Currently, LinkedIn boasts more than 467 million members in over 200 countries. When used correctly, LinkedIn’s InMail is an incredibly powerful tool for laser-targeted B2B marketing.
While using InMail to get your message in front of a receptive audience sounds great, unless you know what you’re doing, you can easily waste your marketing budget on campaigns that don’t convert.
Here are some of the biggest mistakes you can make when using LinkedIn’s InMail:
Lack of personalization.
In 2017, the notion of taking a generalized approach to marketing is well and truly over. If your recipient gets any sense that you’re using InMail to send the same generic message to a group of people, you’ve already blown your chance of connecting with them.
Conversely, you’ll dramatically improve your odds of receiving a response if you take the time to personalize your message.
Before drafting your message, scan the recipient’s entire profile for any interesting details you might mention. Awards, musical interests and favorite sports teams all make for interesting conversation pieces when messaging someone.
Additionally, some people’s LinkedIn pages have links to their Facebook and Twitter profiles, where they might post less formal content. Scan these profiles too so that you get a better understanding of their personality, hobbies and interests.
Be sure to mention any commonalities, such as a shared acquaintance, and use the pronoun “you” to make your dialogue sound friendly and conversational. Statistics show that referencing a former employer in common increases your chances of getting an InMail response by 27 percent.
Of course, it’s not possible to personalize every message, particularly when you’re targeting larger audiences. In these cases, remember to use the %FIRSTNAME% function and to use terminology that resonates with your target demographic.
Underwhelming subject lines.
A study on email marketing revealed that 33 percent of email recipients open emails based solely on the subject line. If you fail to capture your recipient’s…
