Have you ever noticed the LinkedIn posts that you scroll quickly past posts that:

• announce that a company won an award or has been named a leader by an industry research organization.  
• show their personnel at a tradeshow.
• urges you to get their (lackluster) branded whitepaper, eBook, etc.
• look the same and use the same words as others in the industry.
• …I’ll stop there.

What you’ll notice is that it is employees and partners that like and share the post, and sometimes a few current customers.

Experiment – try something else

Try some changes to the way your posts typically look. Your posts need to resonate with your audience, rather than what is typical, salesy or grandstanding.  This applies to both paid ads and organic posts. (You can and should swap paid and non-paid posts depending on the audience). This is where it is important to really know your audience (and not as a predetermined persona – read “Do you know your target audience“).  How is the subject of your post going to help them in a tangible way?  Why should they care?  Is it really going to help them in their job or at least make them laugh a little?  

Banner blindness and ad fatigue

Ad fatigue is when your audience is so used to seeing the same colors, fonts, images and words used repeatedly.  Since everything is usually the same, the posts simply don’t register with the viewer.  Often, the same images and words are used across competitors in the industry as well.

Here are typical images that are used frequently by cybersecurity organizations in posts and content, not unique.

Solution

Try doing drastic A/B tests.  Don’t change just one thing instead make the B version completely different. Try using a very different color, with a different type of image, or just text with no image and try a different font, etc.  Reduce the amount of copy you have on your posts.  Consider editing stock photos so they become more unique or hiring a photographer (someone on your team perhaps) to take photos and build your own photo library.

Oh no… more pictures of employees at a tradeshow booth

When you post pictures of staff at a tradeshow on LinkedIn posts, who is it who usually likes or comments on them?  Is it your target audience (prospects) or is it employees, partners, and a few customers?  Think about why they should be excited to see that post.  What’s the value or interest for them? 

Solution

If you are trying to encourage people to come to the booth, make a video of a portion of a demo in your booth or a brief customer interview.  Remember, it doesn’t have to be a perfect video.  Either use your mobile device or hire a videographer prior to the event.  It’s the information/content that counts more than anything.  If someone gives a presentation share a portion of it via written format or video.

Just another typical asset download

Why should prospects download your whitepaper, case study, eBook, etc., especially if it is gated?  Is it really a whitepaper or is it 8 pages with a lot of stock photos and a long problem description and salesy?  Are they going to learn something that they couldn’t learn via search or an AI tool?  Is it fluff?  They see so many of those types of posts that they tend to ignore them.  On the chance they do click on it, they are presented with a form or even worse, directed to a web page with all kinds of content and information on it.

Solution

Ungate the content and let viewers know that it is ungated.  Add in small italics “No form fill needed” (see image below).

Viewers will tend to click on it to check it out in the hopes that it is informative content. Most b2b audiences assume that content is gated, so it will be a nice change.  Also, and this goes to the content issue, why not label it something else that is a little less generic and more descriptive than calling it a whitepaper, eBook, etc.  Call it an “Industry Paper”, eCommerce Cyber Industry Report, or Review or Insights (here’s some more ideas to inspire you). Also, you could add “a 5-minute read” if it makes sense.         

Not another award announcement

You need to ask yourself how much this really matters to your audience. Yes, it is important to your organization and can help establish a brand but just how important is it to your target audience?  Prospects are more interested in what you can do for them, not in what you’ve done for others.

Awards require prospects to make a leap of faith; to believe that your work for them will match your work for your other clients.  Also, awards come and go and many in the B2B world have doubts about awards for various reasons. Will the award influence the buying committee overall? Will it help answer their questions about your solution to their challenges?  

It is more important for them to know what their peers thought of your product, your customer support, ease of integration, etc.  Awards lose their power when your audience grows desensitized and stops paying attention.

Solution

If the award announcement is on your homepage and you did a press release about it, people will see it. Put it on your product pages (which is where you want them to end up ultimately).  Mention that you won the award in the content hub or landing page that you are sending the audience to for content. Find out if you can use a small icon or banner in your posts. Have the award logo in the background of your videos or post (a subliminal message that you won an award).

LinkedIn posts should focus on your target audience.

The best approach for LinkedIn posts or any channel you use is to keep the focus on your target audience and what matters to them. Don’t settle for what other organizations typically post, instead go beyond mediocrity; experiment and always think about who your target audience (persona) is and what they would find informative, interesting and even…. humorous. 

This blog is via AI – Anne’s Insights NOT Artificial Intelligence.