How to Become a LinkedIn Influencer in 2023

LinkedIn has over 875 million users across 200 countries.

Although the number is much lesser than social media giants like Instagram and Facebook, it’s still the marketer’s favourite B2B lead generation platform.

In fact, LinkedIn accounts for 80% of B2B leads generated by marketers.

Ya, LinkedIn is a dominator in the B2B sector!😉

You might have understood why becoming an influencer on LinkedIn is a significant step.

However, it’s more complex than it sounds.

Unlike Instagram or Facebook, LinkedIn targets businesses, jobs, and networking.

So influencing an educated audience involves a hell of work and some out-of-the-box techniques.

But firstly, you need to gain people’s trust by showing yourself as an expert in your field. How can you do it?

Here are nine proven steps you must follow to become an influencer on LinkedIn.

9 Easy Steps to Follow to Become a LinkedIn Influencer

#1. Set Clear Goals

Before you hop on to join the top 1% on LinkedIn, ask yourself,

Why am I here?

What do I want to do on this platform?

Creating content without defining your goals is fruitless. So, list all the things you want to achieve on LinkedIn.

For instance, if your goal is to market yourself and get more clients or solve problems and help people in your niche, make that goal explicit.

Knowing this helps create the right strategy for building a loyal community on LinkedIn.

#2. Create a Stunning Profile

A spectacular and attractive profile sets the tone of your personal brand. It’s the foremost thing people are going to notice about you. So make sure it captures their attention.

To begin with, use a professional photo with a catchy bio that reflects your personality and goals. As per research, profiles having decent pictures are likely to be viewed 14 times more than others.

Here’s an example of a top LinkedIn influencer profile, Ankur Warikoo.

Source: LinkedIn Page of Ankur Warikoo

Apart from the pictures, add your achievements and experience to your profile – even the most minor achievements.

#3. Content Strategy

Once you’re done with your bio, it’s time to focus on the content.

Amongst a growing LinkedIn user base, it’s essential to deliver value-driven content to stand out.

But what type of content should you create?

You can’t post about anything and get noticed. So, firstly discover your niche.

The most common mistake people make here is they wait for the Eureka moment.

However, finding your niche is a deliberate process. It takes time, effort, and experimentation to land on a precise topic you want to talk about.

What’s more, your content must be distinct and engaging.

After all, it’s a fight for attention. So, unless you’re a great storyteller, it’s difficult for you to stick out. Try taking up some storytelling courses to enhance your writing skills.

Not only text-based, but you can also use videos, GIFs, and other graphics to make it intriguing for the audience.

#4. Honest Engagements

Engaging with other people’s posts is vital to get started on LinkedIn. It’s a great way to interact with other influencers, eventually boosting your brand.

Doing so will likely make them engage with your posts too.

However, refrain from comments like

So good
I love this
Amazing

Also, don’t leave a comment for comment’s sake.

Instead, try to spark meaningful discussions on their posts. When you offer something valuable to them, they will reciprocate, and that’s the first step towards building a personal brand on LinkedIn.

To sum up, people appreciate kindness and authenticity. You only need to find the right mix to engage with others. This will make you even more gripping and encourage others to connect with you.

#5. Turn On the Creator Mode

If you want to be a LinkedIn influencer, you must activate the creator mode.

As the name suggests, it’s a LinkedIn feature that allows you to access several tools and analytics to create content and grow your followers.

The immediate benefit of creator mode is that LinkedIn optimises your profile to display your content. This boosts your visibility and the number of followers.

Here’s what else you get after you turn the creator mode on:

Access to LinkedIn creator tools like LinkedIn newsletters and LinkedIn live video
Can choose up to five different hashtags which show your followers the topics you focus on

The best part, it’s free to use. You can find it easily as you scroll down your bio and turn it on👇🏻

Note: To access LinkedIn’s newsletter and live video, you must have more than 150 followers or/and connections.

#6. Schedule Your Posts

After LinkedIn rolled out this new feature, you can schedule your posts a week or a month before and publish them correctly using automation.

Scheduling your content in advance saves you from last-minute tantrums and streamlines your workflow by publishing the right content at the right time.

This way, you can engage with your audience regularly, even if you’re visiting social media less frequently, and focus on other essential aspects.

#7. Consistency

Consistency is key to increasing your LinkedIn presence and creating a solid personal brand.

Being consistent on LinkedIn helps you to:

Have more opportunities to engage with your audience
Gain traffic organically
Establish yourself as a top voice on the platform

Posting regular content doesn’t mean you have to do it every day.

It would be best if you chalked out a plan based on your audience and capacity to do that. Otherwise, you might trade off consistency with mediocre content.

So, coming to the ways to do that:

Learn every small thing about your industry
Brainstorm a variety of ideas
Make a calendar to publish your content

#8. Cross-Channel Content Strategy

LinkedIn is good, but as an influencer, it’s better to expand your reach to other social media channels; this results in more exposure to a broader audience.

A cross-channel strategy is a powerful way to reach your business goals since it involves audiences of different social media channels.

In addition, multiple interactions of your brand with the targeted audience increase its familiarity among them. So they are more likely to connect with you.

Similarly, you can drive traffic and followers from other platforms to LinkedIn (If needed).

#9. Networking

LinkedIn is all about making meaningful connections. So if you know how to network with other people, you’re halfway there.

Although some of us have a knack for making friends in no time, it’s a challenging skill to be honed for most.

Here’s how to do that:

Practice value-driven engagement
Send a personalised note with connection requests
Learn the art of cold mailing
Join relevant groups

Networking might sound boring, but It can help you to:

Come across more business opportunities
Learn new things from other’s experiences and expertise
Establish long-lasting relationships apart from being professionals

Following LinkedIn, influencers are a great way to inspire yourself, learn from them, and get a hold of the industry you want to enter.

Moreover, you can connect with them and ask questions about their success and failures.

How to Become a LinkedIn Influencer in 2023