Did you know that your free LinkedIn account could be costing you money? No I am not talking about monthly charges, I am talking about lost new sales opportunities, revenue and bottom line profits? In this article I am going to share with you exactly why upgrading to LinkedIn Premium is the best option if your looking to generate highly targeted and responsive leads, build your personal brand and/or connect with media and influencers around the world.
If you’re like most users you’ve considered upgrading to a LinkedIn premium account but for some reason just never pulled the trigger…probably the money? That’s why I decided to write this article where I share 4 reasons why being penny wise and pound foolish could cost you millions in lost sales opportunities in the long run.
Yes it’s true…LinkedIn does offers a variety of free tools for users to amplify their brands, connect and engage their prospects. But beyond the free tools they offer, LinkedIn Premium subscriptions that can dramatically enhance your ability to go beyond connecting and start actually leveraging LinkedIn to generate revenue!
4 reasons your free LinkedIn is costing you money!
1. Limited access to see who’s viewing your LinkedIn profile.
On your LinkedIn homepage, login and hover your mouse under the “profile” tab. You’ll see a link to “Who’s Viewed Your Profile.” If you have a free account, you can see up to the last 5 people who have stopped by. Upgrade to a premium account (either LinkedIn Business Plus or LinkedIn Sales Navigator), and you get access to everyone who has viewed your profile in the past 90 days. If you’re putting in the time to implement a LinkedIn sales system (like the system I teach in my Linked Academy course), knowing the names and roles of everyone who has viewed your profile can be invaluable.
Why should you care?
Example A.
Imagine a prospect you spoke with 10 months ago finally has the budget to pull the trigger on your proposal. After looking at his file he uses LinkedIn to refresh his memory on the different players involved. At this point you only have a free LinkedIn account with limited access to who’s viewed your profile data so you miss the fact that he visited your profile. 🙁
But your competition has a Premium LinkedIn account and notices that “your prospect” viewed his profile so your competition decides shoot him a message or even given him a call. He then sets up a meeting and wins the business before you even know what happens.
Example B.
You took the time to optimize your profile and are doing the right things to keep your name in front of your target market on LinkedIn…kudos to you. But you’re still sing a free LinkedIn account and can only see the last 5 profile views.
A LinkedIn users by the name of Jim, who you have never met but is specifically looking for the exact product or service you offer is shopping for a reputable vendor on LinkedIn. He visits your profile but your busy and never notice. He moves onto the next vendor who because he has a Premium account notices the profile view so he reaches out and get the deal.
I have generated dozens of clients this way and continue to generate 5-10 new highly qualified prospects per month by engaging with long lost prospects as well as connecting with new prospects that I never knew existed until they stumbled across my LinkedIn profile.
It’s not hard but without the expanded visibility into who’s viewing your profile, your unlikely to pull it off.
2. Limited access to advanced search features.
LinkedIn Premium is all about access to more and better data. When you upgrade, you gain the ability to get extremely granular with Advanced Search strategies. This maximizes your time and efforts when building your sales funnel through LinkedIn (Not sure how to build a sales funnel using LinkedIn? That’s a major part of my soon to be released Linked Academy training program).
It’s easy to get lost in LinkedIn search – after all, you’re sifting through over 450 million profiles. Advanced Search for Premium users helps you maximize your time and efforts by allowing you to pinpoint exact client avatar.
Added search criteria in LinkedIn Premium includes Groups, Years of Experience, Function, Seniority Level, Interested In, Company Size, and When Joined. I use this expanded data set to both find and engage my target market. It’s not hard but it’s even easier and more accurate with a LinkedIn Premium account.
Once you refine your search to find your perfect client avatar, you won’t have to waste time building the right criteria each day during your sales efforts. Instead, you can use Saved Searches to preserve your search and allow you to return and pick up where you left off the next day. Free accounts provide 3 saved searches, but Premium accounts give you 7.
Last but not least LinkedIn limits free users to 100 searches results per month while Premium users are given unlimited searches. Trust me 100 search results is not a lot considering their are over 450 million users worldwide and 2 new users are joining every second of every day. Based upon the fact I have generated over $20 million in new business through LinkedIn the expanded search options and unlimited search access are worth far more than the monthly fee to upgrade.
You do the math!
Just one small client from LinkedIn that generates just $5,000 a year in profit for your company is equal about 84 months of a LinkedIn Business Plus account which only runs about $59 per month.
3. Limited access to important company data.
In Summer 2016 LinkedIn added a new feature for premium users called “Premium Insights.” LinkedIn curates critical company data for you and presents it “at a glance” to save you time and energy (while likely providing more accurate information than you could find elsewhere).
Specifically, Premium Insights offers data on:
– Total employee count
– Employee distribution by function
– New hires
– Notable alumni
– Total job openings
4. Limited ability to message your prospects.
Connect with someone on LinkedIn and you can message them freely. Messaging everyone else including your prospects; however, can be challenging. LinkedIn Premium provides users with between 15 and 30 InMails per month – messages that can be sent to anyone on LinkedIn. After you’ve used the expanded search capabilities, InMail helps you reach your prospects without being connected.
Premium users also get access to open profile messages, a feature that most don’t know about or use, but one that can add significant value to your efforts. Specifically, open profile messages are free InMails you can send to any LinkedIn user with Open Profile turned on. These messages won’t count against your InMails, and can significantly boost your InMail efforts.
Upgrading to LinkedIn Premium makes sense for your business, but you need a “premium” profile to maximize your results.
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Cheers,
Dennis Brown
“Stop the madness. There’s a better way!”
LinkedIn Marketing & Social Selling Consultant, Trainer, Speaker
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