Link∙Ability's Lynnaire Johnston explains how she uses the analogy of gardening and horticulture to help people understand LinkedIn® and why it works.
This blog post originated as a LinkedIn® live on which Lynnaire Johnston was interviewed by Sarah Clay for her YouTube show Sarah's LinkedIn® Live Lounge.
I do a video post each week about my garden. I'm usually standing in the garden, by a garden bed or a pot and I find a way to align what I’m seeing to LinkedIn®.
For example, one day I was grooming a pot of dahlias, removing dead leaves and flowers, and realised it was like housekeeping on LinkedIn®. By which I mean you've got to answer all your messages, respond to your connection invites, and keep everything neat and tidy. Just the same as with tending to a plant in a pot.
Here's another example. I was looking at a sunflower last weekend and realised it was planted in completely the wrong place so the birds wouldn’t eat the seeds. It was like creating a post that nobody saw. This got me thinking about how you can repurpose or reuse your content in the same way plants often have more than one use.
I don't think I'll ever run out of ideas because gardening, like LinkedIn®, never ends. There is always something to do, something to learn, somebody new to meet and something new to try out. Every task and idea can generate another and bring you into contact with new people.
Posts, gardening and relationships
My LinkedIn® posts generally start out twice as long as they end up, so I need to do a bit of editing. That's how I see my gardening, too – I've got to tidy things up, make things look better, do some trimming and ensure plants are not crowded out by other things.
In a post, for example, you want one idea, one message to come across loud and clear, and if you don't weed out all the extra words, people aren't going to understand what you're trying to say.
My posts based around gardening help people to understand me and to see me in a different light. People get to know you when they're seeing you in your natural habitat.
LinkedIn® is all about people and relationships. Integral to that is providing ways people can get to know you, like you and trust you. If they can see you in your garden or somewhere you feel comfortable, I believe that goes a long way towards helping people understand who you are as a person.
How video shows the REAL you
I like video. A lot of people haven’t yet mastered the use of video on LinkedIn®, something they really need to do. And if someone like me can do it, anybody can.
A lot of people avoid using it because they think it’s too hard, when what is really stopping them is fear. But you just have to say: ‘I am going to do this. I'm going to get over my fears and make it happen.’ Be determined and give it a go.
I alternate between LinkedIn® lives and audio events. I swap them about because audio events get quite a good audience and quality interaction.
With lives, the guest and I can be talking, and attendees can be writing in the comments, but you can't easily invite somebody else to come on-screen to share the spotlight and ask a question. Whereas with an audio event, you can, plus it’s easy to set up and to run.
I really like audio events because they're a great chance for people to have their own radio station but a lot of people are not seeing the advantages of that yet. People who came from the Clubhouse era do, but those who didn't, who don't know much about how audio events work, are a bit like those who resist using video. They’re saying ‘this is not for me’, whereas I think they are missing an opportunity.
Visibility is important on LinkedIn® and, as most of us know, posts are not doing nearly as well as they were even just a year ago. Consequently, being visible – attending events, being a host on an event or being seen on the stage of an event – is a really good way for people to learn about you.
There are multiple reasons why events are doing so well, and why people should be considering running them more themselves, not least because you can run them from your profile and/or your company page.
💡 Three tips to action today
#1 If you are in B2B, make the most of your Services section now that it's visible on the front of your profile, right underneath your About section.
#2 Start collecting reviews for your Services section because if you have a Premium account, your latest review and the number you have will display prominently.
#3 If you don't have many recommendations on your profile, collect more. You need at least one of them pinned to your Featured section.
Bonus tip: In your Services section you can upload native video. In the Featured section your video either must be hosted on YouTube or Vimeo, or it must be embedded in a post. In your Services section, you can simply record your video and publish it as is. In short, go to your Services section, optimise it and fill it with plenty of media including video.
The key is to do these things today. Ideas are only ideas, whereas implementation and action are what make things happen.