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In our digital paced culture, there are countless ways to grow an audience. But which ones really work? I recently had great success leveraging LinkedIn Groups to boost my subscribers and blog readers. Here is how I did it and how you can do the same.

LinkedIn Groups provide a place for professionals in the same industry or with similar interests to share content, find answers, post and view jobs, make business contacts, and establish themselves as industry experts. I leverage LinkedIn Groups to connect with like minded individuals who can collaborate over new ideas. I have joined 46 different groups, started my own group and actively contribute to most groups. I post to my blog twice a week and if any of my content is applicable to a particular group, I will post a link to the blog post along with a thought-provoking discussion question.

I usually get a few likes or comments per discussion post. However, I posted my article “What Everybody Ought To Know About…The Myth Of Experience” into the “Future Trends” LinkedIn Group on Sunday April 28th and (to date) it’s generated 32 likes and 98+ comments. The next closest article in the group has only 39 comments.

I do not share these stats to impress you but rather impress upon you how valuable LinkedIn Groups can be for your brand or business.

7 Must-Haves To Grow An Audience Via LinkedIn Groups

1. Value-Add Content. The content that you share must bring value to your intended audience. If the content falls flat, you’re sunk. Nothing else will matter.

2. Catchy Title. Ensure the title of your discussion is succinct and attention grabbing. My title was: “Is experience irrelevant these days?” And if you choose to add additional details, use it to create more interest. I used: “Before you answer that…consider these trends.”

3. Relevant Content. The content shared must relate to the theme of the group. For example: Don’t post “How To Perfect Your Golf Swing” in the Future Trends group.

4. Concise Content. You will capture more readers if your content is scannable, scrollable, and skim-able. Stay clear of long and heavy content. Shoot for less than 500 words.

5. Engaging Picture. Use the “Attach a link” function when posting a discussion. This will then add the picture associated with your article. Secondly, ensure your profile picture is inviting and it communicates your a pleasant person. A close-up shot of your smiling face is ideal. Remember, these 2 pictures are the billboard of your discussion.

6. Controversial. Content that takes a stance and goes against the grain is naturally going to stir-up more conversation. The haters will hate (just check out some of the comments I got on my discussion). Don’t be afraid to be contrarian. But do not tolerate malicious comments. And encourage people to keep the discussion constructive and productive.

7. Established Group. Make sure the groups you contribute to are active and have a large enough audience to make it worth your time. As a reference, Future Trends has 229,000 members and multiple discussions are posted everyday.

Leverage these must-haves and you will find how truly rewarding it can be when you serve up valuable content that stretches the thinking of the group and creates productive discussion. Create your epic content and go grow your audience via LinkedIn Groups.

Question: How have you leveraged LinkedIn Groups for increased engagement around your brand or business?

About the Author: Ryan Jenkins is a next generation speaker and blogger. His content helps his online and offline audiences leverage today’s tools, trends, and talent to thrive in tomorrow’s multi-generational marketplace. Connect with Ryan on his Blog / Twitter / Facebook / LinkedIn / YouTube or email at rj@ryan-jenkins.com.

You don’t need to be on Twitter.

That’s not a typo. Just because it makes news, it doesn’t make it a wise business move. You must figure out where your customers and prospects are spending time online and focus your efforts there.  This is #1 in establishing an online presence that engages an audience and promotes your business effectively.

Social media can truly transform your business efforts if done correctly, and as I always say, if you’re not seeing results, then it’s just a hobby! Don’t just do social media because everyone tells you to do it – truly make it work for your business.

What’s the difference between businesses that thrive online and those that don’t?  Well, it all comes down to how we communicate and how we generate interest in our products and services.

Want to learn how to be one of those businesses that’s thriving?

On May 7th, I’ll be holding Social Media and Dale Carnegie: A Winning Combination at Dale Carnegie Training of Georgia.  This seminar will teach you how to do social media for your business.  I’ll be covering:

Google prides itself on developing superior products that help people find what they are looking for on the internet free of charge. Google makes money by selling ad space located next to search results. The ads that have the greatest relevancy to the query are ranked highest on the page. Google’s advertising products currently include Search, Mobile, Display and Video/YouTube ads.

Search ads are placed on Google.com pages at the top and to the left of the search results. Search ads are text only ads limited to 140 characters and placement on the page is determined by Google analytics. Mobile ads are similar to Search ads, however due to smaller mobile screens they appear at the top of the search results.

Your business should take advantage of the free Google Places profile listing, which will give you a red pin on Google Maps searches. This can be augmented with paid advertising extensions like AdWords, which can link highlighted ads to appear in searches and turn your map pin blue. A blue pin is a great way to stand out in location searches.

Display ads can appear on websites, such as news sites and blogs, which receive compensation from Google for ad space based on traffic to their page. Display ads come in a wide variety of sizes and formats that include text, rich media and video.

Video/YouTube ads are available in several forms on the YouTube.com site, which is owned by Google, and can appear as commercials that air before videos, at the top of search results and alongside upcoming videos. Video ads can also appear in the search results of Google.com and as display ads on partner websites.

Google advertising products are extremely flexible and can deliver qualified traffic to your website, when used the right way. Google ads can also be very cost-effective, because advertisers are able to determine their daily budgets with no minimum, and also bid on the amount they want to pay for their ads.

Ads with keywords that have the most relevance to the search query and the highest cost per click (CPC) bid will appear highest in the search results. However, with pay per click (PPC) advertising, the advertiser will only be charged when the searcher clicks on the ad. There are also two alternative bidding methods available that use similar formulas, however the amounts are based on the cost per 1,000 impressions (CPM) and the cost per acquisition (CPA).

The relevancy of the keywords in your ad and the website your ad is promoting, and developing an ad that resonates with your audience is key to your success. Google provides a comprehensive interface that includes tools to help advertisers research and determine keywords, develop ads, determine bid amounts and place and schedule advertising. Local businesses can also take advantage of AdWords Express, which is completely automated and handles the placement of your ads and even suggests a budget.

Google recently introduced Enhanced Campaigns, which allows advertisers to designate bid amounts and run different ads based on the searcher’s desktop or mobile device, the location they are searching from and the time of day the search is being conducted. Because desktop and mobile searches are used differently, this allows local businesses to show ads across devices and target local searches in a highly strategic manner.

The Google interface includes comprehensive reporting and analytics on the performance of your ads, including detailed information on the number of impressions, clicks and campaign costs. It is recommended advertisers create several different ads with slightly differing copy, keywords and offers to promote the same web page. Then poor performing ads can be cancelled, and the budget for the better performing ads can be increased. This makes it easy to attract your target audience without wasting advertising money or time.

Getting started with Google advertising is as easy as going to http://www.google.com/ads/new/ and creating a Google Account, which is tied to a free gmail email address. From there advertisers can follow the instructions after the “Get Started” link.Google provides information to assist with planning and fine-tuning your ads for maximum results. It is a good idea for new advertisers to read the material and watch the video tutorials at http://www.google.com/ads/new/ before you begin.

Which posts of yours have received the most engagement?

I planned on just going to Google and finding a company to sell me a plan. As usual, My ADD kicked in and I found myself popping over to LinkedIn for a moment before I started my research. I was skimming the news feed and saw an excellent Dale Carnegie Quote about worry and stress. Perfect for a guy who is already stressing about his daughter’s first date!  Guess who posted the great, inspirational quote? You got it, Mark did. I clicked on his profile and sent him a direct email that stated, “I’m finally ready to buy life insurance.”. He was able to get in front of me when I was in ‘buy mode‘ and earn my business. Not by annoying me with constant followup, but just by being active on LinkedIn.

LinkedIn is void of a lot of the noise that frustrates people about Facebook and Twitter and therefore is an excellent place to garner attention from decision makers. LinkedIn can help individuals and businesses increase awareness, strengthen credibility, and stay ‘top of mind’ with clients and prospects. Below are four simple strategies to take your LinkedIn experience to the next level.

1.  Be Proud of Your Profile

If you haven’t reached 500+ connections, stop everything else you’re doing and get connected with your network. When someone visits your profile, LinkedIn only shows the number of connections up to 500. After 500, they just add the + sign. So whether you have 501 or 5001, it will still display on your profile as 500+.

Make no mistake about it—numbers matter. Almost every meeting planner I’ve spoken with has said they check out a prospect’s LinkedIn profile prior to booking them. What message do you convey with just 112 connections?

Some responses I’ve heard from planners are, ‘small,’ ‘disconnected,’ ‘out of touch,’ and ‘fly-by-night.’ Perceptions like these are not going to help your case in being hired.  So start connecting to your colleagues, customers and prospects on LinkedIn and don’t stop until you hit 500+.

2. Get Quality Recommendations from Past Clients

When it comes to recommendations, it’s quality over quantity. If you ask the right people to recommend you on LinkedIn, they will spend time crafting endorsements worthy of your exceptional performance. Recommendations matter.

No, scratch that…

Quality recommendations matter. Recommendations that only come from people who booked you and loved what you had to offer.

3. Update your profile daily…

This takes little to no time at all, but could result in significantly more opportunities. Go check out your LinkedIn profile. You’ll notice some updates from a few of your contacts. These are people who have posted an update to their profile and did it right around the time of your visit. If you’re in ‘buy mode’ for their products or services at the time of their posting, this could be the friendly reminder that earns them your business.

The same goes for your prospects. They could be in need of your services and you may have fallen off their radar for one reason or another. But during a visit to LinkedIn, they see a status update from you referencing a great article on leadership from the Harvard Business Review. Whether they read the article or not is irrelevant. The point is, you jumped back on their radar at precisely the right time and a business inquiry could result.

This strategy has become even more important with LinkedIn’s mobile app. If you don’t already have it, I’d encourage you to go download it. You’ll see that as soon as you open the app, updates from your network are the first thing that you see. This is prime real estate and you can take advantage by simply adding high-value content to your LinkedIn profile.

4. Use the Get Introduced Feature.

Simply put, this is my favorite feature in all of social media. In the world of LinkedIn, the power is not in your network, but in your network’s network. There is no reason to ever cold-call again without at least checking LinkedIn and seeing if you have a mutual connection with the person you’re trying to reach. Let’s say you want to do some sales training for ABC Company. You can go on LinkedIn and search for their company page. LinkedIn will show you employees from ABC who have a LinkedIn profile and, if there’s a #2 next to their name, that means you know someone they know. So after looking at their page, you see that Steve Smith, the sales director from ABC has a #2 next to his name. You click on his profile and see that you and he are both connected with Dan Davidson. You’ve done some work with Dan in the past, so you contact Dan to see if he’d be willing to introduce you to Steve. Dan happily obliges and sends a note to Steve telling him why he needs to take your call. You just turned a cold call into a warm lead. Powerful. Just remember, in order for this to work, you need to have a good relationship with Dan and Dan needs to have a good relationship with Steve. If either is not the case, do not request the introduction.

These four strategies will help you get more results from your LinkedIn efforts. I hope you put them to action and I look forward to hearing about your successes!

Still the most important sentence you’ll ever create on the web.

I’ve been speaking on the topic of Internet Marketing for over ten years. Most of what I spoke on back then has changed so much that it wouldn’t be relevant in today’s digital world. But the exception is Title Tags. They are still critical in how you rank on search engines and whether or not people visit your website.

Creating good Title Tags can change your search engine rankings for the better, as these few small words are a big part of Search Engine Optimization (SEO).  Including your company’s name and what it does is crucial to your search engine traffic.  People who know your company can search you by name, but including some descriptive terms can bring those in who are looking for your specific products or services.

In this quick 90-second video, I share exactly what a Title Tag is and why it’s so important.

Corey Perlman – The Most Important Sentence You’ll Ever Create on the Web

Does your business have a strong Title Tag?

• You know who is looking for your product or service.  If they “like” you, their profiles will come up when doing a search for your brand or company.

• “Likes” will be more important again.  The more “likes” you have, there’s a greater likelihood that your business page will show up often, such as when friends of your followers search for interests or pictures related to your page.

• Graph Search can bring new, expected visitors to your site.  Someone may know your company as “XYZ Creative,” but if they search for “Ad agency in NYC” and you show up, they will unexpectedly come across your page.  Content is extra important now, as they will decide to stay or leave your page once it pops up on their Graph Search.

• Promoted Tweets: Most of the time, you won’t even know if a tweet is promoted or sponsored.  Users simply see the tweet as usual, so they don’t feel that they are receiving an advertisement.

We believe LinkedIn is currently trying to figure out how to use Native Advertising on their platform. The ‘news’ that you see at the top of your profile is a start in that direction. I’m sure companies will pay a pretty penny to be a part of that precious real estate at the top of LinkedIn. Watch for more of this type of advertising in the coming months.

Native Advertising strives to provide value and quality information through content on social media networks.  Relevant content is important here, since these ads are to come off as part of the user’s normal experience, not through an intrusive ad.

Photo Credit: facebook.com

Dr. Covey had a tremendous impact on how I manage my time and the areas where I spend that time. Although I first heard it many years ago, to this day, I still refer to the time management matrix he created in almost all of my speeches.

There are four boxes where we can spend our time, and the one we often leave empty is the Important/Not Urgent box. This is the box that usually can have the greatest impact on our business, yet it often gets left empty.