3 Content Tips to Increase our Visibility on LinkedIn

 I've missed a week posting my newsletter.

Last week was crazy and my task list got way out of control. I'm back now with some tips to help you increase your visibility on social media.

Please do go and try these tips on LinkedIn. Share them with your contacts and don't forget to subscribe to my email newsletter to get more tips like this

Make it simple

This connects to my other two points below but is more nuanced. Social Media isn't a place where we operate our full brain capacity. It's a place of distraction and mindless browsing. Social Media isn't making us smarter - it's an escape. 

This means you have to cater for your audience to understand that basic premise. Keep your sentences simple and short. Don't over-complicate things.

Write how you speak.

Most people are on their phones, so keep in mind, that paragraphs can be hard to follow on a small screen. 

That's why most people write in shorter sentences.

They also put paragraph spaces between lines.

Not because there is some secret algorithm benefit.

Just because it is easier to read.

Quick tip. There is a website called hemingwayapp.com where you can test your social content to see how easy it is to read. I always aim for Grade 4-6 to make my posts as easy as possible for people to consume.

Engagement Training

Nobody wants to be the first to like or comment. So, some posts can bounce along the bottom simply because you haven't trained your audience to engage with you.

Sounds stupid, I know, but people need to learn and create habits. If you want more visibility you need to make it easy for people to engage with you. 

I see some posts on LinkedIn that are just a touch to engage with. When I am trying to build relationships with people, I deliberately choose to engage with their content. Sometimes, I find it almost impossible, because they have made a post that doesn't require a reaction or a comment.

So, some simple tips, 

• Ask questions
• Ask for recommendations
• Use Polls
• Create comparison posts

These types of posts will help you train your target audience to engage with you. 

I remember when I was a kid, the newspapers would offer free holidays. Each day there would be a voucher printed into the paper. If you collected them all over a series of weeks, you could get a free holiday.

The newspaper had brokered deals to help UK holiday destinations fill their excess capacity, they wouldn't make any money on the accommodation, but they would capture the food and drink spend.

For the newspaper, this had a big benefit. It trained people to buy the paper daily over a period of time. It established a routine by leveraging this promotion.

Your role is the same. Make it easy to engage by offering simple ways people can like and comment. Over time, they will develop a habit of commenting and liking, this will result in higher visibility of your content in their feeds.

The Ten Second Rule

The Ten Second rule will massively improve the reach of your content. It goes like this... does your post convey a solid point in ten seconds. Not 3 seconds and not 40-seconds. The key to getting visibility on social media is dwell time. It's very difficult to get people's attention for a long time on social media. 

But 10-15 seconds is possible. So focus your posts to keep people for 10-seconds as a minimum. That sounds easy, but 10 seconds is longer than you think. Count it out.

The longer you try to hold people's attention, the more you will have to do to keep the content alive. Ten seconds could be a very simple post, but the point is made 2/3 way through the content. If you were aiming for 60 seconds, you would have to keep shaking things up to keep people's attention.

A practical tip is to break your content into sections

• Hook - Getting attention in the feed.
• Teaser - Holding attention in the caption/post copy for 3-4 seconds
• Substance - What you really want to say  4-5 Seconds
• Wrap Up - Summary 1-2 Seconds
• Call to Action - Action

This works on Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter - most of their algorithms will reward you with increased visibility if you can hold your audience for 10-15 seconds.

Being visible is important. You don't know who is seeing your content.

Most people quit and don't stick at it. Some of my best clients have come to me saying "I've been seeing your posts for a while now..." these are the easiest people to convert into paying clients.

Why? Because you've built trust, credibility and you've helped people see you can help them solve a problem. 

If you think of content on social media as an immediate ROI, you'll miss the big opportunity to build your brand and mass educate your audience on your value.