The power of social media is impossible to deny in today’s technological age.

However, you may not be leveraging your social profiles as well as you could be to earn more money now.

Below, we tell you exactly how you can make more money using your Linkedin profile to get new clients, new jobs, and even new visits to your website.

A Few Starter Tips

• Update your profile: include a professional picture, in-depth details about your latest position, add your specialties, and join groups to network.
• Add connections: add people who you have met in real life, and people with who you share similar connections. Also, be sure to add connections who have positions you would like to have in the future, and prospective clients.
• Be a good LinkedIn citizen: add a personal message to your connection requests, like other people’s statuses, and congratulate your connections on their milestones.

Now start making money! But how?

LinkedIn Articles

LinkedIn articles are a great way to draw attention to a message or mission you are looking to push. Once a LinkedIn article is published on your page, all of your connections will be able to read it, and it will be prominently displayed on your profile.

If you have put in some work creating a worthwhile profile and adding connections, hopefully your connections will be in your ideal audience. If your article is well received, it may be more likely to show up in the feeds of your network. For an extra bonus, you can add affiliate links to get compensation for anyone who purchases a product using your individual link.

Pro tip: Make sure your article is well-written and well thought out, otherwise your article could have the opposite effect. Also, make sure you’re being a good “social citizen” if you like and share other’s articles you find to be impactful—they are more likely to do the same for you.

Drive Traffic to Your Website

If you have a website or blog, using LinkedIn is a great way to drive traffic to your site—especially if your blog is related to your industry or specialty. You can do this by adding your personal blog or website to your profile and sharing your posts via status updates to your followers. You can also repost your blog content via the LinkedIn articles section mentioned above.

As with any social media, you want to be careful about frequency. Don’t overdo it and don’t promote content you don’t think is click worthy. Try and provide value to your audience.

Get New Clients

Are you looking to get started in online freelancing? One way to prospect new clients is by using LinkedIn. In the professional world, anyone who is anyone is on LinkedIn. The great thing about professional network, is your ability to message and add people who you may otherwise be unable to contact.

When contacting new prospects:

• Do your research. Make sure you know something about the company and are confident you can add value to their business.
• Use a personalized message. Include a first name and try to include something that shows the message isn’t just being generically used for all of the people you’re contacting. The ‘spray and pray’ is never a good idea.
• Be short and sweet. Explain how you can provide value to the client—don’t just drone on about yourself.

Keep in mind, many LinkedIn members get TONS of messages—make sure your message stands out from the pack and put a bit of effort in.

Add Content to LinkedIn SlideShare

LinkedIn SlideShare has become a very important tool in the Content Marketing toolbox. This tool has recently started to boom! It’s a great way to share branded content with your built in audience.

SlideShare allows you to:

• Share certain clips of your presentation with your audience to drive traffic,
• Have your presentation indexed to improve your brand SEO,
• Be featured on the SlideShare homepage, opening your message up for a significant increase in exposure.

Pro Tips:

• Add images. The most popular presentations have many images. In fact, great images help to increase retention over 40%.
• Use bullet points. To make the presentation easy to read.
• Proofread. Since these presentations will be out in the digital world, make sure you put your best foot forward.
• Backlink. Include links to your LinkedIn SlideShare on social media and on your personal blog or website.

LinkedIn continues to grow more and more popular in the professional world. If you are looking to earn more money now, LinkedIn is a great place to start. But, being thoughtful about the content you share is important. Spell check, re-read, and even ask a friend to proof read and review. Your LinkedIn profile is like a public resume, so put your best foot forward.

The post 4 Easy Ways to Leverage Your LinkedIn Profile to Make More Money appeared first on MoneyMiniBlog.