What Is The Social Selling Index?

The LinkedIn Social Selling Index highlights your social selling performance. Initially, the tool was exclusive for members who opted for the premium service Sales Navigator. Now LinkedIn has opened this service up for anyone. Those who want to review their social selling performance. But… What exactly is the LinkedIn Social Selling Index? 

The Social Selling Index Explained

The SSI or Social Selling Index on LinkedIn calculates a salesperson’s social selling performance. It offers statistics to show how well the salesperson is performing in four separate fields of social selling. The higher your social selling score the better results the salesperson can receive on the platform. The index also shows you how you rank compared to others within your industry. LinkedIn breaks the index down to four main factors: Branding, Finding the right people, engaging and building relationships.

The Four Key Factors 

Establishing your professional brand

Building your brand on LinkedIn is based on how well you present yourself. Ensure you have a complete profile so everyone knows who you are, your experiences and your business. A Complete profile gives you more reach on the platform and your content will perform much better. Content is also a factor for improving your score, as it establishes your professional brand (as seen above in Orange). Posting highly engaging content, and commenting on well-performing posts all help improve your score. LinkedIn states that 92% of B2B buyers are more likely to engage with sales professionals if they are known industry thought leaders. 

Finding the right people

This factor is self-explanatory. If you’re searching for and connecting with the right people your social selling will improve. Connecting with people you have little to no interest in communicating with is time wasted. This social selling index also relates to how you use LinkedIn’s tools. If you use Sales Navigator, are you saving/ tagging leads and creating lists? Are you filtering your lists to seek out introductions? Most importantly are you taking advantage of who is actually looking at your profile? 

Engaging with insights 

Insights refer to your professional insight on topics you discuss.  Sharing value information with your connections and engaging in trending topics will help establish your credibility in your field. Generating discussions and passing on valuable information to your prospects is a great way to let them know you care about their success. If you become a trusted source of information more people will listen to what you have to say. 

Building relationships

Social selling is all about building relationships. As we mention time and time again at Maverrik, people buy from people. 87% of B2B buyers on LinkedIn stated they would have a favourable impression of a salesperson who was introduced to them through someone in their professional network. To many of us, our connections are important to us and their opinions play a vital role in our decision making at times. A large network benefits from the ability to find new prospects and open more doors. Focus on a large pool of decision-makers, build upon your relationships with them and continue to grow. That’s how to build this section within the SSI. 

Where is my SSI Score? 

Your Social Selling Index can be found at https://www.linkedin.com/sales/ssi. You don’t need a Sales Navigator subscription to check your score, all you need to do is log in to LinkedIn and follow the link. What you will see are all four of the main factors and how well you are performing in each. Make a note of what needs improvement and devise a strategy to raise the profile above those others in your industry. At the top right-hand corner of the page, you will find how well you perform alongside your connections and competitors. 

Some networks have a lower SSI score than others, this is due to the nature of their business. A software-based industry will have a lower score than a CEO of a marketing and sales business. 

How Can I improve my Social Selling Index Score?

You don’t need a perfect SSI score to make social selling work for you on LinkedIn. Gunning for the 100/100 score isn’t really the point of the Social Selling Index. It is designed to highlight areas for improvement. To provide valuable feedback on your journey with LinkedIn. To increase your SSI score on Linkedin review your activity on LinkedIn. Set out a plan and review if your changes have made a difference. Interact with your connections more. Join a few groups. Connect with ten people per day. Whatever the SSI highlights as a weak point, work to improve your daily activities to reflect that. 

The Social Selling Index is your guide to your activity on LinkedIn, so use it as a guide to where you can improve. Such as using LinkedIn’s latest features, or making sure to comment and connect with at least 5 people a day. You’ll soon see your activity and score increase when you become more active on the platform.