Is your personal LinkedIn profile growing steadily?
Then, it’s time to take it to the next level.
If you really want to grow your brand and give it the recognition it deserves, you need a LinkedIn company profile page.
It’s a critical component of your overall optimization strategy not because it’s its own channel, but also because of the other growth options, you get from it.
So, shall we get started on that company profile page?
The Benefits of a LinkedIn Company Profile
We all know how powerful a personal profile is, and your company profile is no different.
The main reason we advocate our clients to rock one is that it gives a brand its own identity that can unite people who are working to grow it.
Think about it.
Your team can tag themselves as part of the company brand, your clients and prospects can call the brand out in their posts, and it also maintains its own roster of followers.
By using a company profile page, you give life to the company brand and allow it to stand on its own.
However, this does not mean you should give up optimization efforts on your personal profile page.
Your personal profile page is supposed to be an extension of the company’s brand with your own personalization. And, it serves as a way of giving your company page the social proof that it needs.
You can use it to cross-promote your Facebook page and group, release new content, and promote your other team members. It’s a good all-around hub to have.
It also makes for a good recruitment page if you’re looking at onboarding highly-talented team members in the future. Applicants can easily check out what your company does, and you can even pin stories about your team on the page itself.
This showcases your company culture, this helps reel in potential talent and gives business prospects a glimpse into what you do as a whole.
Here’s what.
The company page is the collective LinkedIn profile of everyone in the organization. It shows people your company values, your products, and its culture.
Plus, it’s another medium for you to generate a passive lead generation campaign!
Can You Get Away Without One?
Solo entrepreneurs, people who are just starting out on the platform, and industry and thought leaders, can probably get away without a company profile page.
But, here’s what.
As you grow bigger, you grow your brand, and even though you actively promote your brand on your personal page, it still needs to have a “home.”
This home is the company profile page.
It is the singular hub where your team can mention that they work with you. It’s an address where your prospects, followers, and your customers can tag you in.
But, most importantly, it gives your brand it’s own identity on LinkedIn.
Creating a LinkedIn Company Profile Page
The first step is to have a personal/member profile up and running. Like most social media platforms, LinkedIn requires that a company profile is managed by a real profile.
You want to head over to the upper-right side of your LinkedIn feed and click on “Work.” Click on “Create a Company Page.”
This will take you to a new page with options to create a LinkedIn company page for small businesses, medium to large businesses, a showcase page, or an educational institution.
For this example, we’ll go ahead and click on “Small business,” which is also the starting point for people – and startup owners – who want to start transitioning from promoting their personal page to their company page.
Once you pick the most appropriate option for your startup, you can now proceed to fill out details about your company.
You start off with the company name. You don’t necessarily have to put in the suffix of your company such as Inc., Ltd, etc. The basic name of the brand or the company will do.
Fill out the custom URL you want to use, so this is basically the name of your company or its initials. If it’s taken, pick out another variation of your company name.
Check out our guide on crafting custom LinkedIn URLs!
Keep in mind that you want to make sure that custom URLs on all the platforms that you’re visible on have to be uniform for maximum visibility on search engines.
If you’ve got a website, make sure to include that too. A link from a social network might not do you wonders in general SEO, but it helps improve your site’s backlink profile.
As you fill out the necessary information, you’ll find a preview section on the right-hand side.
LinkedIn gives you a list of industries that you can pick from, and you have to fill in your company size and type.
Make sure you upload a PNG of your logo and position it smack dab in the middle.
Lastly, you have the option to include a tagline for your company. This is similar to a headline on a personal profile. Make sure that it’s catchy and that it has a keyword or two.
If you want ideas on crafting an effective tagline, you can check out our article on LinkedIn headline creation.
By doing this you can entice prospects to click on you and improve your search visibility on LinkedIn.
Now all that’s left for you to do is click on the checkbox, and hit “Create page.”
And, just like that, your brand has its own LinkedIn page where it can get mentioned, tagged, and noticed!
Company Profile Banner
Do you want to tell people more about your company?
Then, use the company profile banner wisely.
This is a prime piece of real estate that can easily communicate your mission to your prospects.
What Can I Put on My Banner? (And, Examples)
We chose to go with a picture of the exterior of our office because we felt like our exterior easily communicated our culture to our clients. (Plus, we think it looks pretty bada** and in-tuned with our branding.)
Apple did the same thing. Their building communicates the great (and futuristic) facilities that they have, and it helps you understand the brand at a glance.
Thinking of showing people exactly what your product does? You can include a screencap. This gives people a quick idea of what you do without having them read your About Us section.
If you want to promote a lead magnet that prospects can download, you can highlight that via your banner. This is great if you want to use the company page to passively bring in leads.
You can also choose to highlight your team since they’re a representation of your brand. Plus, it also communicates your culture of putting people first which is a plus point for new hires and prospects.
You can go for the text-only approach by either putting in a striking piece of copy.
Or, you could use it to communicate your vision.
Finally, keeping things as simple and sleek as possible is also a good way to build an aesthetic.
When you’re first starting out, you can choose to follow the personal profile banner approach by mixing various elements and including a call to action. This way you can maximize your visual real estate.
Use a tool like Canva to create a banner for your company profile page. You can do it for free and they have easy-to-use templates that you can easily fill out.
What we like the most about this approach is that it automatically sizes your banner to be optimal for your download. Plus, you don’t need to be a photoshop whiz to use their platform.
About Us Section
The next area that’s critical is the About Us section.
This is where you get to showcase your brand or company and tell people a little more about what you do and how you do it.
Keep your paragraphs short, down to three lines if you can, to optimize for mobile use.
If you’re first starting out, follow the personal profile option and stick in your company’s contact details up on top. This way it makes it easier for people to contact your company if they’re just browsing through.
Put in a list of all the things that you do and don’t forget to talk about your company culture and your vision.
You want to be able to incorporate this because people are interested in a company’s personality. This applies to both prospects and potential talent that’s looking at your page.
Also, don’t forget to optimize the section for search. You’ll want to include your primary and secondary keywords to make sure you rank well.
Find out more about Linked SEO optimization with our extensive guide here.
You can also choose to keep it short and sweet, just like the way we do it.
You can put in other details like hiring details if you want to.
As soon as your team members start tagging your company page, you’ll find that this area of your company page will start being populated. This is a section that’s important for talents who are looking to work with you.
As you can see, it follows almost the same principle as a personal page on the platform.
Have More Divisions? Use Showcase Pages
If you have distinct departments or brands within a particular company, then it’s probably time to use showcase pages.
Showcase pages are exactly what they are, they allow a company to showcase individual brands or departmental divisions in a company.
Why does this help?
For larger or growing companies, this helps you provide your prospects with customized feeds depending on what they’re looking for.
Think of your company page as your homepage with showcase pages as individual services that you offer.
Here’s an example.
Say that your company specializes in tech software and consulting, when someone lands on your company page, but they’re interested in your consulting page, they can easily visit your consulting page via showcase pages.
Content on your company page is going to be generally suited to explaining what your company does as a whole. Content on the showcase pages will be personalized for individual pages.
Check out how Microsoft does it with its different divisions and brands. A prospect will see them as “affiliated pages” on the right-hand side of the LinkedIn company page.
Remember, personalization is the only way to succeed in passive lead generation.
Growing a LinkedIn Company Page
Growing a company page follows the same pace as growing your personal profile page.
It’s slow.
But, it can soon pick up the more you spend time with it.
- Engage with you customers – one way of getting momentum with your page is to make sure that you engage with customers using your company page. This bolsters your visibility and helps you get your name out there. As soon as someone tags your company, make sure you drop by and punch out a quick reply.
- Post, then, post some more – building traction starts with getting more eyes on your company. You can upload your whitepapers, post lead magnets and hit up your followers with inforgraphics. You have to be active, there’s no other alternative.
- Upload videos – if you’ve been following our blog and our content guides, we’ve always highlighted using video because it’s one of the most engaging forms of content. You can start your video posts by reuploading and refreshing video posts on your company page. Remember, there’s a tab on your company page that’s dedicated to video.
If you spend an hour engaging with people on LinkedIn on a daily basis, then devote some of that time to your company page.
Remember, it’s another page that can have its own followers, you want to build lists of people following you to increase your market share.
Also, don’t shy away from trying to create viral content for your page.
You’ve got to get the flywheel going and start cranking up momentum. The harder you work at it the faster it will build, the more optimized it is, the more efficient it will be.
Takeaways
Your LinkedIn company profile is important.
At the very least, it allows your team members to properly tag the brand.
It serves as your brand’s personal LinkedIn profile page making it a powerful medium that you can use to update your prospects, show people your company culture, and increase brand awareness.
However, just like your personal profile, it only works if you invest some time into growing it.
You’ll still need to spend the time engaging, posting, and optimizing.
It’s an invaluable resource if you’re growing your brand, your team, and your business.
You could get one today or you could get one in a year.
What’s important is that you get one locked in.
