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I love animals so I’d love to see more companies be pet friendly. This is a win for the company because people are more relaxed around their animals AND it encourages customers to bring their animals also! We now only go to restaurants that are pet-friendly so we can bring our new puppy. PLUS, pets make GREAT social posts so highlight a new pet each week.

As part of my series of interviews about “How to Use LinkedIn To Dramatically Improve Your Business”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Tami Wloch.

For over 15 years, Tami has been providing Marketing services for companies, using her expertise in Social Media, Website Design, PR, Trade Shows, Radio/TV/Newspaper, print, and more to increase Brand Awareness & Sales. Because of her successes with Social Media Campaigns, she was invited to serve on Advisory Panels for both Facebook Corp & LinkedIn Corp where she is helping shape the future of Social Media. She also teaches classes, both in the US and internationally, to help business owners understand the complex world of gaining customers thru Social Platforms. She can be reached at: www.SCmarketinginc.com

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 have been lucky to be in marketing world for over 15 years. I saw the incredible change in digital techniques from designing websites from scratch, starting email marketing when few people had email accounts, and melding digital with traditional tactics like trade show booths, print, and radio. I really enjoy what I do, helping businesses grow, so I continue to take classes to keep up to speed with this rapidly changing field.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started this career?

It was really interesting when, about 3 years ago, I got a call from Facebook asking me to be part of an Advisory Panel. Of course, I thought it was a scam call and nearly hung up on them. Fortunately, I didn’t hang up and ended up being on multiple panels for Facebook and then, about 2 years ago, I was invited to join LinkedIn’s panel.

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?

Years ago, I had just gotten a new client and he was very rushed in trying to get his first social posts up. To drive people to the grand opening, he wanted to highlight some great specials that people could get if they attended. I had created a great description and graphic and he had approved it with some minor changes. I made the changes and launched the campaign only to realize a bit later that I had made a typo when revising and it said $99 when it should have been $999. Fortunately, I was able to quickly pull the add before it was distributed but that was a huge panic moment. I learned to ALWAYS have the client approve the final copy before it launches.

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 is great because all of the “C-Suite” people are on that platform. The paid campaigns are more expensive than on other platforms but you have to expect to pay more to reach these customers. You can also sort on specific job titles which is a huge help when you need to reach specific jobs. Facebook is much less expensive so, if you can open up your targeted audience a bit, you can reach more people for less than half the cost.

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.

Absolutely — there are easy, FREE ways people can use LinkedIn to generate more sales!

  1. Amp up your personal profile
  2. Spend the money to get a professional headshot done! People do not take you seriously as a business person if you can see someone’s arm where you tried to crop the photo.
  3. Also, don’t hold a cup, even if it’s just water. It can send the wrong message.
  4. Lastly, don’t use a cartoon drawing (unless you are a cartoon artist) and don’t put up a picture of your pet as your profile pic. LinkedIn can reach customers with money so keep it professional.
  5. Use that banner on both your personal profile AND your business page
  6. This is FREE advertising so change it often — everyone who goes to your page will see this banner!
  7. Make sure it includes your email OR your phone # OR your website — make it easy for customers to contact you
  8. Join groups
  9. Not just groups with others in your profession — join groups that contain your best customers
  10. Post often in the groups so the people see your name and see your breadth of knowledge
  11. Follow the 80/20 rule — 80% of the time share your knowledge and only 20% of the time ask for a sale or pitch a service
  12. Make connections
  13. The biggest mistake some people make is just connecting with only people in their own industry — this is fine, but it won’t get you sales
  14. Set a goal to invite 20 people each week to connect with you — target those people who would be your best customers
  15. Then, when you post each week (YES, you should post each week), your connections will see what you post (the 80/20 rule still applies)
  16. Post at least once/week
  17. Set one day each week to post to LinkedIn. It’s easy if you follow a schedule! Here are some great things to post about — use one of these ideas each week and you are set for months!
  18. POST = New products/Services; Employee anniversaries/birthdays; Thank your customer for something; Welcome new customers; Customer reviews; Summarize and industry article; highlight one of your services/products

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. ðŸ™‚

I love animals so I’d love to see more companies be pet friendly. This is a win for the company because people are more relaxed around their animals AND it encourages customers to bring their animals also! We now only go to restaurants that are pet-friendly so we can bring our new puppy. PLUS, pets make GREAT social posts so highlight a new pet each week. This would be particularly great if your business could sponsor a rescue animal and have them at the business once a week — post that on social also so the pet gets adopted!

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 ðŸ™‚

Wow, I would love to have lunch with Warren Buffett — he seems to be such a down-to-earth person and he does so much good for businesses who are growing. He gives back so much to the world, both in teaching and in donations. I’d love to have the chance to talk about his struggles in growing a business & hear some advice on growing my business!

Thank you so much for these great insights. This was very enlightening!

Tami Wloch: How to Use LinkedIn To Dramatically Improve Your Business was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.