Here are some tips that will help you kickstart grow and maintain a LinkedIn group of your own.1. Pick Your Poison – Open Group or Closed Group
LinkedIn offers two group settings open or closed. With an open group, discussions are publicly visible. Anyone can join and depending on your moderation settings anyone can submit discussions. In closed groups, people must request to join and the discussions aren’t visible to everyone on LinkedIn. A “lock” icon appears next to your group name to indicate this.
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2. Set Some House Rules
Community guidelines are an important part of any forum. Under the “manage” tab you will find the section where you can set some Group Rules to set clear expectations for what you hope members get out of participating with your LinkedIn group. Spam and self-promotion are party-fouls. They ruin the fun for your group members who are actually trying to learn and connect. Give some tips on what members can do to make the most of the group and in a direct but friendly way make note of what won’t be tolerated.
3. Send Announcements to Your Group
Generate leads from your LinkedIn group by sending announcements to your members. You’re allowed to send up to one announcement per week. Under the Manage tab you’ll see an option to send an announcement on the left-hand side. Make the most of it by sharing content that leads members to fill out a form on a landing page on your site. Whether this is for an eBook or white paper or an event registration be sure you’re leading them to a landing page where they will convert.
4. Grow Your Group: Invite Your Network
You can do this in two ways: Send invitations or share the group.
Invitations: Under the manage tab you’ll find an option to send invitations. Invite colleagues and professional connections to participate. Be strategic though. Don’t mass-email your entire professional network asking them to join. Use personalized messages and explain to people why you think they’d enjoy the discussions in your group.
Share the group: If you want to go the mass-invite route you can select the Share Group option in the top right hand corner. There you’ll find an option to post the group not only to your LinkedIn profile but you can also share it on Facebook and Twitter. Even though it’s a mass “invite ” still personalize it by filling in the message box. Provide context and explain why you are sharing the group.
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5. Participate!
LinkedIn shows some engagement metrics to help you measure your progress including sharing who the top influencer is. The thing is: You don’t wanna be that guy. A community member should be the top influe