LinkedIn has developed into one of the essential tools that anyone in the world of business should use to help promote their company. Every business owner should understand the most effective ways to use LinkedIn, and include it as one of the company’s primary marketing strategies. If you don’t know how to use LinkedIn effectively, then the power of more than 250 million members will not help you to grow your business and make it succeed and thrive.

LinkedIn, just like any other successful venue, is not a stagnant tool. It is ever changing, producing more ways to help business professionals and their companies promote themselves, find out what’s new in their field, and help others in their  industry.

Here are a few tips on the most effective ways to use LinkedIn to help market your business:

Don’t forget to cross promote the content from your LinkedIn Pages

Business professionals post things on their LinkedIn Pages frequently, but they may not think to also link it to their other social networking sites, their company websites, and their blogs. If you have accounts with not only LinkedIn, but with Facebook, Twitter, or Pinterest, you can get more ROI from your posts by cross linking them to each other. This means that many more people will potentially see your posts, and your business will get more exposure, which equals more brand advertising and more credibility for your company.

Be sure to use the LinkedIn Mobile Apps

Just about everyone seems to have a smart phone these days, if you don’t take advantage of that by using LinkedIn Mobile Apps, then you are missing out on about 40 percent of the potential prospective leads and customers. It is estimated that more than 40% of Internet traffic in the Unites States is conducted on mobile devices. Mobile apps and responsive websites are big nowadays because regular websites don’t usually load properly onto cell phones. If you are not using LinkedIn Mobile Apps along with your LinkedIn account, you won’t be able to reach mobile users.

Post relevant and useful information regularly

Another effective way to get the most out of your LinkedIn marketing strategy is to post relevant, and useful, information three times weekly, at a minimum, once a week. One of the worst things you can do is build your LinkedIn account and then let it lay dormant. If you go out of your way to find something new about your industry, and post that to your LinkedIn Pages, or help one of your contacts with a problem they posted about, or start a group discussion that helps build your brand credibility, then you are using LinkedIn properly. If you are not doing this, no one will know who you are, or what your business can do for them, and that doesn’t promote your brand, or get you potential leads and customers.

Content you put on your posts will be seen by everyone in your groups, and all of your contacts, so be sure what you post online is correct, valuable, and current. Be mindful that LinkedIn is a business related social site, for posting pictures from your time at the beach, or your daughter’s birthday party, use FaceBook, not LinkedIn. Posting valuable content to LinkedIn on a regular basis will help your company earn the trust of other LinkedIn members and will help you to find potential leads or customers.

Make Sure Your Profile is Complete

Keep your LinkedIn profile current, and complete. This is the first thing someone sees when they find you on LinkedIn, you only get one shot at your first impression, so you want it to be complete with current data on you and your company. Be sure to include what your company can do for your customers, don’t make it all about you. People who read your profile could be anything from potential customers to potential employees, or just other like-minded business people who want to connect with you and join your network.

Your profile needs to be written in a professional and businesslike manner, include a current photo of you in business attire. This will help people to put a face to the name, making it easier to see  your business as having a human element.

Join LinkedIn Groups

Be sure to take advantage of LinkedIn Groups. These are groups of business people who come together to discuss a topic that they all believe in, or a business niche that they all belong to. If you join groups in your industry you will learn more about what is going on in your field, and will grow your brand by participating in group discussions. You can also create your own group and invite other professionals to join it. Then you can be the one who leads the discussion, and if you provide quality content, this will also help your business become the “go to” expert in your business niche.

Using these tools available with your LinkedIn account will help you to use LinkedIn in the most effective way, maximizing your marketing efforts, and will help to make your company well-known and more profitable.