Posted by Social media platforms are continually churning out new features to give their audience something new to experience, and LinkedIn isn’t one to lag.
Just like Snapchat, Instagram, and Facebook, the latest platform to join the ‘Stories’ bandwagon is LinkedIn. These images and videos appear for 24 hours on top of the application and website.
You can customize it with text and image overlays and can even see who all viewed your stories. It’s meant to post those things you don’t want on your permanent feed, but want your connections to see temporarily—a sweet spot.
It’s time to include LinkedIn stories in your marketing strategy because any new feature that rolls out on a social media platform has a higher organic reach than anything else, so leveraging that will boost your reach and, eventually, your business.
Here are some ways you can use LinkedIn stories to boost your business presence:
1. Share behind-the-scenes and employee insights
People don’t connect with brand names, they connect with the people behind the brand, so it’s essential to show what happens behind the scenes. LinkedIn stories are just the perfect way to do that.
Quite often, people know what you are doing on the front, looking at your achievements and failures, but they never get to know about the things which lead up to those outcomes.
Those behind-the-scenes actions that slowly build up your business make your brand more ‘human,’ something essential in a world where everyone is trying to be a clone.
But how will this help you?
It will help build trust because now people finally know your brand’s personality and the heroes behind the action. It will give insights about your working process, thus building credibility.
2. Feature bite-sized expert tips
LinkedIn is widely used for thought leadership content and building a personal brand as a thought leader. Thought leaders share their experiences and industry tips, which portray them as an expert.
With the stories feature, they can share bite-sized video tips to establish a one-to-one connection with the audience while providing value. The people viewing the stories can directly reach out to them by replying and start a conversation, which is again beneficial for networking.
Another alternative is to feature bite-sized tips and direct viewers to your company blog.
From industry updates to experienced know-how, stories are a great way to share thought leadership content.
However, you need to keep in mind that the content should be easy to understand and consume since it will only be live up to 24 hours.
Stories also bring out a challenge since you need to establish a connection, provide value, and display your personality- all within a short duration of 15-20 seconds.
3. Announce brand and product news
Since new features always get a good organic reach and there’s a first-mover advantage, leveraging this feature to talk about your brand can be significant.
You can talk about recent developments taking place in the company, promotions, employee insights, job openings, product launches, giveaways, etc.
You can engage with your audience better through stories and communicate more about your brand in a snackable format. You can even promote your content from different social media channels by repurposing it or sharing it on stories, thus increasing their reach.
The idea is to provide value by grabbing their attention and openly talking about your brand. This will help build credibility because they know what’s happening inside your brand and what they should look out for, increasing curiosity.
It’s a win-win situation.
4. Host a Q&A
Q&As are very popular on Instagram stories, but you can use it on LinkedIn stories too for showing a more authentic side of your brand.
You can ask people to submit any questions they have related to the industry through messages or comments on a post feed. And you can answer those questions through video or text on stories so that everyone can view them.
This will directly show your audience how much you know about your industry, positioning you as an expert, and building affinity.
The Q&A will also help resolve any doubts your potential customers may have about your brands, eventually helping you provide a better experience.
Quite often, Q&As are great for social listening. It means catering to what your customers or audience are saying. This can help you present your offer better, package your services in an informed manner, and position yourself correctly, so they don’t have such doubts again.
5. Share user-generated content and customer testimonials
User-Generated Content, or UGC, is the content your customers create voluntarily because they love your products or brand. It’s not branded content where they get paid for posting, but it’s content they post out of love for the brand and their products.
User-generated content is the most significant source of building trust with your audience because it’s practically word-of-mouth on steroids. There’s no better way to convert your customers than seeing those who have used and loved the products.
You can gather this content from Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn wherever people tag you. You can also encourage them to create this content as a part of a contest or giveaway by tagging friends, using a specific hashtag, and sharing their favourite part about the product.
Besides, you can also share customer testimonials on your stories from time to time, further establishing credibility and social proof.
Conclusion
With digital media, keeping up with trends is essential to position yourself in front of your audience. Besides first-mover advantage, social media platforms push those new features and are increasingly being used by the audience, thus giving you the organic reach you need.
While there were extensive contemplations about the scope of 24-hour stories on a professional platform like LinkedIn, there are plenty of ways it can professionally boost your brand’s awareness.
It all comes down to how you plan out your marketing strategy and maintain flexibility in accommodating evolving trends and making the best use of them.
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