Social Networking through LinkedIn
Posted in PLM Files on April 1st, 2010 by Yvonne_PLM – 1 CommentI recently participated in a discussion about whether LinkedIn was useful for getting business, meaning real hard sales.
Here is what I said.
for me it is very clear…
1. Start the conversation
2. Build the relationship
3. Make the sale.
This is what we do when we are doing online product launches and integrated Internet marketing.
1. Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, offline networking etc all start the conversation.
2. Sometimes you also carry on the conversation with social media but you really start to build the relationship in your blog, on the phone, in email and face to face.
3. Only then are you in a position to sell. If you miss the relationship building, whether online or offline, you are back to the bad old days of hard selling whatever medium you use.
LinkedIn is just another funnel of opportunities and prospects with a specific demographic that just happens to be the demographic for my business. Facebook doesn’t work for me. Twitter opens up a few prospects occasionally.
I think there is another important point when talking about LinkedIn in that you need to set it up so you “attract” business. Does your profile work for you? There is no doubt that I attract business on LinkedIn. I was approached, as recently as yesterday, by someone with an attractive business proposition who found me on LinkedIn.
I consider LinkedIn extremely useful if you see it in the context of the 3 points above.
In relation to online marketing you may have heard that the money is in the list. Well as Jeff Walker says, the money is in the relationship with your list.
We make sure we work VERY hard on creating the relationship with you existing and potential customers when doing an online product launch.
Yvonne
However, something in the human psyche drives most people to seek out face-to-face contact and eventually one-on-one voice conversation. 
