Experts POol

HOW WILL I KNOW IF I AM MAKING PROGRESS
ON LINKEDIN?

If you are really honest with yourself, you have probably asked yourself this very legitimate question.

The ultimate answer should beIf you’re accomplishing the LinkedIn goals you’ve set, then you’re making progress.

And the most common goals I hear are:

• generate customer leads
• find a job
• increase my brand
• improve my presence
• find donors or volunteers

Trust me, I hear success stories for each of these every week, but it sometimes takes time to see the progress.

So, while you are on that journey, what numbers should you track to see if you are making progress?

Here is a list of the ten most important LinkedIn metrics you may want to start tracking as you work to accomplish your overall goal(s).

Note: I am not going to address any LinkedIn company page metrics in this article. I will save that for another article.

1. # of connections. This is the big one. In general, the bigger your network, the better off you are. Many of the metrics listed below will improve just by growing this number.

2. # of connections in your targeted industries, companies, regions, etc. To monitor this, you’ll need to use LinkedIn tags to categorize your connections. Seeing these numbers go up will mean good things, because you can send targeted messages to these important groups of people.

3. # of profile views. The raw number is important here, but more important is who are these folks and what action steps (connect, message, etc.) did you take with the good ones. For more information on this highly rated feature, click here.

4. # of times you showed up in a search. This should increase not just from increasing the number of connections but having enough of your keywords in the right spots on your profile.

5. # of invitations to connect. If this number is increasing month over month, it usually means your activity level is increasing not only on LinkedIn itself but in your physical world as well.

6. # of people viewing your updates. If you haven’t startedusing this section, you are missing the boat. Of course, you have to post status updates to get these metrics. It’s a great way to see what type of updates are resonating with your audience and what time of the week might be your sweet spot for posting.

7. # of people “liking,” sharing or commenting on your updates. Yes, the numbers are important here, but also consider reaching out to the people who share, “like” or comment on your updates. A simple thank you or sharing one of their insightful updates with your network would be noticed and appreciated, I’m sure.

8. # of endorsements for your top ten skills (keywords). I know you may be annoyed by the whole idea of endorsements (I’m with you), but LinkedIn loves these, and so I’m pretty sure that increasing your number of endorsements for the right skills is going to help you.

9. # of recommendations. Even though endorsements are all the buzz, recommendations are still extremely important for your overall social proof. Believe me, people do read these, especially if you’re directing them to do so at some point in your conversation or relationship. Work hard at getting LinkedIn recommendations. It will be time well spent.

10. # of hits to a website from LinkedIn. This could be from any shareable link you may have placed in the following LinkedIn profile sections or features:

• Contact Info section website entries
• Publications
• Projects
• Professional Gallery
• Group discussions started by you or answered by you
• Status updates shared by you or commented on by you

I suggest you set up a simple spreadsheet with any of these ten LinkedIn metrics you think are important to you. Decide how often you will update your spreadsheet, and thenstart tracking. I suggest you do it at least quarterly.

As you improve these ten numbers, I suspect you’ll see tangible evidence of progress in reaching your LinkedIn goals. Good luck!

Wayne Breitbarth, Grad '86, is a speaker, author and consultant for Power Formula LLC in Milwaukee. Register for his weekly email with LinkedIn tips. He can be reached at wayne@powerformula.net.