it out yet until you did that. So how did you fall into that?
[00:05:14] Michelle J Raymond: Fall into it is the right words. So three years ago I set up my own business and not even that was intentional, it was accidental. So I’m an accidental entrepreneur, which I hope some other people can relate to. But picture this, one day I win a 2 million deal from a LinkedIn post for the company that I was working at. about a week later, I had to quit on the spot because the boss reneged on that deal. So imagine going from the highs of a 2 million win to I quit on the spot, never planned on quitting.
[00:05:46] Michelle J Raymond: And that whole mess that that was, but I just decided I wasn’t going to work for anybody else ever again. I’d had a run of bad bosses and I just figured I might as well work hard for myself. And so I did that. And after, you know, six months of trying to figure that out, I end up. On LinkedIn training, because I’d been using LinkedIn to sell for the last six years at that point.
[00:06:07] Michelle J Raymond: And so I thought I could help other people because it was March, 2020, you know, that little thing called COVID that sent the world into lockdown. That’s when I set my business up which turns out it was a good thing, but essentially I help people. And I went to the first person, offered them training and they said, can’t you just do it for us?
[00:06:23] Michelle J Raymond: And I said, is that even a job? Like I didn’t even know April, I’m not going to lie. I didn’t even realize that people would pay other people to do social media. That’s the craziness in hindsight, but I’m not even making that up. And the thing was company pages are a way that you can get a third party to do your LinkedIn for you without breaking any of the terms and conditions.
[00:06:43] Michelle J Raymond: So I started to do that for one client. Then I looked around and went, no one else is talking about this. So I’m just going to own that spot. And three years ago, people thought I was crackers. There’s no other words for it. They just thought, where’d I come from? And why was I talking about this thing that absolutely everybody else was just.
[00:07:03] Michelle J Raymond: Slamming and that’s where it started. It got me noticed for being known for that one thing. And it’s just got me so many opportunities since. But that’s how it all started. It was crazy. But here we are now.
[00:07:16] April Beach: It, you know, there’s the guy, there’s so many gems from what you just shared in your story. But just for our listeners also, this is totally a sidebar, but it shows the importance of being known for something and being known for one specific thing, even though Michelle and I, and you that are listening, you all, we have a million different things we could do.
[00:07:36] April Beach: But the becoming known for one thing and leaning into that and the power of that. And so that’s just a, that’s a, we could just end the podcast right there on that, but we’re not going to, I mean, that, that’s a, that’s a gem lesson right there. Right. It really, really shows that importance and then we can be known for something else next and something else next. And we just keep reinventing ourselves. Don’t we, you guys.
[00:07:56] Michelle J Raymond: Yeah. And that’s where I’m up to right now. Reinventing because, you know, I was known for that one thing and it’s opened so many doors. But now I’m going through this next evolution phase, which is exciting because being known for that one thing got me onto a podcast, which was picked up because someone saw me write a comment on LinkedIn and then someone in New Zealand listened to the podcast and then they reached out and they’re like, do you want to write a book together?
[00:08:20] Michelle J Raymond: And like the whole thing, it went from Vienna to Dubai, to New Zealand, to me in Sydney. How crazy is that? That’s the power of LinkedIn. And that’s why I fell in love with it so long ago.
[00:08:31] April Beach: Oh my gosh. I love your story and I’m so grateful that you’re here. Thank you so much for being here to share with us. All right. So pages, company pages. I mean, I, I think that I have had company pages since I don’t even know, before 2010 probably. And they have just sat there. We’ve been trying to use our company page in the past couple of years, but I have no idea what to do with it. So why is it important to have a company page?
[00:08:58] Michelle J Raymond: Yeah, look, and this is the thing. Company pages realistically have been around for a long time, but it’s only been over the last few years that I think that they’ve got the attention they deserve from LinkedIn themselves. Now, why is that? Thanks to COVID, everybody brought their advertised Spend off other platforms and brought it to LinkedIn, you need a company page to run ads.
[00:09:19] Michelle J Raymond: And so they are cashed up and this is one area of growth for them. Now that works out for all of us who only do organic strategies, i. e. not paid because we get the benefits of all of these additional features. And so LinkedIn have put more resources, they’ve made them more actionable, but why should you use it?
[00:09:38] Michelle J Raymond: Go and Google your business name. That’s my simple answer. We piggyback and leverage off LinkedIn’s credibility and Google loves LinkedIn. And so your company page will show up in the first, probably five results maximum, sometimes one or two, depending how much content you’ve got out on the internet.
[00:09:56] Michelle J Raymond: Picture that first page results, top five, your LinkedIn company page is going to land there. Now you’ve got two choices. You can ignore it. Or you can basically roll out the red carpet if someone clicks on it and give them something that really welcomes them and shows them who you are and what you do as a business. That’s what I help people with. I want them to roll out the red carpet.
[00:10:19] April Beach: Wow. I had no idea. I just never even thought about that. But now that you explained that, it makes complete sense. And so in the past, I know that besides the SEO part of it that you just mentioned in the past, it was really hard to get followers to company pages and they don’t have a lot of exposure.
[00:10:38] April Beach: And the SEO within LinkedIn itself just didn’t seem that it was being shared with a lot of people. Can you speak a little bit to, you know, if there are so few people that actually see this. Other than some other benefits. I know we’re going to learn from you. Like why take the time? Why, why spend the time to curate the content for this page?
[00:10:56] Michelle J Raymond: They were super hard to grow. When I first started, they were like snails pace. I would have to tell people, you know, plan six to 12 months before you see anything, and I can assure you when someone’s paying you for a service. They don’t want to wait six to 12 months to see a result. The good part that LinkedIn’s done is one of the new features that they rolled out a while back is that we get invitation credits so we can invite our first degree connections.
[00:11:20] Michelle J Raymond: That’s people that we’re connected to. We can invite them to come and follow the page. Now we went from 100 to 250, so it’s a really easy way. That you can build a niche community. Now, this isn’t a place where you’re gathering friends and family and former colleagues or aunties and uncles, or, you know, relatives that aren’t interested in your business.
[00:11:40] Michelle J Raymond: We’re building a niche community, much smaller, a higher concentrate of people that are interested in what you do and what you offer. And that’s the main difference between our personal profiles. So one’s highly concentrated and one’s a bit more of a numbers game of lots of people that we’ve connected along the way.
[00:11:58] Michelle J Raymond: And they just work differently. And I think that’s an important piece for people to understand they work differently. So you can grow really quickly. You can do a lot with a page that’s got a couple of thousand. And if anyone’s ever used a review website, like TripAdvisor, Yelp, any restaurant review website.
[00:12:18] Michelle J Raymond: That’s what we do before we make purchases. It’s completely normal for us to go and research companies. So they might like me or they might like you, April, personally, and have followed our content. When it comes to handing over that money, we just want to make sure that the business is credible as well. And so this is where your company page supports what you do with your personal brand.
[00:12:39] April Beach: Oh, it all makes so much sense now that you explain that. Can I ask you specifically about those invite credits? Can you share just a little bit more about how those work? Because I know that people have heard about them and, and just a little bit more clarity on that.
[00:12:52] Michelle J Raymond: Yeah. The thing is, I don’t think most company pages are taking full advantage of this and it is the fastest and easiest way to grow your page. And so what happens every month you get 250 invite credits that can be used across of all of your page admins. So you might have multiple people helping to manage your company page and spread that work around.
[00:13:12] Michelle J Raymond: So what happens is you invite people and here’s the kicker. For every person that accepts, you get an invite credit back again, which is awesome. So be targeted higher chance of acceptance. You get another turn brilliant, but here’s the other side. They expire at the end of every month. So if you don’t use them, you lose them.
[00:13:31] Michelle J Raymond: So keep an eye out. It’s really simple. Just go to the page admin view. And in the top right hand corner, you’ll see invite connections. And what makes this even more brilliant? Is LinkedIn introduced some filters for us. So whether you target people by a geography, by an industry, or maybe you went a particular school, then you can do that within these filters.
[00:13:52] Michelle J Raymond: So again, they help you be targeted. They help you form that niche. And that is where the brilliance starts to come into play.
[00:13:59] Michelle J Raymond: Oh, that’s so cool.
[00:14:00] April Beach: I did notice the filtering on there and was playing with some invite credits in the past, and I think it’s really cool how they give you the credit back when somebody accepts it.
[00:14:08] April Beach: It’s just saying, yes, somebody actually really does want to know about your brand and follow you and be part of this community. So that is super exciting. So let’s kind of go into how do you even have Post on this company page. What do you put out there? What kind of content should we share on a company page versus in our on our personal linkedin profile?
[00:14:29] April Beach: I really I don’t think that people understand and know and what I’ve seen in the past. And I feel like we’ve done the same thing, too, because we didn’t know any better was just kind of sharing some of the same stuff And, and I understand now already just in what you’ve shared with us, that that is definitely not the right approach.
[00:14:47] April Beach: Look,
[00:14:47] Michelle J Raymond: it’s not the worst. I’d rather that than nothing because again, if someone finds you or discovers you on Google or the LinkedIn search bar, then at least they find something and not just the ghost town. So not the worst thing, but here’s my three, two, one strategy, April, which I’ll share, which makes it super easy for anyone running a company page to know what to post.
[00:15:08] Michelle J Raymond: And the last thing we want. We do not want them to be broadcast channels all about the company. No one wants to read that. It reads like ads and everybody just scrolls as fast as possible past ads. So don’t do it listeners. But here’s the three, two, one strategy. So three plus two. Plus one equals six.
[00:15:26] Michelle J Raymond: Okay. So we’re talking about six posts in total, and I’m going to show you how we break down those six posts. Now, for some of you, you might only be able to do one post a week. Totally fine. You might be able to do two in an ideal world. I’d recommend three, if you can get those done. So how are we going to do it?
[00:15:44] Michelle J Raymond: We have what’s called good to know posts. So three out of those six are good to know. And what do I mean by good to know? These are the posts where you highlight what you know is going on in your industry that would really help other people. If you’re a subject matter expert, doesn’t matter the topic you have access and to, or probably have done a lot of research in your particular area.
[00:16:07] Michelle J Raymond: Instead of other people having to do that same research, you become the place that they come to learn. And so this is what I call good to know. So trends that are going on. Maybe there’s been legislation changes for some people. Maybe there are things that are impacting that particular business, like changes to technology.
[00:16:24] Michelle J Raymond: You know, chat GPT is probably a big one that’s. That’s, you know, just being all over the place, but how is that impacting your particular area? And so you start to build up your credibility and to be known for that thing. And then, but if we just talk about that all the time, April, not going to lie, that gets a little dry, a little boring.
[00:16:42] Michelle J Raymond: And that’s when people are like, okay, you know, but what kind of a business are you? And this is where we start to come into the, what I call good to feel. So this is. What is your business? What do they stand for? We know that buyers are drawn to people who share values, purpose driven companies are getting, you know, a lot more say these days.
[00:17:04] Michelle J Raymond: So start to show us some of the things that makes your business different to others. What do I mean by this? If you’re doing work out in the community, show that. Show us some photos of what goes on behind the scenes. You know, it can be as simple as grabbing your phone, taking a selfie or a video when you’re out and about, and just explaining to people that this is part of your process.
[00:17:26] Michelle J Raymond: We want to see behind the curtains, like the wizard of Oz, you know, who’s behind that curtain. And this is what the good to know, sorry, good to feel posts will show people. So then we get that affinity for the business and we get to start to filter out who we want to work with and who we may not want to, but that leaves the lucky last post out of those six, which is the most important one, even though it’s the least that most people skip over.
[00:17:51] Michelle J Raymond: And you know what it is. The good to buy post for the love of God, please tell people what your business does and make it really clear so that people don’t have to guess what you do. I have so many people that I’m connected to on LinkedIn that post regularly that I learn a lot from. I even like them a lot, but I have no clue what they actually sell to people to be able to refer business or to buy from them. And I’m sure you see that a lot as well.
[00:18:22] April Beach: I think I do that a lot. Not only see that a lot.
[00:18:26] Michelle J Raymond: Yeah.
[00:18:27] April Beach: Wow. It is. It is so true.
[00:18:30] Michelle J Raymond: We get stuck in adding value. There’s this thing don’t sell on LinkedIn. And the problem is we can absolutely sell on LinkedIn. That’s why I’m there. I help businesses grow using LinkedIn.
[00:18:41] Michelle J Raymond: But the problem is when we do it all the time and get the ratio out of whack, say we were doing it six posts, we were just saying, bye, bye, bye. No one wants that. But the problem is we’re doing all this value, building up our credibility, people like us, and then they’re just confused. They’re just like, well, what would I actually spend my money with you?
[00:19:00] Michelle J Raymond: Now, when we keep it in the three to one ratio, people don’t mind because they’ve seen, you know, your things, they have an affinity for your business. And then they’re like, shut up and take my money, but they don’t know where. And so this is what I’d like to help people. It’s no longer a broadcast at people.
[00:19:16] Michelle J Raymond: The content style is very similar to what you do on your personal page, but. Don’t forget the good to buy posts. It is critical, even on your personal posts. It won’t reach as many people as part of the game, but it will reach the right people. And that’s the important piece. We don’t want to walk away and leave money on the table.
[00:19:36] April Beach: Wow. Okay. So three good to knows, two good to feels and one good to buy.
[00:19:43] Michelle J Raymond: Don’t forget that one.
[00:19:44] April Beach: That was a game changer for me, an absolute game changer for me. So let’s talk about the frequency of this and, and how often you think that we should be company or posting to our company page.
[00:19:56] April Beach: I don’t think
[00:19:57] Michelle J Raymond: there’s any one answer because every business is different. So let’s say it comes down to resources. Now for a lot of businesses, if you’re a solopreneur or a micro business, you don’t have a team that’s doing all of this for you, so you’ve got to do it yourself. I would kind of do the 80 20 rule. Most of your content should go over on your personal profile with, you know, just the smaller share go over on your company page.
[00:20:21] Michelle J Raymond: So we’re going to take it over in that particular case, ideal world. Even with my paying clients, we’re only doing three times a week. We’re putting our efforts into elsewhere on the platform, you know, forming relationships, nurturing relationships, and putting content out personally. So just keep it ticking over.
[00:20:37] Michelle J Raymond: Don’t get stressed. It’s okay to repurpose to your point. I have no problems for that, but what we do is we just put a bit of a gap in between when you’re repurposing, unless it’s time critical for say an event, any other posts, just put some space between it. And then that way people will just kind of go, I haven’t seen that before.
[00:20:56] Michelle J Raymond: And you’ve kind of got two different audiences. And on LinkedIn, we often see the same thing twice. And what do we do? We just scroll by and just go. What’s the silly algorithm. We don’t blame the person. And so I’ve got a concept that might help some people to keep going. Create your LinkedIn company page is going to be your greatest hits library.
[00:21:16] Michelle J Raymond: And what I mean by that and I’m going to be showing my age here, but when I was younger, I used to buy CDs and you would buy a CD, which have say 25 songs on it and three were great. But you had to buy the whole thing just to get those three. Well, we’re not going to do that. We want all killer, no filler.
[00:21:34] Michelle J Raymond: So we just want the three good tracks on the company page. And don’t worry about trying to keep up with the rest. When you take away the volume component and up the quality, it becomes so much easier to do. So yeah, create it as your greatest hits library and it’s so much easier.
[00:21:50] April Beach: Ah, I’m going to, it used to be cassette tapes for me. I’m really going to age myself.
[00:21:54] Michelle J Raymond: I’ve got those too, the mixtapes.
[00:21:57] April Beach: The mixtapes. We used to hit record when the radio was playing live to try to catch the song in the beginning. Oh my gosh. Yeah. This is, that is really, really interesting. Okay. So the greatest hits I honestly, I always like try to throw myself under the, well not try to, I always end up throwing myself under the bus here on the podcast, especially when I’m learning so many new things.
[00:22:17] April Beach: I honestly think that we have just been saying, okay, we don’t know where else to put this content. We’re just going to put it out on the company page. It was, we have so much content because of the podcast. We’re like, sure, let’s just put it on the company page, put it on the company page. And so I think that we’ve been sharing a lot of content, but there was certainly been no strategy behind it other than sharing, you know, this weekly podcast.
[00:22:37] April Beach: This is a game changer. And now I can see why you wrote the first book on LinkedIn company pages. And also why so many people are coming to you to help grow their business and their brand on LinkedIn. So I’m absolutely incredibly helpful, Michelle. I know that many of our listeners want to connect with you, want to know how to get your book because I mean that if this is what we’ve just picked up and you know, 20 minutes, then what is it going to be if they, if they actually dive into all your genius, how can they find you and connect with you?
[00:23:10] April Beach: Well, the
[00:23:11] Michelle J Raymond: easiest place to find me is always on LinkedIn and it’s Michelle J. Raymond. And that J is there deliberately not to make my name longer, but to make it easier for you to find me because there’s lots of other Michelle Raymonds. So Michelle J. Raymond and the book is called Business Gold and it’s on Amazon.
[00:23:26] Michelle J Raymond: But if you go to my profile, there’s links there and always happy to point people in the direction, but ultimately it’s everything you need to get you started. Started with your company paid. So we’ve covered a little bit here today, but for those of you who want to be stepped through the book is great. It’s a two hour read. It will set you off at success for the future.
[00:23:44] April Beach: Wow. Thank you so much for your wisdom and your experience and your excellence and everything you’ve taught us here today. We’ll definitely be applying this. I know in our business, and we’re really excited because you get to come in and teach our clients in an intensive coming up.
[00:23:58] April Beach: And I know our clients are really excited to be able to work with you. So just. Thank you so much for all the change that you’re making in all of our businesses. And we really appreciate you.
[00:24:07] Michelle J Raymond: It is my pleasure. I wish everyone all the growth this year. It’s a tough year, but I know they’re in good hands with you. So yeah, I’m excited to be working with you guys and just show people that this is just another tool that you can leverage to help your business grow. So yeah, excited to see what we can do.
[00:24:24] Michelle J Raymond: Me
[00:24:24] April Beach: too. Me too. It’s excellent. Thank you so much.