TECH Connect 2017 - Marketing ROI Workshop session by Sugam Agrawal - Lead Insights, LinkedIn Marketing Solutions

1. Sugam Agrawal
Insights Lead, India
LinkedIn
Session 3 - Strategies & Tactics To
Increase Marketing ROI On LinkedIn
#inTC17
MARKETING ROI WORKSHOP: GETTING BETTER AT MEASURING IMPACT

2. ​Optimizing ROI is one the most crucial
challenges facing digital marketers

3. ​Driving content engagement is most important lever
to improving return on ad spend
Probability of reaching your
target audience is a product of
Bid & Relevance Score
A lower bid with a higher
relevance score can still
reach more people
Highly engaging content
bumps up your
relevance score
SCOREXBID
RELEVANCE SCORE
Click-through rate
Comments
Likes
Shares
Member feedback
3
$8
$12
$4
9 72
48
12
BID
RELEVANCE
SCORE
COMBINED
SCORE
4

4. Build trust in your brand via an
always-on thought leadership
focused content strategy
1
Nurture your audience and
convert leads effectively via a
multi-product strategy
2
3
Amplify your message at
every stage of the funnel via
an employee advocacy
strategy

5. Build trust in your brand via an
always-on thought leadership
focused content strategy
1
Nurture your audience and
convert leads effectively via a
multi-product strategy
2
3
Amplify your message at
every stage of the funnel via
an employee advocacy
strategy

6. ​Influencing B2B buyers is harder than ever
reveal themselves to
vendors immediately, with
most doing so only after
drawing up a shortlist of
solutions
Only
10+pieces of content
consumed by B2B
buyers during purchase
process
Source: LInkedIn – Be Present, Be Constant; Google Zero Moment of Truth study

7. ​What is Thought Leadership?
A study by Edelman Trust
​“Free deliverables that organizations or individuals produce on a topic that they
know a lot about, and they feel others can benefit from having their perspective
on. Thought leadership, in this context, does not include content primarily
focused on describing an organization’s products or services.”
​Formats of thought leadership include, but are not limited to:
Research reports
Similar such items that organizations make
freely available (or in return for submitting
contact information)
Thought pieces
EssaysVideos
Webinars
Presentations (live or
published online)

8. helps brands
stand out, build trust, generate demand

9. ​Thought Leadership helps brands …
Open the conversation Build trust Generate RFP invitations
What Decision Makers actually do after
engaging with thought leadership:
Decision makers said:
“It (thought leadership)
increased my trust
in the organization”
82%
81%
Business decision
makers
C-Suite executives
44%
55%
Business decision makers
C-Suite executives
“Gave the organization
your contact information”
Decision makers said:
37%
41%
Business decision makers
C-Suite executives
“After seeing its thought
leadership: invited the
organization to propose on
a project”
Source: Edelman 2017 Trust Barometer

10. ​True thought leadership needs ‘always-on’ approach
B2B decision-makers are ‘always-on’ for business

11. ​Always-on results in brand awareness uplift
​Global professional services brand
12% Increase over
continuous media spend
period
9%
Decrease
when media
stopped
Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5
Aided Brand Awareness

12. ​Always-on strategy is cost effective and performant
Initial burst
strategy …
… was replaced by an ‘always-on’ approach that
enabled brand to better engage with audience and
improve cumulative campaign ROI/performance
Spend
Click Through
Rate
8k
6k
4k
2k
0k
0.04
0.03
0.02
0.01
0
Source: LinkedIn data of an anonymized client example
Jan
24
Jan
31
Feb
7
Feb
14
Feb
21
Feb
28
Mar
7
Mar
14
Mar
21
Mar
28
Apr
4
Apr
11
Apr
18
Apr
25
May
2
Jan
24
Jan
31
Feb
7
Feb
14
Feb
21
Feb
28
Mar
7
Mar
14
Mar
21
Mar
28
Apr
4
Apr
11
Apr
18
Apr
25
May
2
Anonymized client example

13. Build trust in your brand via an
always-on thought leadership
focused content strategy
1
Nurture your audience and
convert leads effectively via a
multi-product strategy
2
3
Amplify your message at
every stage of the funnel via
an employee advocacy
strategy

14. ​Driving recall via pattern recognition in today’s
crowded landscape is essential for brands

15. Leading marketers use multi-product
strategy throughout customer journey

16. ​Complementary products reinforce each other’s impact
NURTURE
REACH
AQUIRE
Sponsored Content
Dynamic Ads
Text Ads
Sponsored InMail
Lead Gen Forms

17. ​Reaching an audience with Text Ads and Sponsored
Content can improve performance
Average
CTR
Average
CPC
Without text ads With text ads
0.35%
0.44% $14.98
$13.81
Exposing audience to
multiple products
improves performance
by:
Better CTR
Lower CPC
Larger Mindshare
Tech company (Security) | 500 employees
Source: LinkedIn data of an anonymized client example; Tech Company (Security) I 500 Employees I Privately Held

18. ​Nurturing an audience with Sponsored Content
improves InMail engagement
​ Warm InMail: Sponsored InMail
sent to a member who had been
exposed to at least one Sponsored
Content from the same advertiser
in the past 30 days
​ Cold InMail: as Sponsored InMail
sent to a member who had not
been exposed to Sponsored
Content from the same advertiser
in the 30 days before the InMail
Open Rates Click Rates
Cold InMails Warm InMails
46
63
3
6
~1.4X
~2X
LinkedIn-wide analysis for Q2 2017

19. ​Sponsored InMail optimization tips
USE FRIENDLY, LOW-PRESSURE
CALLS-TO-ACTION (CTA)
Commitment is hard
§ Members don’t want to
commit to signing up. Nip
that fear in the bud with breezy
CTAs such as “try” or “free.”
Top performing CTAs
1
2
3
4
5
Try
Free
Today
Click
Apply
KEEP YOUR MESSAGE SHORT AND
SWEET, AND INCLUDE HYPERLINKS
Be short and sweet
• Body texts under
500 characters
have 46% higher
CTR.
Make your message
interactive
• Additional hyperlinks in
the body lift CTR by
21%.

20. ​Sponsored InMail optimization tips
Don’t miss a beat.
Always be on.
• They open Sponsored
InMails the most on
Tuesdays.
• Members click on
Sponsored InMails the
most during weekends.
KEEP YOUR SPONSORED INMAIL
CAMPAIGN RUNNING DURING
WEEKENDS
Be personable.
Be approachable.
• Member senders perform
better than company
senders.
• Sponsored InMail messages
from director level and
below also yield higher open
rates.
SEND YOUR SPONSORED INMAIL
MESSAGE FROM A PERSON INSTEAD
OF BRAND

21. Build trust in your brand via an
always-on thought leadership
focused content strategy
1
Nurture your audience and
convert leads effectively via a
multi-product strategy
2
3 Amplify your message at
every stage of the funnel via
an employee advocacy
strategy

22. ​Trust in institutions is eroding faster than before
For the first time, “a person like
yourself” is now as credible a
source of information as an expert.
55% say individuals are more
believable than institutions. Trust in
mainstream media has also fallen
to a 17 year low.
A company’s social media is seen
to be 61% more believable than its
advertising.

23. Employees are your most
trusted spokespeople

24. ​Employee networks are a valuable marketing resource
Source: Edelman 2017 Trust Barometer; LinkedIn internal data
Employees are your most credible spokespeople
Company CEO
Senior executive
Employee
Activist consumer
Academic
Media spokesperson
Business practices/
crisis handling
Innovation
efforts
21
23
37
29
22
11
24
31
33
25
21
11
26 26
32
22 23
13
21
23
30 29
22
14
Views on
industry issues
Partnerships/ programs to
address societal issues
higher click-through rate
on employee’s share vs.
shared by company
Even on LinkedIn
when sharing the same content

25. ​Employee networks are under-utilized for marketing
of employees share
company relevant content
today
Only
Employees have 5-10X more connections
than company page have followers
100
Employee Shares
48
Company
Page Views
16
Company Page
Followers
48
Job Views
32
New
Connections
96
Profile
Views

26. ​LinkedIn Elevate makes it easy for employees to
share your content with their networks
Easily source content
and suggest to
employees
Employees share
content to their social
networks
See the impact your
employees have
driven

28. THANK YOU