How To Leverage Content For Marketing And Social Selling Success

When people are only popular and not productive in the social selling world they’re losing business. That’s what LinkedIn & Branding Expert Viveka Von Rosen and I explored in our video interview. The first half of this interview starts with what NOT to do.

In this second half we discuss what you should be doing when it comes to creating content and conversations online: How to become “Productively Popular”.

There’s POPULARITY: Which means a lot of people know your name. But that doesn’t mean they’re becoming your clients.  There’s PRODUCTIVITY: Which means you’re growing your business. But that doesn’t mean you’re experiencing enough growth.

The gap between the two is the Know, Like & Trust factor. Viveka told me how to bridge that gap.

People get to KNOW you through content.

If your content helps them they’ll start to LIKE you.

As they interact with you over time TRUST is built and they can become clients.

CONTENT is the bridge over that gap to becoming Productively Popular.

3 Ways To Become Productively Popular

  1. Write quality CONTENT that creates quality ENGAGEMENT

Viveka shares these strategies to create it:

  1. Ask questions
  2. Add calls to action
  3. Encourage engagement

A great example is the always insightful sales trainer, Jeb Blount. One of his posts high amounts of comments and likes – with his target markets.  He gets paid for sales training so that’s what he writes about. Jeb encourages his audience to share their genius. That’s productively popular.

One of Viveka’s clients has landed multi-million-dollar deals from conversations that began on LinkedIn. He sells airplanes so he writes about the aviation industry.  He meticulously follows up to each comment. He invests time in building trust by creating ways for his readers to reach out and ask more questions.

“Social selling is about creating a space for ENGAGEMENT.

It’s NOT about Woo-hoo, I got 50,000 views!”

~Viveka Von Rosen, @LinkedInExpert

  1. Follow up to the comments PRODUCTIVELY

Make sure you’re responding to any leads that are in there.  Posting the content is the starting point for conversations. Following up afterward is crucial. Here are a couple tips from Viveka that you can apply immediately.

TIP 1: DO Reply to comments and say “I’m happy to answer any questions, it’s just easier to do if we’re connected on LinkedIn. Would you like to connect?”

TIP 2: DON’T invite everyone that comments. Connect ONLY IF they’re a good lead.  You need to know who your target market is and foster relationships with them or else chaos takes over.

  1. Create MEANINGFUL Online Interactions

Meaningful online interactions are communications that BOTH people consider to be important enough to follow up to with a phone call.  

By writing and sharing quality content you’re more likely to start quality conversations and attract new clients.  Discussing someone’s needs, understanding how you can help them and assisting them with solving their problems when possible will lead to more business for you in the long run.

CONNECT WITH VIVEKA!

Forbes listed Viveka as a top social media Influencer for 4 years in a row, and she has been cited in Entrepreneur, CNN, Forbes and more.

  • Viveka loves sharing her experiences through interviews; if an interview like this one would be helpful for your audience let her know!
  • If you know anyone that wants to create a better LinkedIn presence please let them know about her book LinkedIn: 101 Ways To Rock Your Personal Brand
  • Currently, she’s focusing on speaking and consulting about third-party tools like Nimble that can help you FIND, CONNECT and ENGAGE with people and convert your connections into clients. If you need help with that reach out.

Her phone number and email are on her LinkedIn profile.  Be sure to send a personal message and mention that you read this interview!