Christina Robinson of Green Umbrella Marketing On How to Use LinkedIn To Dramatically Improve Your Business
An Interview With Candice Georgiadis
Use your voice — Post original content on LinkedIn every single day. Allow your connections to see who you are, what you’re passionate about and why you do what you do. Share an opinion, or talk about what you’ve been up to that day. It’s common for business owners to struggle with posting daily content, so imagine that you’re sending an email or a message to an ideal client. Share something that’s going to appeal to them and grab their attention. That’s when your posts will turn into conversation starters and encourage more engagement
As part of our series of interviews about “How to Use LinkedIn To Dramatically Improve Your Business”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Christina Robinson.
Christina is the Managing Director of Green Umbrella Marketing, a UK-based Marketing agency that she bought from the previous owners in 2019. Green Umbrella Marketing offers Done-For-You marketing services to recruitment agencies, SMEs, start-ups and entrepreneurs. Christina also teaches business owners how to create and implement their own marketing strategy and campaigns.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
I went to university as a mature student, at the age of 31, but dropped out after 18 months as I hated it. Most people who go to university talk about it as this amazing experience, but that wasn’t my experience. I found it quite soul destroying. So I made the decision to leave as it wasn’t making me happy, but I didn’t have a back-up plan or a plan-B. I literally had no idea what to do!
As part of the degree I was studying, I did really enjoy learning about social media and how it can be used to promote businesses, so I decided to become a freelance social media manager and would offer social media support to businesses in my local area. It sounded like it would suit my family situation and my lifestyle, so I was able to work around raising my daughters. I started doing some research and soon learnt that social media agencies were a thing, and that there was one within 10mins of my front door.
I checked out their website and their Facebook page and within two days an advert popped up on my Facebook feed — they were looking to hire social media freelancers to support the agency and their clients. It seemed too good to be true, but I applied for a job, went for an interview and started a few weeks later. Within eight weeks I was hired as a part-time member of staff and within six months I’d been promoted to second in command, working alongside my boss to grow the agency and manage the team.
In 2019 I bought the business and now run it as the Managing Director.
It’s not how I thought my life would pan out, but it’s been a brilliant ride!
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started this career?
It has to be buying the business from its original founder, as it was never part of the plan. Not that dropping out of university was part of the plan, but once I had dropped out I was quite happy to support other businesses with their social media. I didn’t consider that to be my own business, I was just helping out other people and being paid to do so. Having a business wasn’t something that people like me have, so when I was offered the job at the marketing agency it was an easy yes. I loved social media and knew I was good at it, so being hired as a freelancer allowed me to stay within my comfort zone.
After a year or two of employment, the owner of the business started talking to me about a management buyout and asked if I’d be interested in buying it. In my head I was thinking ‘no’ but I found myself saying yes. I had no idea what a management buy-out entailed, but I knew that opportunities like this didn’t happen very often, so I had to say yes, then learn everything afterwards.
A few years passed and in 2018 I said to Julia; ‘if this is going to happen it needs to be now.’ The MBO went ahead and I’ve now been the owner of Green Umbrella Marketing since 2019. The process of buying a business wasn’t too difficult, but the fact that I was buying a business took time to process. It was never part of the plan. It wasn’t a dream of mine. But here I am now, a university drop-out who is now the owner of an established marketing agency.
It has been said that our mistakes can be our greatest teachers. Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
I didn’t realise it was a mistake at the time, but I was in such awe of Julia, who owned the business, that I tried to be like her whenever I met clients, or whenever I was delivering a training session or masterclasses. Everyone seemed to love her so I modelled myself on her, delivering sessions in the same style as her and communicating in the same way she would. Looking back, it’s quite sad really, that I felt so uncomfortable being me within my work environment that I tried to be like her. But it’s something I hear a lot from other business owners, that being fully authentic can feel scary, in case we repel clients or they don’t take us seriously.
But the more I allowed myself to get comfortable with being uncomfortable, the easier it was to show up as myself. I soon started to attract people like me and it all clicked into place. People loved Julia because she was Julia. As soon as I started to embrace Christina and show up as her, people loved me for being me too.
Which social media platform have you found to be most effective to use to increase business revenues? Can you share a story from your experience?
LinkedIn has been the most effective platform for me as a personal brand, as well as Green Umbrella. Once I’d decided to go ahead with the management buy-out I realised that it was time to put as much focus and attention into growing my own LinkedIn profile that we do for our clients. I created something I call ‘The Hit List Strategy’, which is what we now teach to clients too. I looked at the top 20 people within our niche, which was the recruitment industry at the time, and I made it my mission to follow them on LinkedIn and engage with their content so that they got used to seeing me in their newsfeed. After interacting with them over a period of time, I would send a connection request, knowing that they’d accept as I’d demonstrated that I was someone they’d want to connect with and have in their network. In most instances they’d actually request to connect with me first.
By interacting with their content on LinkedIn I could see what they were doing outside of LinkedIn. I could see which events they were going to be at, which books they were reading and which podcasts they were listening to. It gave me the ability to dive deeper into them as individuals, so when I did meet them in real life I had something to talk to them about. Impressing people is really easy if you can demonstrate that you actually care about them and what they do. It also meant that I could tag them in content I was sharing on LinkedIn, which then opens us up to their network too.
Let’s talk about LinkedIn specifically, now. Can you share 5 ways to leverage LinkedIn to dramatically improve your business? Please share a story or example for each.
Tip #1: Use your voice
Post original content on LinkedIn every single day. Allow your connections to see who you are, what you’re passionate about and why you do what you do. Share an opinion, or talk about what you’ve been up to that day. It’s common for business owners to struggle with posting daily content, so imagine that you’re sending an email or a message to an ideal client. Share something that’s going to appeal to them and grab their attention. That’s when your posts will turn into conversation starters and encourage more engagement
Tip #2: Don’t just post, engage
The easiest way to be a part of the conversation is to comment and engage on other people’s posts. Commenting on other people’s posts is way more effective than you posting on your own profile. Business is all about building the know-like-trust factor, which you can’t build without talking to people. People may not interact with your comments immediately, but once they’re used to seeing you popping up regularly, they’ll start to interact with you, which pushes you out to more people in their network. The magic always happens in the comments, not on your posts.
Last year we had a stand at an expo and I noticed this guy hovering around the stand. Not just once, but three or four times he’d hover by the stand but never come over and introduce himself. His face looked familiar but I didn’t fully recognise him. When he did eventually come over and introduce himself he turned out to be one of the best CV ad writers in the world, who recognised me from commenting on other people’s Linkedin posts. Because what happens, when you comment on other people’s posts your content is then shown to them more frequently, so they get to see you and build a hidden rapport with you, even though they’ve never met you.
Tip #3: Be responsive
Make sure that your notifications are switched on so that you can see when someone interacts or comments on your posts, because you want to strike up a conversation with them. Take the time to read what they’re saying and respond accordingly. Social media has been designed for us to be social, so be social. A conversation that you start in your feed can then continue in the DMs, which is strengthening relationships even more. We have all these conversations publicly, but rarely move them into a sales environment, which in effect means that you’re leaving money on the table.Don’t be afraid to ask for what you want either.
Tip #4: Show up
Tip number two was all about posting every day, but you also need to show you, especially if you’re a personal brand, as your customers want to see you as much as they want to see and hear about your products or services. Allow your customers and clients to see the real you, outside of work as well as inside of work. Post about what you did at the weekend, talk about something you’re excited about at the moment. You’ll often see people on LinkedIn moaning that ‘this isn’t Facebook’, but showing who you are as a person is just as important in building the know-like-trust factor, so your fun, out of office side needs just as much air time as you inside of work. People buy from people like them, they don’t buy from machines.
Showing up will make the difference between showing up regularly and getting nowhere and showing up and making an impact.
Tip #5: Back yourself
This is all about having the confidence to show up and post every day, knowing that your content is making an impact on someone, somewhere. Don’t focus too much on vanity metrics as not everyone is going to interact with your content, but something that you say may make an impression on them that they won’t forget. When you show up with confidence you’re declaring that you’re the expert. You’re giving people a reason to be connected to you.
In 2020 we started working with a business owner who was nervous to show up online for fear of judgement. The thought of going live filled him with dread as he has a stutter. We slowly helped to build his confidence and create a plan for him to follow. Although he still dreaded going live, he was starting to enjoy it, which showed, as the business is now making over 7-figures in revenue. If he hadn’t made the decision to show up every day and go live on social media his business wouldn’t have survived the Covid-19 pandemic. As with any economic downturn, many businesses pull away from social media, so not only was he in front of his audience at a time when they needed him, but when his competitors re-started their social media he remained at the forefront because he’d been everpresent.
Because of the position that you are in, you are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
I am on a mission to grow one million businesses to reach £1 million in revenue. Think about what that would mean for the world — if one million businesses were able to make £1million in revenue, they’d be able to do so much more to help so many more people. They’d be creating more job opportunities and boosting the economy. They’d also be able to give more freely in terms of sharing their time and expertise and pay it forward, whether that’s hosting free seminars, or talking to primary school kids, or volunteering for a charity.
If I can do this, then over time, those who I’ve helped will then be able to pay it forward, and those people who they help will be able to pay it forward.
One one person grows, we all succeed. So let’s help more people to grow.
Some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂
Alex Hormozi. I really like the approach he takes where he lets people have access to all the information they need, for free, so that they can start to create the products and services that will make money. Not every business owner can afford to invest in learning when they first start out, so how can they be expected to sign up to courses or work with coaches when they haven’t started making money yet?
I’m also really interested in Elena Cardone. She must have to take on so much of the media backlash and social media haters because of who she’s married to. Most of the time she’s referred to as Grant Cardone’s wife, as if that’s her job role. As if she isn’t successful in her own right. But most people won’t know who she is. They’ll know that Grant Cardone is married, but not necessarily who to, or what she does. It’s something we see a lot in the press. When successful men or celebrities are photographed with their wives, the wife is introduced as ‘the wife’, not as a person in her own right. That needs to change.
Thank you so much for these great insights. This was very enlightening!
Christina Robinson of Green Umbrella Marketing On How to Use LinkedIn To Dramatically Improve Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.