With over half a billion users, LinkedIn is the largest social media platform for business professionals. The trend for diversifying marketing strategies and going beyond Facebook advertising has been growing lately. Brands are now looking to establish partnerships with LinkedIn members with engaged followings in order to boost their reach and strengthen credibility.

When brands want to put their business in front of key individuals in their industry, LinkedIn is now the way to go. On LinkedIn’s professional-focused network, influence, audience, and authority are built upon expertise. Brands now realize mentions by influencers on LinkedIn reach audiences who consider them industry thought leaders, which is a trust beyond compare.

Content creators of all kinds should make sure they are focused on building authority on the platform as it translates to real-life credibility with the people you already know and can be a game-changing addition to working with more brands in 2021.

Remember, it’s fairly easy to share quick to consume content on Facebook or Instagram. And while that may build a following, longer form content on LinkedIn can grab attention and have a greater impact on the mind of your audience. But you’ll have to put in some work to gain traction on this platform.  Here’s why.

Posts on LinkedIn have an organic reach of less than 10% of your actual follower count. You can increase that reach by getting engagement on your posts with likes, comments and shares. If you get enough engagement, LinkedIn may feature your post under its Trending Topics section. This delivers your post to users outside your immediate network and can result in new people following you.

Here are some tips to start increasing your credibility and reach on LinkedIn.

Stand out by sharing insightful content about your niche. An easy way to do this is to find topics that others are talking about in your industry and reshare them with your own personal take that provokes your followers’ curiosity. You can use Google News, or even search Facebook or Twitter for relevant keywords to find popular articles that are trending in your industry. Use this approach to share trending articles on LinkedIn and include a unique spin.

Be sure to share stories that others can connect to. Because LinkedIn is a professional social network, sharing anecdotes and personal experiences stand out on the platform. Just make sure to share stories in a way that are appropriate for a business environment.

Make sure to publish posts with over 500 words. Long-form quality content is more likely to get the engagement required for a LinkedIn Trending Topics feature. It also tends to go more viral than does shorter content.

Publish content regularly. Be active on LinkedIn so people recognize your name and remember you. If you can’t maintain one update per day, choose a frequency that works best for you. Consistency is more important than frequency. You can even schedule posts with a tool like Hootsuite.

Be sure to follow BabbleBoxx on LinkedIn for more industry insights.