Exactly where to start with your Linkedin Company and Personal Page - Teacher: Michelle J. Raymond

in my experience, probably nine outta 10 people are petrified of creating content on LinkedIn because they're worried about colleagues judging them, their boss judging them.

What if you lose your job if you post the wrong thing? Like these are real concerns from real people. 

This is Michelle J. Raymond, the corporate trainer and two time best selling author who has become the go to authority on LinkedIn company pages.

And today on Useful Content, she's going to share her proven strategies on how to grow your LinkedIn company and personal pages.

It's about finding what is the thing that you are most comfortable with. That for the first couple of months, you can commit to doing consistently every week. Because it's that consistency which is gonna pay off 

Why your company is better off having many people creating on LinkedIn.

LinkedIn's a team sport. The more you get your team involved, I. The more success that you're going to have.

Why it's critical to fix both your personal and company pages before you start making content.

Imagine creating amazing content. Somebody has a poke around, goes back to your profile or your company page, and they're greeted with either a ghost town or something that's completely outta date or really undersells the person or the business. 

And finally, she shares a perspective on the one thing you really need to be worried about when you start sharing content on LinkedIn.

There's so much advice going out there from LinkedIn. Trainers like myself often conflicting and I say. Throw that all out the window, push it to the side. The only thing you need to worry about is 

Let's make useful content.

Hello and welcome to the Useful Content Podcast and today we have a brand new teacher in the useful content classroom. Michelle Jay, Raymond. Hi Michelle.

Good day, Juma. I am so excited to be on the podcast with the man with the smoothest tones and best teaching. So I've been waiting for this, uh, episode for so long, and here we are. Oh, you flatter me too much. Too much. And I could say so many good things about you. So we've been connected on LinkedIn since 2021. I checked and that is pretty accurate. And over the past few years, you have had tremendous. Growth on LinkedIn. You create a ton of weekly content, you have a successful, um, LinkedIn company page 'cause that's the thing that you do.

You have launched two podcasts, written two books. You've launched a newsletter, launch, a YouTube channel, and uh, at this point you have, I don't know, hundreds of live, live shows and you've basically become the go-to authority authority when it comes to LinkedIn. Company pages. Not to mention you did a massive rebrand last year.

How has the journey been for you on LinkedIn?

When I listen back to what other people tell me I do. There's no way that I believe that I'm doing all of that myself, because it's kind of crazy to think about. So for the person who doesn't listen to podcasts, I run two of my own. For the person who doesn't really enjoy video content, I run a really successful YouTube.

Channel for the person that never thought I'd be an author. I've written two books. and why? Because I like to create content for how my audience likes to consume it. So, that's what drives me. So, and I think that's one of the things that when I look back, I'm most proud of. I can't wait to talk to your audience a little bit more about how that all came about.

Company pages on LinkedIn are my specialty, but there's just so many more opportunities that have come out of that. It's kind of crazy when I stop and think about it.

And also you, uh, by the time this comes out, it'll been long gone, but you are gonna be at the social media marketing world this year as a speaker. And how has that preparation been?

I am not gonna lie. It depends on the moment you ask me. So I found out, you know, a few months back and I was so excited dancing on the spot, like no one's watching and super crazy. And then I go through these moments of. Oh my God, I'm going to San Diego to present on a stage in front of all of these people.

What if I don't know my stuff? And everywhere in between, depending on the moment. So the thing is, at the end of the day, I know that what I've got is gonna make a difference to all the marketers that attend, and I can't wait to get there. Now. It's, it's not too far away. And as, as you said, it'll probably have happened, you know, by the time this goes live.

And I have another one to look forward to. I'm getting to speak in Denmark now. This whole thing blows my mind from starting my business four years ago to speaking on international stages like pinch me juma. How did this all happen? 

I think it's amazing. I think it's simply 

amazing. and and most of it, I mean, it's mo it is you, but most of it. is due to how you built on LinkedIn and of course your 20 years of B2B sales experience and all those things that came before. 

So could you share with the people how you help your clients make useful content?

Yeah, I'd love to. So ultimately, I, specifically help business owners in the business to business space learn how to leverage LinkedIn to grow their business. So I, as you just said, spent 20 years in B2B sales. So that part of me has never really left, but I learned how to leverage LinkedIn around nine years ago. So I started creating content as part of my role as an account manager selling raw materials and ingredients that make beauty products, you know, and fast forward nine years, I, I'm just teaching other people all that experience. And so for me, when I'm working with my clients. They're at all different stages of the journey.

Juma, as I'm sure you can relate, some of them have never created anything, nor do they want to. Some of them are active and need some help to refine how do you do it on LinkedIn? And so it's, you know, finding that balance as well between building personal brands And how much effort you put into that content.

And your company page and how much effort you should put into that. And it's been amazing to see even in the last four years how much those two things, building personal and company brands and the content you create for both is actually almost morphed into the same thing. So that's an interesting dynamic to have seen.

So knowing what to post, how often to post, And what formats to post. Is, you know, one part of the conversation, but I also like to. help 'em get the right mindset so that they're not freaked out about actually getting out there. Because in my experience, probably nine outta 10 people are petrified of creating content on LinkedIn because they're worried about colleagues judging them, their boss judging them.

What if you lose your job if you post the wrong thing? Like these are real concerns from real people. So I love helping employees as well. 

you mentioned to me earlier when we were speaking offline that just just this year that you've 

started to get some help doing your own development and uh, with your website and different things and for people who are doing it for themselves. 

What is one of the biggest things they have to look out for when trying to build their B2B business and even their personal 

business on LinkedIn?

There becomes a point where you have to know your own limitations and ask for help. Now I personally pride myself on being able to figure stuff out and I think that came, I moved outta home when I was 18. Never had any money to pay people to fix stuff for me, so I used to love researching to figure out how I could do anything. And I carried that part of me into my business and I prided myself on, you know, how do you do a podcast? Or how do you do a YouTube channel? But there were some things which I realize now in hindsight, that I wish I'd reached out to experts. Earlier on, and So the thing that I prided myself on can also be the thing that holds me back. So that willingness to ask for help, especially on LinkedIn can be helpful because sometimes just posting content over and over doing more content is not gonna help you if it's the wrong content. Doing the wrong thing? for years is also not gonna be helpful. So if you are on LinkedIn and think you're taking the right actions, but you don't have people booking calls with you, you don't have people converting into sales, then that's the moment where you need to stop and invest in things like training with an expert, because otherwise you are just gonna keep going down that rabbit hole.

And the funds dry up. The opportunities dry up. You'll start to feel overwhelmed and it can get really frantic when you can see your bank account dollars going down and down and down. And so this is the thing that I would say, the thing I've learned is ask for help if it's not worth it is a worthwhile investment and can bring all of those results you desperately want and need forward.

And that's really important. 

Yeah, that's so true. And that's a real 

feeling that people have, entrepreneurs, particularly people who are in it for the first time and they something that they're 

trying, they don't know the way. And I have had that feeling too when I've built certain things. Now I've been in business for a number of years and uh, and so there are some things that have become 

second nature, but there are some things that you just don't know And you don't know that you don't know sometimes. And only when you have a conversation with somebody who is more knowledgeable, who has built something that you can have a clear sense of, these are the steps that I have to take and these are the things I have to do in order to grow. And today that's what we are gonna get into.

We're gonna get 

into B2B growth for for 

LinkedIn, and how you can grow your business on LinkedIn. So when you have to talk to 

somebody about growing their business on LinkedIn, what's the first. Thing that you tell them in the beginning of that process. 

The first thing, the very first question that I always ask is, what are your business goals? Right? Everything we do on LinkedIn has to be driving you towards those goals. Now, you'd be surprised at how many people say. I don't really know. I just know I should be on LinkedIn. I'm like, okay, but if you wanna be busy for busy's sake, you can spend a lot of time on LinkedIn.

You can get lost, and all of a sudden you'll realize, hang on, where's my day gone? But if you start with a business goal and then work backwards and say, how can my LinkedIn strategy get me towards that business goal? That's the first place to start. Because if you don't start with the goals, then how do you know who you're talking to?

How do you know what products and services you're offering? What kind of content works best for that particular audience? And so, you know, people skip this step. They want, and I love the enthusiasm. I love that they wanna dive straight in. I am that person. I appreciate you more than you know. The fact is you'll spend six months and then go hang on a minute.

You take a look around, you are in the wrong place, attracting the wrong customers and not getting those opportunities. So for me, I always say start with goals. I'm wondering what do you start with Juma? 

Well, I, I mean, I'm not really someone who tells people how to be successful on LinkedIn, but when we start with content, that is actually what we do. We ask people what are their goals? So we start from the top. Maybe it's a content strategy. I. We go above that and say, well, what is your marketing strategy?

So we try to look at the bigger picture before we come down to what we're gonna execute for 

them on the content strategy level. So I agree with you 100%. You can't start on the journey without having a 

clear sense of where you want. To go and those things might change in the 

journey. You might adjust them, you might change them.

You might say, okay, I'm gonna lean more this way, as I'm sure you've discovered in your process, but you must start with some 

type of reference point. So I agree with you 100%. And one of the ways people can grow on LinkedIn is. 

By having a presence there, right? It's just by having a presence on LinkedIn.

So there's a personal and there's a company presence. And how does 

one, if somebody has never been on LinkedIn before, I know some people they have 

dead profiles. Basically they were back in the days when LinkedIn was a resume site. Uh, what if 

somebody first changes that people would have to make to their presence on LinkedIn, both for themselves And for their company pages in order

to start that journey of growth? 

You are absolutely right. The profile on the company page are like your foundational stones, that when you set those, you can build everything else on top. 'cause imagine creating amazing content. Somebody has a poke around, goes back to your profile or your company page, and they're greeted with either a ghost town or something that's completely outta date or really undersells the person or the business.

And that's typically what I see. So building your personal brand and your company brand by having a company page that's set up. So go back and spend some time and make sure that it's up to date. You would be surprised at how many people have incomplete company pages, and LinkedIn tells us Juma, that if you have a hundred percent page set up completed, you get up to 30% more weekly impressions, which on company pages, we have to fight for every little impression that we get.

So that's a big change. On your profile. I think it's even more important 'cause you're gonna get more visitors over there, especially the smaller businesses, you know, you're gonna spend a lot more time building your personal brands. And so, going back and, you know, I, I've recently run a, you know, challenge on my YouTube channel, and one of the things that I did to people was I said to them, you can actually download a copy of your PDF of your LinkedIn profile.

Old school, grab yourself a highlighter or a pen and go through it and just find out what's outta date, what's missing, what is really speaking to your ideal audience? So a quick tip, if it speaks about yourself in the third person, we've moved on for that because profiles now are in service of your ideal audience.

So show them why you are the most, you know, I guess show them why you are the best person. For the job to take away the problem. You know, that's why businesses exist. We exist 'cause someone's got a problem, they pay us for it to go away. And so when I had people start to just do that really simple task.

All of a sudden they were like, oh my God, I haven't updated this since the last time I went for a job. Which for some solopreneurs and business owners, they haven't been for a job in 20 years. Uh, the oldest photo that got updated as part of the challenge was 30 years old. That's how old the person's photo was that they were using.

And I was like. Okay, can we just at least start with the basics, an updated photo from the last couple of years, a banner and you know, some information in that about section. Let's just start there and we can work our way up.

Yeah. That's so interesting. That's so interesting. 

People actually having put the profile there just for having it 

their sake and having utilized it as yet, and this can apply 

not just for. People who are running their own business like solopreneurs, but they can also apply to employees of B2B businesses as well, and maybe even executive.

Have you seen there be a, a great, uh, influx or a great growth in the numbers of people from companies who are now updating their profiles and being more current? 

It is really interesting that someone flicked the switch in business to business and said, Hey, you need to be online these days. You know, you need to have a digital presence now. LinkedIn is the number one platform for B2B because it's trusted now the B2C, so business to consumer industry. They nailed this.

10, 15 years ago, you know, e-commerce is pretty amazing and pretty switched on. Business to business, however, yeah, they're way behind and just getting started and what's happening, and I saw it even when I was working in, you know, sales based roles, is that more and more as the internet became a thing and yes, I, I was selling long before Google was a thing. Ultimately what was happening was once upon a time, I had all the power. I was the salesperson. I had all the product sheets, the spec sheets, the inside details, the market knowledge. It was all with me. And you would come and reach and ask your questions of me. Fast forward, Google kicks in, everything's online, and now the B2B buyers got all.

The knowledge, they can just type it in. They probably know more than most salespeople 'cause they're interacting with so many different people now. The research shows that roughly, you know, 60 to 70% of that buying decision has done being done online before they even reach out to a salesperson. So if you are waiting for them to talk to someone, you're too late.

And this is why I'm seeing many more businesses start to go. We need to be online. And I think the other thing that happened during Covid lockdowns, you know, around the world, you know, sure. No one ever expected something like that to possibly happen, but old school selling methods went out the window. No more trade shows, no more events, no more customer visits, all these kinds of things got benched.

Then people started, even more people started coming online looking for answers because you know, those traditional methods were gone. So we're seeing like a shift post that, and we're seeing the power shift with the buyers and I think that's why now I'm seeing lots of companies reach out to me.

Michelle, I. I want my, you know, CEO wants to be a thought leader. It seems to be the cool thing to be at the moment, but I think there's more to it than any one person in a business is responsible for growth on LinkedIn. LinkedIn's a team sport. The more you get your team involved, I. The more success that you're going to have.

So don't leave it to just one person in marketing or the CEO's profile, or just one employee who might be already creating content. Bring it all together. And those synergies, that's where we get the awesome results. I. 

LinkedIn is a team sport. I had 

never thought of it that way because when you think about profiles, you think 

about the individual. Um, and I, you know, coming to think of it, I had seen some companies, 

like they synchronize their. And 

different things like that, So I had seen that, but it never really occurred to me that yes, if everyone in the company or, well, maybe not everyone, but if the people who are willing and ready to be more present on LinkedIn actually have a presence and share content, then that will amplify the brand in a way that you can't do if just one individual or maybe even a 

company page could do.

But I know in your case you believe 

in a combination of LinkedIn profiles and. Company page content and as the winning combo. So why is that the winning combo? And Then afterwards we could talk about some specific things we could do on either page in order to start the journey of becoming more present on LinkedIn.

Why are those two things a winning combo? 

If we take that sporting team analogy a little bit further, and I love creating LinkedIn dream teams, imagine the company page, maybe that's your defense, and then you've got your employees are out there on the offense, like to and name any sport, doesn't matter which one it is. But if you were to take the company page out, you've effectively lost 50% of the opportunities that are available to you and then all of a sudden you've got no one backing up those employees that are out there. Now, if you're a sporting person and you want to go out and play for a team, you wanna. To play for the best team in the world, the best team in the league, you know, and think about it. When they go out on the ground, they've all got the same jerseys on. They're all showing up, doing exactly the same thing, working for the same goal.

And I think that's the important part, is not just going, oh, that's marketing's job. You know, leave it up to marketing and the sales team sits back and goes, that's not my job. I'm not gonna help them. I don't get paid to do that. Well, no business operates in isolation. You all have to work together to get those results.

And so if you think about it, why not just go hard on personal branding because we know that we'll probably get more reach with our content. Well, the problem is juma, what happens if your star employee who has built up their personal brand, goes to another company or sets up their own business or decides they don't wanna do it anymore for whatever reason?

What happens then you've got all your eggs in that one basket. The same thing happens when you wanna replace that person. They're doing their online research and employer branding becomes really important, and they jump online and the LinkedIn company page will show up on the first page of Google results.

If you Google a business name, typically, and it's right up at the top, if I click on that. What impression do I get if I come across to the company page? And so we've got this combination of things going on of how do you support people to grow their personal brands? How do you become an employer of choice?

And there's lots of different dynamics all going on at the same time. But I think I. In life, the more that you can bring people together and they'll all do different things. Not everyone wants to be a superstar on LinkedIn and create content, but sometimes you'll find some people in the office, they're amazing cheerleaders.

You know, they're gonna support other people to do it. So it's about finding how do you find that right balance? And I can assure you it's. Starts at the top. So any CEO or business owner or leader that's listening to this podcast, you really need to set the example 'cause people are looking to you and they'll copy your behaviors.

And if it's good enough for you, it's good enough for everyone else. This is not a case of do as I say, not as I do or not my problem. I'm too busy. It's uh, something that I think you have to find time for. 

That's great. That's a great 

opening to ask. Now what are the 

things or the, the, the top three things. 'cause I'm suspecting there's a long list of things you could do to make an impact with your 

LinkedIn present, both on the profile, person profile and on the LinkedIn page. Um, and I, and, and let me just say too, this doesn't only apply 

for companies with multiple employees.

This could be like a solopreneur. They can have a, uh, 

profile, personal profile, and then have their company represented as a page too. So these things can work for both. Yes. 

Yeah, absolutely. And the good part about it is the smaller the business, the bigger the opportunity. Now, why do I say that? Because you get all the same features as a multinational company with 15,000 employees, you get the same banner size, the same amount of content. You can put out all the same features, pretty much for free. You know, you don't need to put money into it. There are, you know, I don't talk about paid strategies. that's not my piece of the puzzle, but you can use your company brand to reinforce your personal brand. No different to the big guys. And actually I think it has more of an impact because it stops you from just appearing like you're just a small fry, not a real business, just a hobby business, or it really legitimizes what you do And so you may not put as much effort and time into it. Because ultimately you're juggling so much, but you are going to all of a sudden look like a a real business in inverted commas, and I think that's important. 

Okay, great. Wonderful. So that leads us straight into, let's get the top three things we can do on either side. In order for somebody to set up their page, we're not gonna go all the way down. If they want to get more detail, they could probably come to you and. You and Michelle and Michelle and maybe Brenda, I don't know, could talk, talk with them together or something like that.

So, but let's get the top three things that people should deal with first on their LinkedIn personal profile, and then we'll switch across and we'll do the top three things that they should do on their company page to connect that and to allow for them to start on their LinkedIn journey, their B2B LinkedIn journey properly.

So let's do the personal profile first, and 

then you could take it across to the company page. 

I reckon we could make it even easier and say it's the same three things on both. Um, and the reason I say that is the first place I want people to start is the banner. So the cover image, which is the big image that you greeted with when you land on a profile or you land on a company page, both that they're different sizes, which makes it a bit awkward, but think about it as your billboard for your business. So if you are missing one or it hasn't been updated in a little while. Think of it as an opportunity that if I was standing in Times Square, had my eyes going around looking at all those billboards, I want yours to stand out so I know I'm in the right place. So I tend to say to people, have a image that's up there with at least five words that describe what you do or what your, you know, tagline might be. And I think that's important so that people immediately know that they've landed in the right place. So number one, I would say is the banner. Number two, I would say is the about section. Um, that is on both the profile and the company page. If it's been a while since you updated it, it's time to go back and have another look. And I always like to say to people, is it clear who you like to work with? What problem you solve and what it's like working with you and if you keep it that kind of simple. There's lots of different copywriting frameworks that we can go into, but I like to keep things a little bit simpler. Just again, if people are drawn to words and wanna dive into things a little bit deeper. Just they have to see that you are the right person for the job. Maybe it's your values aligned, maybe it's your way of doing things. Maybe some people just wanna group work instead of an online course or vice versa. One-on-one. Um, and so just again, make it really, really obvious. I think too many profiles, tumor, they end about sections on comedy pages.

They either get lost in jargon. Lost in talking all about the person and how amazing they are. And people, when they land there, just go, okay, enough about you. What about me? And I don't ever want people to think about that when they land on either my about section on the company page or the about section on my profile.

The third thing I would say is just the incomplete information is the thing that is worthwhile investing and going back and updating and you know, it seems kind of. Obvious and basic. And the problem is every single profile and company page that I work on with audits or rewriting services. I always find broken links.

I always find missing information. The last thing that we want is to basically have someone on the hook. They love to, you know, they'd love to work with you. They like the content that you've been putting out. They can't find you how to work with you or connect with you. And so making sure that that kind of stuff is up to date is another thing.

And you know, there's, people think that LinkedIn, you have to make it complicated to win. And I actually say it's doing the basics consistently over time, which is where the winners come through. So, um, they would be my three tips which apply across the board. 

Oh, that's great. That's good tips. So those 

two sets of tips, well that one set of tips applies 

to both your company page and your. Personal profile. Is there any difference between those? 'cause 

I know on your company page you'll have to get your own headshot and then on your No, on your 

profile, you'll have to get your headshot.

And then on the company page, you'll probably want to put your logo as the image and things of that sort. And maybe There might be some same structure. There might, but there might 

be slight differences. Are there anything 

that we should be aware of when we are doing it for the first 

time and we don't know,

um, how to do it? 

We know that LinkedIn always doesn't make life as simple as what I just have. So the banner sizes are slightly different. You're right, we will have a photo versus a logo on the company page. Uh, things like the tagline and the about sections, they're different lengths on company pages. It's like 2000 characters on your profile.

It's 2,600, so make sure you use as many of those as you can. So if you go in there. And you are only using a small amount, make sure that we kind of maximize it and put lots of keywords in there so that the LinkedIn search algorithm knows what your company page and your profile's all about. So, but you're right, there is a lot of crossover.

And at the end of the day, even if you're a solopreneur, your business is different to you. It can have a slightly different personality and care about different things or not care about things more than what you do personally. And so it doesn't have to be. Not human. you don't have to try and pretend you're bigger than what you are.

But they are different things and you know, I say to people you don't know where you'll be in, you know, five years, you know, plan for what would happen if I wanted to sell the business. I can't sell Michelle j Raymond's LinkedIn profile if I built up 20,000 followers. That isn't an asset that I can give to someone else.

Uh, if you've got a great following on your company page, you can, same as if you've got employees that are coming or you want to come, or collaborative partners that you wanna work with. so just think, maybe it's not right now, but what are your hopes And dreams for your business that, you know, maybe these two tools can help support you to get there. 

Okay. That was good. That was 

good. There's a little difference. There's a little tweaks We could make. And, uh, also what about, um, because you mentioned 

earlier that the way in which you run your pages is that, uh, 

in the intro I talked. 

About the many things that you've done and the different types of content you've released from podcast to newsletter to YouTube channel, and all those 

different things. Uh, and so there 

is some indication that you need to serve different types of content because your audience will 

consume it in, in different ways. 

What is the advice that you give to people who are starting up and 

beginning to create content? What, should they really be looking out for?

Um, and is there a difference between I. Company page content and personal profile content. 

If you're starting out, pick whichever your favorite is. There is no point me saying that short form video is gonna work the best if you are terrified about being on camera and. The same thing goes. If you don't wanna write long form texts, then maybe articles and newsletters are not for you. It's about finding what is the thing that you are most comfortable with. That for the first couple of months, you can commit to doing consistently every week. Without missing any, because it's that consistency which is gonna pay off more than worrying about, oh, should I do this type or this type or mix it up or go crazy. There are some people who are really great with graphic design that is not me for the record, if anyone's ever seen any of my, uh. A Photoshopping type fails, but it's always a bit of fun. But ultimately, just find what works for you. I often find if you take a photo of something that you're working on somewhere that you're at, photos are easier to talk about.

You know, when you're writing the text for them and they prompt your mind about why you took that photo. Um, but I think most people over. Think this stage and don't get started. And that's the biggest fear that I have. And I hope that our listeners, maybe there's someone out there right now that hasn't done their first post and is held back. It's just put something out there. Even if it's just to say, this is my first post and I'm terrified because guess what everybody else is as well. It might feel like everyone's got it all together, but the fact is it's just. You know, a couple of percent of people that are actually posting consistently.

So for me, start small. Start with your favorite thing. That is not your excuse later on to not try other things in other formats. I was absolutely petrified of making a five minute video for a digital marketing course I signed up for so much so that that course sat in my cupboard and is still there and I never completed it.

I started on LinkedIn lives as my way of trying to get over that hurdle and people probably think LinkedIn lives. How crazy is that? Like, you know, people are watching you live. I say, yeah, but they don't expect me to be perfect. It doesn't have to, I don't have to worry about editing. I didn't have to worry about seeing an audience, you know, and things like this.

So it was a great place for me to start and I highly encourage people to, you know, check out LinkedIn lives. Part of the reason I can do all of those things you were talking about Juer is because I repurpose, and I know you are such a big fan of repurposing as well, but my LinkedIn live turns into my podcast, audio turns into short clips, turns into YouTube shorts.

You know, it turns into blog articles that I write. So that for me, talking for half an hour on one LinkedIn live. Turns into so much more and saves me so much time. So that's probably one of the other secrets. Don't go too hard too early, you'll just give up. Um, and that is the last thing. 'cause you know, as you know, LinkedIn doesn't work with spike of activity.

Disappear for three weeks, spike, disappear. It is the slow and steady keep showing up, staying top of mind. So there's, um, probably more tips than you ask for. But my most powerful one is please just do what gets you started and gets consistent. 

Oh, We're 

grateful for the tips, that's for sure. We're grateful for the tips. Um, I I, and I agree with you, and I think 

that people really get bogged down by that Like, where do I start? What do I have to create? and I have to take somebody blame 

for that and other creators have to take somebody blame for that.

'cause we tend to push the thing that 

we are most comfortable with. Like I might say, do video video so 

easy. You just have to follow these 10 tips or whatever it might be. And people might be saying they might actually not want to do video, they might actually just want to do some text 

posts. And that might be the thing that they are going to succeed 

with because it's not so much the format. But is are you gonna keep on doing it, as you mentioned, are you gonna be consistent in. Putting the content out, executing on it week after week I would say you have to do it for at least a year. That's for me personally and in our 

dealing with clients, we have found that it takes about a year to build this habit and to get results.

Sometimes it's quicker, sometimes it's slower, but you know, around a year to 

to 18 months and, um, and then you start to get results. When I was looking at your 

profile. Uh, earlier today I noticed an interesting thing, Michelle, and I want you to tell 

me, 'cause I've never seen anyone do this before. Uh, so in your, the contact 

section of your personal profile under 

the address, I. You have a long message 

and it's not your address. It's just basically saying that because of the power of Zoom, I can actually read it. Thanks to the powers of Zoom, I would globally with clients, if you want to send me something, send a quick DM and I'll give you the address. And I didn't know you could do that, and that's such an interesting thing.

What made you come up with that?

I didn't wanna lose out on business opportunities because someone logged on, had a look, saw her, was here in Sydney, Australia, and went, oh, I can't work with her because she's not in the same country as I am. My thing that I love about LinkedIn is that the opportunity is you can narrow in and focus and work with people locally, or you can zoom all the way out and work with people all over the world.

Now. That's the option that I've. Ended up going down, um, I would say nine outta 10 of my clients come from overseas. I've worked with about 18 different countries, so it was just my way of saying, Hey, don't cut me off just because I'm not in the same place as you. Uh, and I think, you know, it's one of those things that when you do anything on LinkedIn, whether it's creating content or setting up your profile or your company page. Everything that I do is in service of somebody else. That's how I've gathered so much success in a relatively short period of time. So I do things that I don't want someone who wants to work with me look at that and then freak out and think, I can't work with Michelle. I really wanted to, but I'm sitting in the UK and she's in Australia.

So you know, everything I do is how can I make the. Yeah, I guess the process of working with me seamless, easy, and the last thing I wanna do with all the content that I put out is lose them at that final hurdle where we're so close, but then they go, oh no, I can't work with this. So it's a bit of fun and I think I encourage every listener to have.

Some fun, try new things. Don't just copy what's out there. That is the biggest mistake that people can make, is just start to look and end up being a clone of someone else. And I call it about, I call it, you know, create your digital twin. You know, you want the version of you on LinkedIn. That's the same as if I met you at a networking event, not this manufactured.

I've gotta be a certain thing on LinkedIn. I've gotta be more professional. I've gotta be this, oh, I can't say that. I can't show my personality. And it's not about just sharing your deep, dark, it's secrets. It's just about being yourself. And when people do that. Takes that pressure off Juma and you see them almost, when I tell people, you can just be yourself.

It's almost like this sigh of relief. Like, oh, finally, I, I can stop holding my breath and trying to be professional. I went through it myself. I know what it feels like. Uh, you know, LinkedIn trainer, Michelle, when I started my business, uh, I did not like being her, I can assure you. But I like being LinkedIn trainer, Michelle, who cares about people.

Not afraid to call out stuff and you know, I found my place and all that's ended up is as time goes on, I'm more me and less of the person I thought I had to be. 

Ah, good business with good people, right? Yeah. 

Absolutely, absolutely. 

such good 

advice. 

Uh, look, it's so easy for me to say, but I just want, I have empathy for listeners who are going, yeah, it's good for you, Michelle, but what about me? It works for everyone. It may not happen to you overnight, but again, when you're in service of other people, it's amazing how much your brain switches off, and I don't worry about.

Oh, does my voice sound funny? Have I, you know, am I the smartest person? Do I know the most about company pages or am I just an imposter? All That noise has disappeared for me because all I do is wake up every day and the actions I take, the content I create is in service of other people. and it, when I think about the difference it makes for them. I, don't have all of that noise anymore. And so that's, You know, the biggest difference. But that didn't happen on day one. So if you're at day one or back in the beginning, don't compare that to, you know, day four years for me, uh, which is one of the best sayings that I, heard when I was starting out. Don't compare your day one to someone else's day a hundred.

'cause that is a recipe for disaster on LinkedIn 

Yeah. And a recipe for disaster almost anywhere. Uh, and I think that is excellent advice. I know for me, I 

have, uh, if I have to be totally transparent, I have issues with myself. Um, we all do. we have issues with how we appear or how we sound, whether we know something or not. You compare yourself to other people.

It's an ongoing battle, internal battle. 

To continue doing the thing you know you need to do in order to build your business and just in 

order to be, um, do well in life in general. And I think I do take your advice and I do 

think it's good advice that you're giving in terms of uh, think about who you'll be helping as opposed to yourself.

If you focus a lot on yourself, you 

become too self-conscious and you wouldn't be able to get over the hurdle of how I look, how I sound, what I know, what I don't know. what other people are doing, uh, you know. Focus on the people that you're 

serving, and it makes it much, much easier to get over the hurdle of starting to share the content in the

places, both on your profile and on your company 

page that will help grow your business, and I think that's extremely important. 

And I'd love to just add one more piece onto that is when you are doing that, you don't get as overwhelmed by all the noise that happens on LinkedIn about, you should be doing this, you should be doing this, this kind of post, this kind of, you know, this number of hashtags, this short form, that long form.

Like there's so much advice going out there from LinkedIn. Trainers like myself often conflicting and you know, there's a lot of guidance about what makes their algorithm happy on LinkedIn. And I say. Throw that all out the window, push it to the side. The only thing you need to worry about is being your digital twin in service of your audience and what will make the biggest difference for them.

And that's like, you know, when people are getting started, you know, a lot of people would say don't use the repost feature, which is something that we can do on LinkedIn because you don't get credit for the reach and impressions or you know, it's helping someone else. It doesn't go very far. Or sharing links doesn't go very far.

I say, you know what? Start where you can start. You know, if hitting the repost button on a great post that you enjoyed, that someone else created is where you are comfortable with, go there because it's that first step that you can build on. It's the people that are stuck. Paralyzed. Can't click on anything, can't press, like can't write a comment, can't send a message, can't connect with people.

It starts with whatever that small action is. So do it in service of other people, and definitely not the LinkedIn algorithm. 

Yeah, I didn't expect our conversation to end up here, to go here, but this is so great 'cause I think this, this is some of the things that people need to hear. This 

is 

so many things that I. New 

business owners who are trying to find their way, or even established business owners who are trying to find their way on LinkedIn specifically need to hear. As somebody who's 

has, who has experience, both you and myself on the platforms and on in our particular places of expertise, we give advice. 

But it's not one 

size fits all. Um, you have to know what applies to you, and in some cases you have to 

ignore the advice. Totally. I don't expect that everyone I speak to or hears or sees my content should take all of my advice. in fact, I go experiment for yourself. Go find out what works for yourself. Do the thing that you feel you're most comfortable with, that you can handle. Don't overwhelm yourself, And then you go through a process of discovering what. Works for you So I, I think that 

is really, really, really excellent advice.

In fact, I like 

recently, and this is just to add to what you're saying, 

recently, I, I myself got fed up 

of following some of the conventions and I said, I'm gonna use LinkedIn, like it's Twitter. I'm just 

gonna write short text posts and just post them. And I've been doing that for the last. Since beginning of this year without any apology and it's been working for 

me because sometimes I just have a thought and I want to 

share it with the people who are connected to me and the people who like my content and it.

I don't wanna go and record a five minute video or spend two hours, four minutes. I just wanna say something and I just do it. And I think doing that really does help you.

It takes away that feeling of being overwhelmed all the time. You know? And when you're overwhelmed, you can't create good content because you're stuck in your own brain going, is it right? Is it perfect? Have I done this per, you know, that person does it like this. Maybe I should try and sound like them.

That person's got more likes. And you know, I don't even get me started on Engagement pods 'cause that's a whole other podcast for another day, but. The thing that I, you know, when Michelle Griffin and I wrote the LinkedIn branding book together, it's a book on branding, but the whole first section is dedicated to mindset because it doesn't matter who we come across, if we don't get people out of being, you know, I guess fearful, overwhelmed.

You know, imposter syndrome kicks in big time for most people at some stage on LinkedIn, myself included as always. But we started with mindset. 'cause it doesn't matter how many LinkedIn tips I give you about content or Juma gives you about content, if you can't get your mindset in that right place to actually get you started, the rest of it is just white noise that gets you nowhere.

So that's why it's really important to me to have the conversations to say, you know what? If you're feeling like this, it is totally real. It is totally normal. It doesn't matter whether you're a CEO starting out 20 years, experience two minutes, experience it. It happens to everybody. And I think it's really important to normalize that feeling.

Social media's It's designed for us all to compare ourselves to other people and. how they're going, and. Comparisonitis that will kill your creativity as well. And so, you know, just by normalizing conversations like this, so I appreciate you Juma, letting this conversation go that way.

Um, because we can talk about features and functions on the platform and you know, what makes great content, but if I can't get people off the sidelines creating, then you know, the rest of it, as I said, is just white noise. And I would hate for that to be the thing that stops people from growing their business like they dream about. 

Uh, so good. That's so good. And I don't think we can add any more to 

that. We can't go back and talk about features and, and tips and tricks about LinkedIn pages. Now we, we've gone down a road 

of encouraging the people and I think this is a good place to bring us in for a close, Michelle, if someone hears this and they want to.

Come to your page and get 

lots more encouragement and also some tips and tricks. Tell me where 

can they find you online? 

I have got millions of tips and tricks in lots of different places, but please come and connect with me over on LinkedIn. That's where I'm most active. And it's Michelle J. Raymond. And the reason that J'S there is 'cause there's thousands of Michelle, Raymond. So I've made it a little bit easier for You to find me not make myself try and sound smarter, which is what somebody asked me one day, do I put the J in there so I sound smarter?

And I was like no, I'm just doing It in service so you can find me easier, which I thought was hilarious. and I was like. Do people think that about me? You know, I'm human. I, I have the same thoughts as everybody else, but I would love it if you've listened to the podcast. So let me know that this was helpful and. if there's anything that I can do to help you get that first post out there. And, you know, myself and Juma, we're here cheering you on, so I'd I, I'm always happy to help. 

That's, that's so cool. That's good. That's good. Um, my middle initial does not work very 

well, so I don't have one. Maybe one day I'll try to make myself some smarter by adding it, in.

You are already smarter. You don't have to worry about that.

Uh, But it's, it's been so, so good talking with you, uh, Michelle, about LinkedIn pages and about personal profiles and in the end, encouraging the people to do what works for them on LinkedIn to get started. That was key inside of there. So thank you so much students for joining us on a useful content podcast, useful content, classroom dismissed.

And we clear. Lovely,

Love it.

lovely. Excellent. Excellent. Well, that was good. I, I didn't, um, expect things to go that direction.

so I know, or is this part of the thing? The few minutes afterwards. 

I just, like 10 seconds 

afterwards, I continue recording. I didn't, I 

didn't, I didn't, I didn't expect it to go there.

sorry about that. We went that way when you wanted to go that way, but I think we weren't where we were needed to go. 

Exactly. Exactly. That's exactly it. Uh, let me okay, let me stop now. 

I love it.