LinkedIn is a great way to build an online presence for yourself as an expert as well as for your business. Unfortunately, like most social media success doesn’t come if you put up a profile and promptly forget about it. Success happens with interaction. One easy way to interact is by joining LinkedIn groups and participating.

No matter what your ultimate goal and objective is in building a LinkedIn account, joining and participating in LinkedIn groups can definitely help you reach your goal.

Here are 8 ways to leverage your LinkedIn profile by joining LinkedIn groups:
 

1. Have a clear set of goals and objectives

Before setting off to join every group imaginable, sit-down and get clear about what you hope to achieve. Write down what you are hoping to achieve on LinkedIn. It can be multi-faceted like build expert status, find new customers, and build a talent pipeline to help with future hires. Or it could be project driven -simply to find a Marketing Manager.

Just be clear on what your intentions are so you don’t spend a bunch of time working on other “possibilities” because those possibilities are endless on social media.
 

2. Find the right groups

 
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Now that you have a clear set of goals and objectives in mind, it’s time to pick the right groups to join. Just because a group is related to your niche doesn’t mean you should join it.

Be specific with your choices and make sure they directly relate to your targets. If you can’t think of a group to join, do some research. Check out the profiles of people who are in your target audience and find out what kind of groups they are in. Take your pick from there.

You can join up to 50 groups.
 

3. Participate in the groups you join

No matter how many groups you joined, there’s no way you can benefit from any of them if you don’t interact with anyone from the group.

Contribute to group discussions, answer questions, share experiences and relevant information. Open up a topic of interest and encourage engagement.
 

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The more often you do this, the greater the chance you could have of being recognized. LinkedIn rewards top contributors and gives them content recognition. When you’re a top contributor on LinkedIn, your profile becomes more visible and invites more interest and inquiries.
 

4. Create your own LinkedIn group

 

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This is quite challenging but is very rewarding when executed properly. Creating, building and moderating your own group opens doors of opportunities that aren’t available to you if you’re just a contributor.

The most obvious benefit is that it can give you a database of professionals are very likely highly interested in your niche and industry. The audience you will get here will be as targeted as you can get.

Other benefits include company awareness, mutually beneficial professional relationships, and heightened interest and inquiries.
 

5. Post a Job

You can post a job on LinkedIn the traditional way, or you can post it on a group board. Job ads posted on group boards not only reach those who are directly looking for a job but those who may know someone who’s interested in the job as well.
 

6. Recruit

You can also reach out to directly to members of groups you are part of to network or recruit them directly. These messages are currently free from LinkedIn, so you may want to join relevant groups for specific openings to expand the people you can contact for free.
 

7. Ask for testimonials or recommendations

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Source: LinkedIn Help Page

If you've provided assistance to someone on LinkedIn, feel free to ask them for a recommendation. If they thought you provided value they are likely to be happy to provide a recommendation for you.
 

8. Engage your employees

Lastly, train your top employees to join in on the conversation on LinkedIn. Establish that they’re speaking on behalf of your company as well as themselves as a professional and have them contribute interesting and relevant insights to the discussions.

This provides a more well-rounded image for your company while also increasing presence and brand awareness.
 

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