Relationships Thrive When You’re Social

LinkedIn has become the most valuable social media platform for CRE professionals to connect, learn and share expertise. National Social Media Coordinator Jordan Caravella discusses the importance of LinkedIn for personal branding and how to leverage Transwestern resources to shape your digital strategy.

Why is LinkedIn so important for personal branding?

Jordan: In CRE, we know the importance of personal connections and that we built trust by demonstrating expertise. With more than 738 million active members, LinkedIn has emerged as the top social media platform for our industry. Having a strong personal profile and presence on LinkedIn can be viewed as a component of your sales strategy. It’s a digital advertisement showcasing who you are, what you do and how you do it.

LinkedIn presents valuable opportunities to build and expand our personal brands by strengthening existing connections, making new connections with potential clients, sharing our work, and displaying expertise through thought leadership.

But why do we need a personal LinkedIn profile – doesn’t Transwestern handle social media?

Jordan: Research shows that individuals have a stronger voice on social media than the companies they work for. In fact, content shared by individuals earns over 500% more reach than a company’s message. And your connections re-share messages 24x more frequently when they’re posted by you rather than your company. Sharing content with your network on LinkedIn both extends your message and helps promote your expertise to develop and reinforce trust.

Remember that LinkedIn is intended for two-way conversations, and engagement cascades. The more you share and comment on content posted by your colleagues, connections and clients, the more engagement you will get in return, which means more eyes on your profile and content.

How can we leverage Transwestern’s marketing channels and online platforms to shape our digital strategy on LinkedIn?

Jordan: Transwestern has an abundance of resources within our digital ecosystem, and it’s easy to create and send content across multiple channels, including LinkedIn. In our “Capture the Win” strategy, when you close a deal, your marketing team will help you generate various methods for sharing it with your network. Press releases about your deals or awards will not only connect to your Transwestern bio but can be posted to LinkedIn along with the resulting media coverage.

When a property is sold or leased, your marketing team can create a shareable visual tombstone image to send through an eblast to the brokerage community and publish on LinkedIn. But don’t just post the image. LinkedIn is the ideal place to enhance your thought leadership by sharing the details of the transaction and explaining how your expertise served your client’s interests.

Case studies are also incredibly useful in building your brand and securing new business. When writing a case study, discuss the specific actions you took and the resources you used to make it happen. Work with your team’s marketing coordinator to make writing case studies part of the transaction recap process.

For more insight, watch Boost Your Personal Brand with LinkedIn, a Transwestern webinar housed in Workday Learning. For assistance creating or updating your LinkedIn profile, reach out to your local marketing team or Jordan.