Selling Corona-Era Benefits: 5 Ways to Use LinkedIn

LinkedIn is the social media platform for business professionals uninterested in sites like Facebook and Instagram. It may not get the same amount of traffic as those other social media portals, but it gets the kind of traffic you are looking for as a sales professional. Believe it or not, you can use LinkedIn to boost your sales even in the coronavirus era.

Let's face it, selling benefits is going to be tough for the foreseeable future. Until the economy rebounds, companies will limit what they spend on benefits packages. You are going to need all the help you can get to sell. LinkedIn offers some of that help. To that end, below are five suggestions for using LinkedIn to boost sales in the coronavirus era.

1. Use the LinkedIn Sales Navigator

Our first suggestion is to use the paid LinkedIn Sales Navigator tool. It is a dedicated sales tool designed to produce qualified leads and the means of connecting with them. You can visit the LinkedIn site to learn all the details, including how much it costs.

A number of useful features make it a must-have for selling Corona-era benefits:

• Highly advanced algorithms that generate the most qualified prospects
• Advanced sales insights to aid in decision-making
• Tools for connecting and building relationships
• User groups for expanding networking opportunities.

The strength of LinkedIn's sales tool is its algorithms. It helps you find qualified leads a lot more easily than combing through LinkedIn and contacting people at random.

2. Make New Contacts

An obvious extension of using the sales tool is to make new contacts. In sales, contacts are everything. Some contacts you will sell to while others will point you to qualified leads. Remember that you need new contacts if you hope to expand your book of business. LinkedIn is the perfect place to find them because it is social media for business professionals.

3. Ask for Recommendations

LinkedIn has a nice little feature that allows your existing contacts to recommend you for particular services. Make use of that. If you are not already connected with clients in your book of business, get connected. Then ask them to provide a referral. You might even reciprocate by referring them for whatever products or services they offer. Do not ever underestimate the value of referrals in the LinkedIn universe. They are gold.

4. Update Your Profile

Far too many LinkedIn users treat their profiles as extended resumes. Doing so makes sense if you are looking for a job, but not if you're trying to sell benefits. Your prospective clients do not care that you have a business degree. They do not care about your accomplishments on the university debate team. What they care about is how you can help them score the right benefits for their employees.

Modify your profile so it speaks more to what you have to offer. Emphasize your experience as a broker. Talk about your relationship with your general agency. Your profile should explain why prospects should choose you over other brokers.

5. Create Shareable Content

Finally, you can create and publish content on LinkedIn. Do it. Write informational articles that demonstrate your expertise as a benefits pro. Write them in such a way that they instantly become shareable when published. If you create content that is relevant, informative, and answers questions your clients routinely ask, sharing will happen.

LinkedIn can be an amazingly effective tool for sales professionals. At a time when selling benefits is more challenging than it has ever been, it makes sense to use every available resource – including LinkedIn.