LinkedIn is a site of professionals and companies. Individuals and companies use LinkedIn for networking, job searching, company research, and connecting with affiliates, including alumni, industry, and  other business related groups. One of the most important parts of LinkedIn is your profile. That's what you use to connect with people in your network and your profile is how you get found on LinkedIn, because it contains information about your skills and experience.                                           Make Your LinkedIn ProfileThe new, improved LinkedIn gives you a one-button path to improve your profile. It is step by step wizard which guides you towards a more complete profile. If you have a creative skill, or even a publication with a neat cover photo, the new elements could add a dash to an otherwise humdrum profile.The 120-character headline is one of the best spots on your profile to explain your brand.                                                                              A Few Initial Tips For Your Profile

 Upload a Professional Picture.LinkedIn is putting the focus on your face with a larger profile image.

 LinkedIn URL - Turn your LinkedIn profile into a personal brand statement.LinkedIn allows you to customize your URL and give it clarity with a vanity URL.You can list up to three URLs.

  Taking care to connect with the right people works on many levels – first and foremost, if they endorse you and give you good recommendations, it could enhance your profile.

 Be invisible - To keep your agenda hidden, change your viewing setting to “anonymous” in “Select what others see when you’ve viewed their profile.”

 Be secretive - When you are in edit mode, head to your privacy controls. Turn off activity broadcasts and change the setting for  “select who can see your activity feed” to “only you.”

 Professional Associations/Clubs/Non-Profit Work.

 Be ungrateful - Ask your contacts to endorse you for only your top skills.

 Be a groupie. Don’t limit the number of groups you join. Join groups related to your area of expertise, industry,  passions, social causes, and other aspects of your identity.

 The summary section is much more prominent- Because of the reduced size of the top box, your summary is now above the fold; thus more important, especially the first few sentences.

 Be personal - Let people know your values and passions.

 Spell Check – Take special care to ensure you have no errors. People DO notice.

 Grammar Check – An incorrect word or odd turn of phrase can be off-putting and distracting from your message.

Make sure your LinkedIn profile makes sense.Your goal should be to help the reader decide.

                      LinkedIn Company Page

LinkedIn is an extremely useful tool for recruiting, job hunting and networking. Now with Company Pages, LinkedIn can also be used as a powerful tool and enhancement to your content marketing plan.To begin creating a Company Page you will need a valid email address with your company domain.

-Log into LinkedIn and click on Companies.

-Click the Add a Company link

-Fill in your company name and your email address at the company.

-Click the box that verifies you as an official representative of the company.

Once you’ve signed in, LinkedIn will redirect you to an editable version of your new company profile.

After  you have created your Company Page, start with the basics. Begin filling out all essential information, including: company name, description, your company’s website URL, specialties, products/services, industry, type, date founded, and your headquarters addresses.The unpublished character limit for a LinkedIn company description is 1500 characters.

Your LinkedIn Company Page is another place where use of search engine keywords and phrases is important. When filling out your description, specialties and products and services use the same keywords you use for your website.

Your logo is already an essential element of your brand and as you need it on all other branding materials, you need it on your LinkedIn Company Page too!.

LinkedIn asks you to upload a cover image.Upload a 646x219 image in the “Image” section – this is an image that will appear in the header area of your LinkedIn Company Page.

In the right column, fill out Company Type, Company Size, Company Website URL, Main Company Industry, Company Operating Status, Year Founded, and Company Locations.

Add Employees as Administrators all or add a select few. It depends on who you want to be able to access or edit your Company Page.

Click Publish when you are done.

                                                LinkedIn Ads

If you are managing LinkedIn Ads for a business you will need to create a “Business Account”.

Creating a business account it's easy. It’s hidden under the drop down of your name in the top right hand side of your screen.

You must to know your target demographic and decide if you are going to direct traffic back to LinkedIn company page, or to your website.

What you Must Know:

1.Minimum CpC of $2.00

2.Up to 15 Ads per campaign

3.10 Targets Per Campaign for: Geography, Industry, Job Function

4.100 targets per campaign for Company, Job Title, School, Skill, Group

5.Minimum Daily Budget $10 or $300 per month

6.Targeting Options Include: Job title, job function, industry, geography, company size, company name, seniority, age, gender, LinkedIn group

7.Ad Copy: Image: 50×50; Headline: 25 characters; Body: 75 characters

8.Ad Targeting is at Campaign Level– Segmentation is key.

9.If you have poor ctr, your ads will stop showing so always be optimizing.

10.Start Bids high. Bid $1-$2 higher than suggested bids in the beginning to help increase CTR and then widdle them down.

You'll then be asked if you want to show your ads on the LinkedIn Audience Network. This means that when your targets visit other sites that are members of the LinkedIn network, they will be served with your LinkedIn ad. This is a good option to choose since your targets will have more opportunities to click through to your site even when they aren't on LinkedIn.

LinkedIn will provide you with reports on how your ads have performed. Pick your best ones and use them as templates for new variations, and continue your trial until you feel that your campaign is ready to go.

If you've been staying away from online advertising specifically because you can't target your customers of choice in a B2B environment, LinkedIn ads are definitely worth checking out, especially since the price of entry is initially low for purposes of designing a proper campaign.

                                           LinkedIn groups

LinkedIn Groups provide a place for professionals in the same industry or with similar interests to share content, find answers, post and view jobs, make business contacts, and establish themselves as industry experts.

To create a group:

• 1. Move your cursor over Interests at the top of your homepage and select Groups.

  2. Click the Create a group button on the right.

  3. Fill in the requested information. A red asterisk means it's required.

  4. Click the Create.. button to create your group as an open group or a members-only group.

Inviting People to Join Group or Subgroup

If you're a group manager, you can invite others from the Send Invitations page within the group.

• 1. Move your cursor over Interests at the top of your homepage and select Groups.

  2. Click the group's name.

  3. Click the Manage tab.

  4. Click Send Invitations on the left and then do any of the following:

  5. -Type a connection's first or last name in the Connections field, and select their name from the list.

  6. -Click the address book icon to choose connections.

  7. -Click the "Add other email addresses" link and enter email addresses of contacts.

  8. -Click the "Upload a file" link to upload a file after exporting a CSV file.

  9. -Click Send Invitations.

As a group owner or manager, you have several options for approving members for your group or subgroup.

• 1. Auto-Join:

  2. Sending an Invitation:

  3. Pre-approval:

  4. Manual approval of all other member requests to join:

Looking to drive traffic to your blog or company website?  LinkedIn group is a great way to do this.   Some ways you can drive traffic to your site from your group:

• 1. Put your website link in the group profile

  2. Add the site RSS feed to the News Section

  3. Send a weekly message to you group, and include a niche related article from your site

  4. Add your site in the group welcome message (more on this below)

  5. Create a discussion and include your link

Creating Sub Groups

Want to target people in various locations around the world, or sub niches within a niche?  LinkedIn allows you to create up to 10 subgroups.  It’s a great way to throw events all around the country.

When you are part of a subgroup, you use the Share box to post links, create polls or start discussions. You can follow discussions in your subgroup by clicking on the subgroup title and looking at the discussion carousal below your picture. You can move back and forth through discussions by clicking on the arrow keys on each side of the discussion carousel. You can leave comments on the discussion or click the “Like” button to indicate preferences.

Subgroups allow you to focus specifically on part of a group you are interested in. Like groups, you get to communicate with key decision makers at specific companies or organizations or learn from their expertise. By contributing to a subgroup discussion, you can present yourself as a subject matter expert and lead discussions on topics of interest to you and your company.