How Entrepreneurs Are Beating Major Brands on LinkedIn

Big brand status: what’s it worth? Not as much as you might think- at least not on LinkedIn. 

The spirit of entrepreneurship is all about pursuing new opportunities to achieve big success. That’s exactly what entrepreneurs are doing on social, and the rewards can be huge. They’re even beating major brands on LinkedIn, which, might seem unexpected at first, but actually makes a lot of sense. Entrepreneurs have all the ingredients for LinkedIn success. They just have to learn how to use them. 

So, how are entrepreneurs beating major brands on LinkedIn? 

Personal Branding

While big brands are all about business branding, entrepreneurs can focus on building their personal brand. A strong personal brand is going to boost credibility, especially when it’s authentic. Not only is LinkedIn a great way to build it, but personal branding can actually do better on LinkedIn than business branding. The reason for this is simple. 

People are more likely to invest in a relationship with a real person rather than a company. When users write comments, they want to know their opinions are being heard. When it comes to the DMs, they want to have meaningful conversations, where they can connect with other individuals. This is just something that major brand accounts cannot pull off. 

Building a personal brand on LinkedIn helps entrepreneurs to create a sustainable and valuable network. This plays a key role in future success. 

Being The In-Demand Expert

Entrepreneurs specialise in all sorts of fields. What’s important is that their LinkedIn content focuses on the problems that they, as an expert, can solve. In doing so, entrepreneurs can make their accounts relatable to their target audience, who are experiencing this very problem. This will drive engagement to their account. 

This target audience is also more likely to go to an entrepreneur for advice about these problems, because of personal branding. When entrepreneurs take the time to reply to comments and messages, they are showing the target audience that they are available. This will all establish the entrepreneur as the in-demand expert, making them the go-to person for the very issue that their product or service can solve.

Social Selling

Personal branding and being an in-demand expert are mutually beneficial to each other on Linkedin. To get the most out of the platform, entrepreneurs are using them as a robust inbound marketing strategy. They both establish familiarity and trust between the entrepreneur and their target audience. This is a valuable form of lead generation, which is an important part of inbound marketing and will have a much higher conversion to sales than cold pitching. 

This is social selling, and entrepreneurs are in the perfect position to be successful at it on LinkedIn. 

Entrepreneurs are not just beating major brands on LinkedIn in terms of networking and engagement but in sales, too. 

Their ability to be personable puts them at an advantage over major brands. They are able to engage with their audience on a different level, one that will boost their reputation amongst peers and target audiences alike. By employing social selling strategies, entrepreneurs are able to use their LinkedIn accounts to create a sustainable model for success.