Michelle J Raymond shares her expertise on leveraging LinkedIn for business growth. She emphasises the importance of LinkedIn as a trusted platform and the need for businesses, both B2B and B2C, to have a presence on the platform. Michelle discusses the differences between personal profiles and company pages on LinkedIn and provides insights on managing multiple staff members’ profiles. She also highlights the importance of posting content on both personal profiles and company pages, as well as the value of different types of content, such as videos, articles, and newsletters. Michelle offers practical tips for reviving a dead LinkedIn company page and maximising its potential. She also encourages businesses to explore LinkedIn Live as a way to humanise their brand and build a community. In this conversation, Ben is inspired by Michelle J. Raymond to put more effort into their LinkedIn company page and do more live videos on LinkedIn. Michelle shares her expertise on LinkedIn and encourages listeners to bring their company pages and LinkedIn profiles back to life. Ben and Michelle plan to connect further in San Diego and improve their LinkedIn game in the future.
Takeaways
- LinkedIn is a trusted platform and a valuable tool for business growth.
- Both personal profiles and company pages are important on LinkedIn, and businesses should invest time and effort into both.
- Different types of content, such as videos, articles, and newsletters, can be effective on LinkedIn, and businesses should consider their audience’s preferences when choosing the format.
- Reviving a dead LinkedIn company page requires updating and optimising the page, posting regularly, and repurposing existing content.
- LinkedIn Live is a powerful tool for humanising a brand and building a community. Invest time and effort into improving your LinkedIn company page.
- Consider doing live videos on LinkedIn to engage with your audience.
Chapters
00:00 – Introduction and Background
03:07 – The Importance of LinkedIn for Business
06:33 – Using LinkedIn for B2B and B2C
10:15 – Personal Profile vs. Company Page on LinkedIn
13:18 – Managing Multiple Staff on LinkedIn
15:27 – Posting Content on Personal Profile vs. Company Page
17:47 – Publishing Company Videos on LinkedIn
19:30 – The Interplay Between Different Types of Content on LinkedIn
22:15 – The Longevity of Content on LinkedIn
24:06 – Reviving a Dead LinkedIn Company Page
26:11 – Overlooked Features of LinkedIn Company Pages
29:21 – Choosing the Right Format for Content on LinkedIn
32:44 – Reviving a Dead LinkedIn Company Page
36:02 – LinkedIn Live for Companies
42:24 – Inspiration to Improve LinkedIn Company Page
43:18 – Connecting and Learning from Michelle J. Raymond
43:44 – Closing Remarks
If you found this episode of value I’d love for you to reach out and let me know on Instagram @engage_ben or email podcast@engagevideomarketing.com
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Transcript of the Interview: ** Note: the following transcript was generated by AI and therefore may contain some errors and omissions.
Ben (00:00.631)
to one ready. Okay. Good night, Michelle. Welcome to the podcast.
Michelle J Raymond (00:05.25)
Thanks for having me on Ben. I’m excited to actually get on a podcast that’s hosted in Australia. So it’s a special one for me.
Ben (00:13.055)
Well, it’s an interesting story that, you know, we’re both Australian and we’re connecting here virtually, but we’re both in Australia and, but we’re actually in a couple of weeks time as of recording this podcast, we’re both going to be over and speaking at social media marketing world in San Diego and that’s how we connected. So when I saw your, your specialty, your area of expertise around LinkedIn company pages in particular, I was like, okay, I got to get you on the show because I need to figure it out for myself and I hope our listeners need to figure it out as well. So, thanks for being here kind of selfishly, I guess.
Michelle J Raymond (00:46.782)
It is my pleasure. And don’t worry, you are not alone. Most people haven’t figured it out. And some days I’m left scratching my head because the things that LinkedIn keep changing on the platform, they move at breakneck speed and, you know, I’m going to share as much as I can today, but yeah, looking forward to speaking in San Diego as well. That’s pretty exciting.
Ben (01:06.931)
Yeah, awesome. Well, well done. And yeah, I’m looking forward to your presentation as well. So anyway, let’s talk about you. So I did a little bit of an introduction to you there, like your bio, but tell me like, what got you into the world of LinkedIn? Why specialise in LinkedIn and, and how did you get here?
Michelle J Raymond (01:23.454)
Around nine years ago, I started a new job, which I got through LinkedIn. So everyone knows LinkedIn is the place where you upload basically your resume and you could go for jobs, you know, and we’re talking eight or nine years ago now, and I started a new job in a new industry and I was selling raw materials and ingredients into the beauty industry. So think about all those products you can’t pronounce on the back of your shampoo bottle. That’s what I would sell.
except the problem was I didn’t have any existing relationships in the industry. I didn’t even know how to pronounce most of the stuff. And ultimately I was starting a new industry with customers spread around Australia. And they said to me, Michelle, here’s 80 customers. Here’s 10,000 ingredients go and sell. And I was just left flabbergasted going, I don’t know how the maths adds up here. How am I meant to reach as many people as possible? So I went back to my boss and I said, look,
Can I put some content out on LinkedIn? He goes, what are you talking about, Michelle? And I said, well, I think he can post and do some stuff. And he said, is it free? And I went, yep. And he goes, I don’t care what you do, just go and sell. And so off I went, you know, I started to create content. Then I realised if you just create content, but don’t build a community, you’re effectively talking to yourself and vice versa. If you’ve got a community, you’ve got to do things to, you know, entertain them almost.
And so that’s what I did and I built the world’s most amazing community in that space that no one else was doing it. It was my way of standing out and fast forward six or so years. And I now teaching other people how to leverage LinkedIn to grow their business. So from where it started to where it is now, it’s been a lot of fun, but I think for business owners, it’s the place that you need to be.
Ben (03:07.307)
So when you talk about you built a community around, you know, these ingredients, right? This science, I guess, you know, what sort of community was it? And what sort of content were you putting out as well that brought people into that, what you call community?
Michelle J Raymond (03:24.378)
Straight away, Ben, I had to work out. I was never going to win sales against my competitors based on being the most technical expert. Like there’s no way I’d never started chemistry or science or did anything along those lines. So for me, I had a manufacturing background, so that’s the piece of the puzzle that I got. So when I got onto LinkedIn, I thought I’m going to do what I always love to do, which is help people and solve problems. That’s effectively what sales is for me.
So I thought, how can I be most helpful for the people that I wanted to connect with? And so I started to explore what are the new trends that were going on in the industry, like the beauty industry, skincare, haircare, all that stuff, heavily driven by trends. So I’d look around the world, find what was going on around the world and come back and post about that. And it was very simple. Sometimes it might be a link to a product. Sometimes it might’ve been a post that I’d write and I enjoy writing content. So I was having a bit of fun with that.
But to answer your question about who I was connecting with, I started with my customers first, you know, the ones I’d already worked with and this is what I encourage other people to do. And then I started to work my way out. So who else was in the industry that I wasn’t connected to that maybe I wouldn’t sell directly to, but maybe they were involved. And so that started to, maybe it was manufacturers, maybe it was people who weren’t necessarily formulating, but there might be the customer service team or the marketing team. Pretty much I was figuring,
How many people at the target companies could I possibly connect with? And I had a reason for that because you don’t know who knows who in a business, who has lunch together, who’s worked together for 10 years, who had fun at last year’s Christmas party, who swapped, you know, departments. And these are the kinds of things that off I went. And after I’d finished like the local stuff, I just went, how about I start looking internationally and I moved across and had a look at the people in New Zealand and
Off it went and you know, at one stage it ended up across the globe. I was the person on LinkedIn that spoke about this and it was really cool because it solved one of the biggest challenges that I had been, which was trying to get to decision makers. And at the same time as a sales rep, I was getting paid for, you know, and my KPIs were all about customer visits.
Michelle J Raymond (05:41.198)
At the same time, everybody on the other side didn’t want me to come and see them. They were moving away from wanting to deal with salespeople. I’ve seen that happen even more. How fun is this? I worked 20 minutes away from the Unilever site, so huge global brand. I could never get into that site here in Sydney, but I could reach the head of Unilever’s research and development in Europe and North America without too much trouble. I think that’s the lesson that I want to share with people today is…
It’s the place where decision makers are that you don’t have to bombard them with another email because no one needs another email and they can consume it at a time that works for them. And so it’s been a really interesting thing to go from someone who loves sales to now all of a sudden going, nobody wants to talk to salespeople. So what do we do? And yeah, I’d love to talk about that some more today.
Ben (06:33.095)
Yeah, absolutely. Well, great story. And I think there’s a lot that I want to unpack. And I do want to get into the tactics quite deeply into this episode. But let me just ask that, play the devil’s advocate here and ask you the question for that person out there who has kind of been ignoring LinkedIn for their business or particularly ignoring their company page. We’ll get to that as well shortly as well. But just generally, they’re looking at other platforms as their
as their content play. So what would you say to someone who’s, who’s been ignoring LinkedIn to this point, particularly now in 2024, because it is changing all the time.
Michelle J Raymond (07:10.826)
It absolutely is changing all the time. And even though it’s been around for 20 years, it really doesn’t have any real direct competition out there with the other social platforms and LinkedIn’s kind of like the uncool cousin to all of the other platforms doesn’t really jump on trends or fads. It’s not the place people are rushing to, but the reason you need to make it a part of your business strategy for marketing is that it is the number one trusted.
platform, it is the number one B2B platform where people go to do business. When you’re on LinkedIn, you’re in that frame of mind, professional frame of mind. Now that’s not saying that other platforms can’t be a part of this and you can’t be active on them. But for me personally, I look at it in Australia. There is literally 65% of decision makers have a LinkedIn profile. You are looking at.
roughly 48% of our population has a LinkedIn profile. We are one of the highest per capita users of LinkedIn in the world. And so I just have a philosophy, you go fishing where the fish are. The people you wanna do business with, they’re on LinkedIn. And so, you know, if everyone else is over on, you know, maybe other platforms like YouTube or Instagram or TikTok, and all your competitors are focused over there,
There’s a real, you know, a real big opportunity for them over on LinkedIn, just as much to reach the right people across all kinds of industries.
Ben (08:39.071)
Yeah, and as you say, particularly, you know, if you are in a B2B industry, it is the platform really to be making those connections. But what role do you think LinkedIn has if you are a B2C type business?
Michelle J Raymond (08:51.198)
I still think it has a big place, you know, a big player, sorry. I still think it has a big part to play. And yes, your target customers may not be on the platform. Although I would argue that if your audience is a professional person with budget, they’re on the platform and you could probably catch them at a time when they’re still scrolling socials. But for me, I think COVID was the prime example of why you need to be on LinkedIn and B2C.
Ben (09:08.661)
Yeah.
Michelle J Raymond (09:19.51)
Because what happened was the whole world blew up overnight. All of the traditional methods of doing things went out the window. So no more trade shows, no more going out and visiting people, that kind of stuff. But the other big issue that happened for B2C was the supply chain fell over from start to finish from manufacturing logistics all the way through. Now what happens if you need to find a backup partner in any of those areas? Maybe it’s a legal area.
You’re not going to go straight to TikTok and trust somebody immediately from that when you’re looking for someone, you know, within that supply chain. So it’s more than just finding your ideal customers, because bringing any business to life is more than your customers. It’s all the pieces in the background, all the other moving pieces, you know, like I said, logistics, legal supply chain, we need to have partners in that. And that’s why it’s just import, just as important for people in those spaces.
Ben (10:15.071)
Yeah, yeah, definitely. So LinkedIn is, there’s kind of two different ways to be present on LinkedIn, right? There’s the personal profile and then there’s the company page. Can you help us understand how you see the difference or the different uses of those if you are obviously a person in a business, whether you own it or not, but you also represent a company, right?
Michelle J Raymond (10:38.774)
Yeah, there is a difference. Even if you are a solopreneur or a small micro business, then there is a difference. Your personal brand is one thing, your company brand is another. So what we have on LinkedIn is we have our LinkedIn profiles where traditionally they were the upload your resume and off you went. But the opportunity for people running businesses is to take it beyond that. It’s almost like your 24 seven webpage, which you can, you know, it works for you.
when you’re asleep, when people are coming to look from all kinds of places. But ultimately you’ve got your LinkedIn profile, which is personal. And then a company page is how you set your business up. Now everyone should have one of both. That’s a non-negotiable for me. How much time and effort you put into both sides depends on how big the business is. So I would say if you’re a smaller business with just maybe yourself, then you’re going to focus most of that time on your personal profile. So the question becomes.
Why do I need a company page, Michelle? Why even bother? And the answer to that is try Googling your business name. What will happen is you’ll have your website typically comes up first, maybe a couple of other things, but your LinkedIn company page comes up in probably the first half a dozen results. Now, if someone’s doing their research, maybe you met them face to face. Maybe they’re thinking about doing business with your company, but they’ll do their own research in the background. And that’s what we know buyers are doing today.
Now they have two choices. If they see your LinkedIn company page, LinkedIn’s a trusted platform. So by association, the company page is trusted. They come across, what are they going to find? Red carpet rolled out or a ghost town. And that’s the choice. And I’ve seen too many examples where people come across a LinkedIn, don’t find anything and it really lets that team, you know, kind of down. So don’t ignore it. It can be used to make a small business seem bigger and more legitimate, not just
a side hobby, you know, for some of your clients that you work with, people might think, Oh, it’s just, you know, someone with a camera does it in their bedroom and they’re not really a real business, but this can really legitimise that and make it, you know, just that bit more professional.
Ben (12:48.735)
Yeah. So with larger companies as well, you’ve often got many people who have active LinkedIn profiles, but they’re part of a company, they’re representing a company. So sometimes I think that comes with challenges, right? Because you want people to go out and be themselves, build a personal brand around their expertise, but you also want them to represent the company. So where do you think those larger companies with multiple staff active on LinkedIn, how can they manage that?
that kind of challenge, I guess, between who are you representing online and how is your online profile representing the company?
Michelle J Raymond (13:27.138)
That is the million dollar question that I think a lot of business owners right now are struggling with. On one hand, they see the benefits. On the other hand, if I had a dollar for every business owner that said, but Michelle, if I get my team active, my best people will get poached. The competitors will come after them. They’ll know how good they are and they’ll go and see them. And I have been that person that I got opportunities because I was building my personal brand.
Ben (13:43.135)
Hmm.
Michelle J Raymond (13:53.246)
And the thing is people will come and go, but I don’t think that they’re ever going to leave just because of that. You know, there’ll be other things. So this is where I think the dynamic is shifting right now where businesses have to come from a place of trust and you have to use the business brand to help build up the personal brands, employee advocacy, traditionally, when we talk about it is how do you get those employees to just talk about the company all the time and it’s not very inspiring for the employee.
And I don’t think it’s very effective because it feels like it’s not genuine. So how do we find the shift where we trust our employees? And a lot of that comes down to having clear policies upfront, having ongoing conversations and training and putting up some guard rails with people. We don’t want to just let them go free for all. But at the same time, it’s their personal profile, you know, at the end of the day, it’s not yours, you have no control over it.
So I think the thing is education and support and checking in and just making those resources available and not just saying, you know what, it’s that person in marketing, it’s their job. It’s not my problem. No, this starts from the leaders and works all the way down. So, but I think it’s a conundrum that’s going to be around for a little while longer, I don’t think there’s an easy solution, but I think when you start investing in things like structures and teamwork around this and making it.
A real thing where there’s people are rewarded for the effort that they put in, not just, can you go and do this just because you work here? Like, come on. They, those days are long gone.
Ben (15:27.7)
So I think that naturally leads into the question around, and it’s something that I’ve struggled with as well, and even as I’m the business owner of my company, but I also have a personal brand I’m building through LinkedIn, when I’m creating content, or if one of my team are creating content, should that content be posted on our company page, or should it be posted on the profile page, whether I’m the owner of the business or not? Like, how do you make that decision?
Michelle J Raymond (15:56.238)
But the fact is as individuals, we’ve probably got far more connections than what company pages do. And the reality is on LinkedIn right now, if you did exactly the same post on a company page versus a personal profile, you are going to get that post seen by far more people on the personal profile. That’s just the nature of the platform right now. So it comes back to what are the goals? What are the resources that you have and how much time can you spend in both?
My advice is as much as I love company pages and they’re an important piece of the puzzle, if it’s a couple of people in the business, you’re going to spend more time over on your personal profiles and building that personal brand just because it’s going to give you a better return on the time and resources you invest, but you need to keep the company page ticking over. And again, that’s in case people change, people come and go, that’s part of life. But also again, just, you don’t want to.
Let the company brand slip and just focus all on people. And I think it’s all about that balance. And the good part is it can be the little things like as a personal post, you tag the company page. It could be as a personal post, you use some of the company’s branding and colours. And that can be helpful to really build both of the marks. So it’s not about one’s necessarily better than the other. They just work differently and depending on your goals and resources is how much time you’ll spend in each.
Ben (17:22.511)
Yeah. So Michelle, when I’m consulting with our clients on their video strategy, so we’ve created a video for them. It’s intended to be published on LinkedIn as a LinkedIn video, importantly, not just uploaded as a YouTube link on LinkedIn. So we’re uploading it to LinkedIn. And what I’m usually saying for companies who are creating a video which is a
company video, right, a brand video, not a personal brand type video. I’d suggest that they would publish it on their LinkedIn company page, but then have their key employees or their owners to share that.
Michelle J Raymond (17:59.566)
Well, sorry, I just missed a piece. Like it just froze for a second. So when you’re, I got to the, when you’re creating videos. Sorry.
Ben (18:04.392)
Okay, no worries.
Ben (18:08.687)
What we might do, there’s a couple of little bits dropping out. I might flick it into what they call low data mode here, which means the video live feed will drop out, but we’re still recording video. So you won’t see me, but you’re still being recorded. Okay, you’re good. You still hear me?
Michelle J Raymond (18:13.602)
Okay.
Michelle J Raymond (18:18.59)
Okay, perfect.
Ben (18:28.139)
Can you still hear me? Oh, okay. Okay, cool. So the video is still recording. We’ll edit this. That’s why I put a clap in there. I’ll kind of ask the question again, okay? So that it cuts together.
Michelle J Raymond (18:30.159)
I can, that’s cool.
Michelle J Raymond (18:33.952)
Excellent.
Michelle J Raymond (18:38.462)
Yeah, perfect. Thank you.
Ben (18:43.647)
I can’t remember how I started it, but anyway. Yeah. Okay. All right. Perfect. So I want to run something by you, Michelle, then, because when I’m creating video content for our clients and when I’m consulting with them on the strategy behind that video content, usually what I’m suggesting to them, particularly if it’s a video that was created for the company, like a brand video or something like that, right? And we’re publishing it directly on LinkedIn.
Michelle J Raymond (18:44.822)
when you’re creating videos for brands and you’re uploading it to LinkedIn.
Ben (19:10.151)
And I’m suggesting that they publish it to their company page, but then have key members of their team who are active on LinkedIn to share that content or repost that content with some additional dialogue or thoughts around that content to their personal feed. Right. Does that make sense to you? Is that kind of the way you would recommend doing that as well?
Michelle J Raymond (19:30.062)
Yeah, look, and ultimately we’ve got to have a look at what is that video about? And then what’s the way that we can get that seen by as many people. So the way the LinkedIn algorithm kind of works these days is it rewards conversations. So if you can get as many people commenting over on that post, that’s a good thing, right? So that’s our first, you know, big tick. And that’s always what we’re striving for. So if you want your posts seen by more people, we need more comments.
And how do you do that? Start conversations, ask questions around whatever that video was and get people involved, having your team come across and start that conversation. I liken it Ben to when you go to a wedding and everyone’s having a great day, probably a few drinks in, and there’s a dance floor in the middle. That’s always empty. The music can be good, but until that first person gets up and goes out there and starts dancing, everybody else just sits back and watches.
And this is why it’s important to get your team to come over and comment first. They get up first and then everybody else can follow. Cause no one wants to go first. That’s the simple answer. LinkedIn also give us some other tools, which is something called repost. So similar to like a retweet over on Twitter or things along those lines. And ultimately you could get your staff to come across and hit repost and they can add their own thoughts, which is one option, or just hit repost in general. Now.
Do they work as effectively? No, they don’t. Um, is it always going to be better if they post themselves? Do you need to worry that there’s multiple copies of that video showing up in all different places? Absolutely not. A lot of the research that the B2B Institute has shown is basically if you pick one day and everyone posts that same thing on the same day, it’s like the big bang effect and it is more powerful than just little pieces over spread out and people have a concern.
Well, I’m sure what happens if somebody’s already seen the company page post and then my employee or, you know, bend yourself, you’re posting exactly the same thing, won’t like people be annoyed. And the thing is not really the chances of the same people seeing the same thing are pretty low. And the other thing is we just know on LinkedIn, if we see the same thing, we just scroll on by and we kind of shrug it off and go, it’s just LinkedIn. The
Michelle J Raymond (21:49.834)
Worst kind of thing that can happen to us on LinkedIn is somebody scrolling by and not stopping and looking at whatever the video content was that we paid. So it’s always about how do you get them to stop scrolling and click? And if they see it coming from yourself or one of your team, it’s more likely to happen than the company page, but think of the company page as a destination. It’s like your greatest hits library. And we want to make sure that those kinds of things are included.
Ben (22:15.411)
Yeah, and I think when you consider the longevity of content within the algorithm on LinkedIn as opposed to some other platforms, for example, where the post can pretty much just disappear unless you go hunting it down via a page profile and so on. But on LinkedIn, I see that content can be refreshed, resurfaced just by adding further comment down the line. Even a week or two after posting it, you can continue to kind of push it in the news feed.
Is that what you see as well?
Michelle J Raymond (22:46.782)
Yeah, you can get 48 to 72 hours. I would say is about the average up to two weeks. Things will still keep popping up and keep coming around depending how popular the conversation is. And again, that’s the comments that are going on. So it’s really important if someone comments on your posts, that you respond to those comments pretty quickly. And as I say, always keep trying to ask as many questions to keep that conversation going. So I, you know, an example this week, you know, some of the different formats on LinkedIn, for instance.
Articles and newsletters are indexed by Google. I had someone comment on an article that I wrote on LinkedIn, which I even forgot about three years ago this week. I was like, that’s a new record. That is kind of crazy. When I think about it at another one from two years ago, and this is why, even though, for instance, articles and newsletters, well, articles before they wouldn’t go as far as a normal post, but it’s still travelling a couple of years later, which is.
just mind blowing to think about. I had to go back and go, what did I write back then? I was a bit worried for a minute because I’ve come a long way since then, but turns out the advice is still good.
Ben (23:54.587)
Yeah. Well, I mean, that kind of brings up another thing that, you know, there are different types of content or media to be posting on LinkedIn. And obviously here at this podcast, we believe in the power of video content.
Michelle J Raymond (24:05.014)
No, it’s gone weird again. Sorry. Sorry, Ben. It cut out at, it brings up, yeah, cut out for some reason at, it brings up another thing that you wanted to bring up.
Ben (24:09.396)
That’s okay. You got me?
Ben (24:19.419)
I’ll try asking the question again and we’ll see if we can make it work this time. No, I don’t know what’s going on. Something weird with the internet. Hopefully it’s not on our end. But anyway.
Michelle J Raymond (24:22.006)
Thanks. Sorry.
Michelle J Raymond (24:31.318)
Don’t want to check.
Ben (24:34.589)
Um, I don’t know.
Michelle J Raymond (24:37.878)
Let me just, sorry, while we’re.
Ben (24:41.811)
I can do a quick speed test here and see if I’ve got some issues.
Michelle J Raymond (24:44.094)
Mine’s sitting at over 100 for speed and the other downloads is okay. Anyway, we’ll keep going.
Ben (24:52.555)
I’m just having a quick look on my end too.
Ben (24:59.699)
Yeah, it looks pretty solid here. 150 down.
Michelle J Raymond (25:06.742)
Weird. I’ve got everything else shut off. I don’t have anything else open.
Ben (25:18.115)
Sorry, I’m just doing a quick check of what else. It does, that’s the benefit of it, yeah. So it should be fine, it’s just we’ve got to be able to hear each other so that we know what we’re asking. Okay, if it drops out, just ask me to ask the question again. Okay, cool. Let’s keep going. So, Michelle, that brings up another thought here, and obviously on LinkedIn the ways that you can post content is there’s multiple media formats, right? So here in…
Michelle J Raymond (25:19.094)
this record locally as well? Yeah. Okay.
Michelle J Raymond (25:31.339)
Okay, perfect.
Ben (25:46.951)
engage video marketing, we focus on video content and believe in the power of that. But LinkedIn, there’s a lot of value to the written word on there. There’s articles on there. There’s newsletters that you can post periodically and obviously photos and so on. So how do you see the different interplay between different types of content being posted? Do you see, is there one better than the other in your mind?
Michelle J Raymond (26:11.53)
If you’d asked me two years ago, I would have said polls, go hard on polls. You could post what’s your favourite kind of chocolate and get 50,000 impressions. It was crazy. It, it was out of control. And then last year, what we ended up with was carousel sliders. So the PDF documents that you slide across and people were going up to like 50 odd slides, it was well beyond my attention span. And so that was something that was really popular.
Ben (26:20.079)
Yeah, they were everywhere, yeah.
Ben (26:30.324)
Hmm.
Michelle J Raymond (26:40.31)
I think what we’ve seen LinkedIn did a bit of a change to their algorithm mid last year and they’re, they say that they’re rewarding knowledge and advice. So speak to one audience on one topic and generate a conversation. That’s as simple as the algorithm is. I kind of look at it from a different perspective and say, what does your audience want and in what kind of formats do they want? And so for me, there’s a reason as a learner, if I look at my own style,
If you asked me to learn by listening to a podcast, I would go to sleep. I also host two podcasts. If you asked me to learn via YouTube, I get really frustrated, but I have a great YouTube channel. If you asked me to write, I enjoy writing and learning by that. Hence why I’ve written a couple of books on LinkedIn. But the point I want to make is everybody learns differently. And I think the right answer is to have a mix of everything. You’ll always have a dominant style.
Ben (27:12.567)
I’m gonna go to bed.
Michelle J Raymond (27:34.946)
for you and your clients is going to be video for sure. And how do you reuse that in interesting ways? So it might be sometimes sharing a link to the full video over on YouTube. It might be a short clip. It might be a 10 minute section that goes into things a little bit deeper. You might want to jump on a LinkedIn live. I think the idea is to go, how can I be of service to my audience? How do I get that message across? And how do I make sure it’s useful for someone else? Because at the end of the day, we’re trading.
their time and attention for the message that we’re putting out there. So I think the right answer is to mix it up. And if you’re just starting out and not sure which one to do, I say, start with your favourite. If text only is what you think is easiest for you to get done, which is how I started because I, I absolutely suck at graphic design or anything creative along those lines. And so for me, just writing texts was it.
Sometimes I shared links to articles over, you know, that I discovered on the internet somewhere and wrote my thoughts on it. Whatever the thing is that will help you start there and then experiment with these other formats as we go on. For your clients, they might have lots of video content that they’ve already created, that’s sitting in a file somewhere online, gathering dust, and I say, bring it out and repurpose it. It doesn’t matter how old it is, you know, a lot of content’s evergreen and will show off your skills and your message just as much. So.
You know, whatever the place is that you’re most comfortable with, start there and then look forward to mixing it. Cause I don’t like to give people the green light to say, well, Michelle said, do my favourite and I never want to be on video, so I’m just going to do text only. No, this is not your excuse not to try new things. Um, I think it’s important to have a go at it all.
Ben (29:21.731)
Yeah, and I love the framing you put there around, but it’s also about how your audience wants to consume the content from you as well. So, particularly if you think about whatever message that you wanna communicate, whatever you wanna teach, whatever you wanna share, what is the right format for this content? If video is the answer, then probably you should make it into a video. If it’s a thing that’s better shared in a longer form article, then do that. If it’s…
better shown visually, post an image. So think about what is the best form of content for the message and for my audience. I think it’s a really good filter and way to think about that.
Michelle J Raymond (30:01.918)
Yeah. And when you’re always focused on why you creating it and who are you creating it for, like you do with your clients, all the strategy behind things, then the format choice becomes obvious. You know, you don’t have to overthink that. And I think a lot of people get analysis paralysis, trying to think, should I do this or this or this in the world of social media, you know, we have a saying, you know, done is better than perfect. So for all the perfectionists that might be listening, it is better to have something out there that is.
you know, pretty good rather than the best ideas stuck in your head.
Ben (30:35.335)
Yeah, I love that, done is better than perfect. So speaking of perfect, well, in fact, speaking of not very perfect, probably many of the listeners of this show like me probably thinking that their LinkedIn company page needs a bit of work. You got me?
Michelle J Raymond (30:49.142)
No, it’s gone again.
Michelle J Raymond (30:53.578)
One moment. No, you’re back now, you’re back now, sorry. It’s every time you ask a question, so.
Ben (30:55.125)
One moment.
Okay, I’m back. All right. Yeah, I know, it’s great. And you need to hear the questions. Okay. You’re like, just talk about whatever. Okay. All right. Got a bit of work to tidy this one up, but we’ll get there. Okay. I love that done is better than perfect. And speaking of perfect, in fact, speaking of less than perfect,
Michelle J Raymond (31:04.61)
Go for it. Yeah, they’re pretty helpful.
Ben (31:23.467)
Probably many of the listeners of this show, like me, are feeling that their company page on LinkedIn is less than perfect for, you know, I would say it’s probably something that is a little bit dead on my end.
Michelle J Raymond (31:33.372)
Our notes dropped again.
Michelle J Raymond (31:37.506)
Hello?
Ben (31:39.195)
Hello? You got me?
Michelle J Raymond (31:41.39)
Hello, hello. I have again now, but it got as far as less than perfect. So bizarre. Yeah, I do. I’m chomping at the bit to answer for you, but I just need the last bit. Exactly.
Ben (31:48.079)
Okay, so you kind of know where I’m going with this. I’ll try one more time. Well, you’ve got a bit of time to think about it. Okay, so I’ll ask the question again, just so it flows and hopefully it doesn’t drop out. But if it does, you can just start answering the question about how to revive a dead LinkedIn company page. Does that make sense? That’s where I’m going with it. Okay, very good.
Michelle J Raymond (32:10.958)
Okay, perfect. That’s where you’re going. Yep, yep.
Ben (32:16.355)
I’ll ask the question and see if it flows through. Okay. Done is better than perfect. I love that. And speaking of perfect, well, probably speaking of less than perfect in my case, and probably many of the listeners at this show as well, feel that their company page on LinkedIn is less than perfect. In fact, ours is probably almost a little bit dead. We don’t get a lot of traction. We do post content on there periodically, but it seems to go nowhere. So what can I do? How can we revive a dead?
possibly dead company page on LinkedIn.
Michelle J Raymond (32:47.286)
If it’s any consolation, I am a specialist in reviving flatlined company pages. So I come across them all the time and it’s not unusual for people to have a company page that kind of just sits there gathering dust. So what would I do to start her up again? First thing that I want you to do is go back and on the left-hand side, when you’re in page admin view, there’s a button called edit page. It’s in the menu. You’re going to go through there and you’re going to make sure that your page has been set up properly.
And what I mean by that is make sure that there’s no missing information. The details are all correct. And it really reflects your business as it is now. The reward that I’ll give you for doing that is LinkedIn tells us pages that are 100% complete, give us up to 30% more weekly impressions. They would also say, if you post it at least once a week, then you can also increase those impressions, right? So we can’t just disappear and then say the page doesn’t work. We have to put some love into it.
Ben (33:34.046)
Okay.
Michelle J Raymond (33:46.05)
So how much love would we put into it? One post a week is fine if you are only like a micro business, it’s just yourself or maybe it’s like someone else, just start off with keeping it ticking over. And you heard me talk about the greatest hits library before, which is how I want you to frame the company page from now on. So it is not going to be the place that’s gonna generate millions of impressions, but when someone wants information, they’re gonna come across there.
Now I call it the greatest hits library because I’m going to show my age. So I’m, I’m 47 now, but I used to save up when I was younger to buy CDs and you would buy the normal CD and there’d be three good songs and probably 15 ones that were rubbish. And then every now and then when an artist got big enough, you got the greatest hits library, which was as someone said to me, all killer and no filler. So what I want you to do with your company page is take that approach where you’re not just putting stuff there and, you know, just
dumping it there just to keep it ticking over, just put the good bits on there. So if someone’s doing their research, they find the best of your company, spend the rest of your time putting it over on your personal brand and growing that if you’re a much bigger business and you’ve got more resources, then I’d love for you to be posting three times a week. But I would say for most people, the strategy with how you can keep up with this content.
is repurpose probably the huge volume of content that most of us have got sitting around that we’ve already created. It doesn’t need to be brand new. And I think that’s where you can take away some of the stress and overwhelm. Most people when they come to me like, I can’t keep up Michelle, like how do you do it all? And you know, if you create long form videos, they are perfect for then repurposing into shorter clips or like you said, turning them into blog articles or posts.
There’s so much content and so many different ways you can take a longer video and bring that back down so that would be my advice keep it ticking over and Just show it a bit of love and just if you don’t compare it to your personal profile and just say you know what? It’s not here to do that. It’s not going to work the same I’m going to treat it differently then it becomes a whole different prospect So hopefully that will help you get yours started as well, but a CPR for the company page
Ben (36:02.355)
Yeah, that’s awesome. So when you think about the personal profile on LinkedIn, there’s quite a number of features that you can set up and add to your personal profile. I feel that the company page features are pretty limited, but are there some things there that many people don’t do or overlook or forget to set up properly?
Michelle J Raymond (36:20.942)
Absolutely. And the problem has been up until about three or four years ago, LinkedIn themselves, I think almost forgot about company pages, you know, and that sounds crazy given the being around for 20 years, like LinkedIn’s not new. But what happened was with COVID, all of a sudden, everybody took their ad spend and brought it over to LinkedIn because that’s where everyone was. It was like the gold rush for LinkedIn themselves. And so they were cashed up. Why does this matter? Because you need a company page to run ads.
Ben (36:28.288)
Yeah.
Michelle J Raymond (36:50.814)
Now the team at the time when I started talking about company pages, so I set my business up four years ago, there was about four or five of them. There’s now about 45 of them in the company pages team. So LinkedIn’s company page team, it sounds silly, but they’re just getting started. And we have seen so many new features. For instance, I had to rewrite, I co-authored the world’s first and only book dedicated to company pages.
And we did that in 2021 and we had to update it and do the second edition and release that just at the end of 2023, because so many new features had come through if I was, you know, starting out on a company page and I had to pick two things, which I think should be like part of your program that would be linked in lives and LinkedIn newsletters. And the reason LinkedIn newsletters is because they’re the ultimate tool for repurposing and you can build up subscribers.
So I love using it to talk about my latest podcast episodes or my YouTube videos. And I bring that across and you can embed them in the newsletter. And then they’re indexed by Google and you just get this really great circle where people get notified every time you put one out and it helps drive people and take actions in other places. LinkedIn lives, my favourite form of video on the platform but it’s a much more casual and again can be repurposed. So.
for your clients that you’re working with, Ben, they might create longer form videos off LinkedIn. That’s totally fine, but make sure you’re repurposing, get value for money out of the time and effort that you’re putting into making these videos and really stretch it as far as you can. And you just be surprised at just how many different ways that you can use these things.
Ben (38:35.231)
Yeah, so you mentioned LinkedIn Lives there, and I think that’s something that I definitely see people overlooking in many cases, maybe because of the fear of going live. But how do you think a company should think about LinkedIn Lives? Should they just find one spokesperson to be the face of their lives, or should they go a bit more varied than that? What are your quick thoughts on LinkedIn Live for companies?
Michelle J Raymond (38:58.862)
I’ve kind of seen both work. I’ve seen where we’ve got a consistent show time with consistent people showing up every week. The guys at StreamYard who obviously run a hosting system, they’ve done a live every Sunday for the last three years, I think it’s been. Now why it works, we always know to look out for it. It becomes like your favourite TV show. You know what kind of format, but for them, why are they doing it? You get that interaction with your audience. You get.
You know, their format is you can give feedback on features. Like they’ve got that instant, you know, communication with the users of their product and I don’t care what kind of product or service that you have. Building a brand community is really important. And we’re seeing that, you know, we’ve gone away from different forms of marketing, you know, it used to be try, you know, try and reach as many people as possible, then it was all targeted, you know, e-commerce certainly, you know, nailed that one.
Now what we’re seeing is where do people hang out? Where does people hang out to talk about your brand and LinkedIn lives are a lot of fun. They don’t have to be, you know, I guess a lot of preparation can go into it. You can have ask me anything styles. I’ve seen people do game shows. I’ve seen people do comedy kind of stuff. I think have some fun with it over on LinkedIn is what my advice definitely is. I don’t want people to create LinkedIn content. I want them to create, you know, engaging content, creative content.
content that helps their audience get more from their products or services. But I kind of liken it to, you know, on the Wizard of Oz, when we pull the curtain back to see the wizard, that’s why you should have lots of your team members out there and on show so we can actually see, well, okay, Michelle’s company is called B2B Growth Code, but what’s going on behind the scenes that we want to know about. So, you know, and you’d be surprised, LinkedIn lives are a lot of fun. It’s where I started because I was petrified of making a five minute video.
for a digital marketing course I’d signed up for, which is hilarious now that I think about it, but I wouldn’t do the course because I wouldn’t make a five minute video and now I’m on LinkedIn lives weekly, once or twice a week for the last few years. So they’re really quite a fun way to start.
Ben (41:09.387)
Yeah, I love that. And I love, you know, the power of going live when you get over that fear is it does humanise the relationships that you’re building around your business, you know. You just have to be real and human when you’re on a live because you can’t be polished and perfect. And, you know, I think making that part of a strategy is a fantastic way to just let your people be people. And people buy from people, don’t they, Michelle?
Michelle J Raymond (41:34.926)
Important points people do buy from people and you know, it takes that pressure away. And the thing is by doing that, not everybody is embracing it. So it’s an immediate way that your brand can stand out and it does not matter the size of your business. No one’s looking going, Oh, that’s a LinkedIn live. And there’s only two people in that business. No, they go, that’s quality. I’ve learned something or I’ve been educated or entertained, whatever, you know, the goal is for the show.
but ultimately you’re starting to build community and that’s powerful and that’s where the money comes from. Maybe not directly working with those people, but there’s certainly going to be people that refer your business on to other people when they’re having conversations. And that’s what we call dark social. It’s those conversations that we don’t know about that are happening, not just directly what happens during the live.
Ben (42:24.195)
Yeah, I love it. Michelle, you have absolutely inspired me to put some love and attention into our LinkedIn company page and to be honest, do more lives as well on LinkedIn. So hopefully inspired our listeners and viewers of this show as well. But if people want to learn more from you or follow more about what you teach and share around LinkedIn, where’s the best place for people to find you? I’m assuming LinkedIn.
Michelle J Raymond (42:48.67)
You guessed right. I am over on LinkedIn. So it’s Michelle J Raymond. So my initial is there to make it easier for you to find me because there’s so many Michelle Ramons on LinkedIn. So Michelle J Raymond, and if you prefer to learn via video, I have a YouTube channel at Michelle J Raymond that you can come and find me over there. You know, either way, I’d love to be connected with the community and, you know, continue this conversation to see if I can inspire some other people to bring their company pages and LinkedIn back to life.
Ben (43:18.407)
Love it. Well, if you’re listening and you’ve been inspired, make sure to connect to Michelle J. Raymond over on LinkedIn and let her know that you heard her here on the show. And Michelle, I’m looking forward to connect more with you in San Diego in a couple of weeks as of the time of this recording. And yeah, looking forward to upping our LinkedIn game in 2024.
Michelle J Raymond (43:38.422)
Excellent. Until then, yeah, I wish you all the best and looking forward to hearing you speak as well.
Ben (43:44.063)
Awesome, thanks. Okay, I think we got through it. Let me see. Hey, success. All right. That was a little bit weird, but anyway. See, now that we’re not recording, it all seems fine.
Michelle J Raymond (43:53.006)
There you go. So bizarre.
I have to, yeah, because I turn all my things off anyway.
I think it’s recording.
Ben (44:05.635)
Oh yeah, we are still recording. Yeah. But anyway, I don’t know.
