LinkedIn B2B Surveys - Will They be Social?

LinkedIn yesterday announced a new service that enables market researchers and investors to conduct market intelligence research using LinkedIn’s network of over 30 million professionals worldwide, approximately half of whom are IT and business decision makers.The news was quickly picked up by numerous bloggers including Doug Caverly and Bill Holmes (an indication of how adept the PR folks at LinkedIn are with interactive PR).

Essentially, companies that want to conduct market research among difficult-to-reach B2B and IT decision makers will now be able to slice and dice profiles of LinkedIn's large member base to reach groups with very specific attributes. From the participant side, "LinkedIn members who participate in a survey can choose from a variety of rewards including gift cards from Amazon, Starbucks, Best Buy, or make a donation to charities."

This is all good—vendors can get valuable feedback from the right sample groups based on accurate LinkedIn profiles, LinkedIn gets another revenue stream, and participants get token rewards. But it seems to me there may be an opportunity missed here.

People join social networks for lots of reasons, but I've never of anyone joining for the purpose of collecting $10 gift cards or Starbucks coffee coupons. Among the top reasons people join are to get recognition and to form new relationships. Bloggers often join, for example, in order to both drive more traffic to their blogs and to connect with like-minded readers and other bloggers.

So...any company can spend some money on gift cards and use the new LinkedIn offering to collect market research data. But the really smart ones will find a way to tap the motivations of LinkedIn members and create a mutually beneficial social experience that provides not just data, but understanding.

*****

Contact Mike Bannan: mike@digitalrdm.com

Comments

Raymond said…

Linkedin is really a job site isnt it? Linkedin was included into the About.com Top 10 job site list but linkedin is still the only social network on the job site list. The newest 3 job sites on the list are-

www.linkedin.com (professional networking)
www.indeed.com (aggregated listings)
www.realmatch.com (matches you to the perfect job)

Complete top 10 job site list here:
http://jobsearch.about.com/od/joblistings/tp/jobbanks.htm

1:03 PM

Tom Pick said…

Thanks Ray. I suspect what's happening is that many people people view LinkedIn as a jobs site (including About.com obviously), the folks at LinkedIn are trying to diversify beyond their current labels.

1:09 PM

Anonymous said…

Well said, Tom. Incentives like cash and gift cards have been standards in the survey business. But I agree that social networking members are likely to respond positively to less tangible rewards.

I started off using LinkedIn as simply professional networking, though have also used it over the years during job searches. But it does seem to finally be rising to the level of an actual social networking site with added functionality, and increasing membership.

11:31 AM

Tom Pick said…

I agree Layne. I think Facebook woke up LinkedIn to the fact that new applications are important, so LinkedIn is now scrambling to add those.

11:43 AM

All Time Greats

Top Notch Digital Marketing Tip: Google AdWords and PPC

MARKETING: 101 Looking for some online marketing strategy or social media tips to grow your business? Well, you’ve come to the right digital marketing resource! Web Market Central has been doling out the proper digital marketing advice for years. And as you already know, marketing to customers online is 100 times easier than using dated, expensive and traditional marketing tactics. Like seriously, who uses billboards in 2019? But you already know how effective digital marketing can be in the modern age. So now that you're totally convinced of what you already knew, let’s give you today's top-notch digital marketing tip! The Pure Unfettered Power of PPC (Pay-Per-Click) and PPC Campaigns Just like optimizing your site to rank for keywords, you can use our online marketing tips to pay to run advertisements on Google so that your business is shown on the first page of search engine results. Ranking this way is instantaneous whereas SEO (Search Engine Optimizati...

How to Use SEO: Leverage SEO To Be Found Online and Boost Your Online Marketing

All businesses that want to attract customers online, no matter the business size or age, have few options other than Search Engine Optimization (SEO). SEO In The Box™ by Results Driven Marketing®, LLC There are roughly 1.8 billion websites online, and basic SEO allows Google to find and index or catalog your webpages. After that, Google serves you up to searchers in the organic section. The question remains: where they list your site, on page one or page 22 or further back? SEO controls your positioning. Do you want to be found online or not? If your business is online or you want your product or service to be found online, then Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a must, and knowing how to use SEO to leverage the power of the internet is vital. Arguably, an effective SEO strategy gets you on the organic results section of the search engine results pages (SERP). Organic traffic is highly valuable and requires high-quality SEO. But even busines...

Top Notch Digital Marketing Tip: Optimize Your Site

Looking for some online marketing tips to grow your business? Well, you’ve come to the right digital marketing resource! Web Market Central has been doling out the proper digital marketing advice for years. And as you already know, marketing to customers online is 100 times easier than using dated, expensive and traditional marketing tactics. Like seriously, who uses billboards in 2019? But you already know how effective digital marketing and an seo strategy can be in the modern age. So now that you're totally convinced of what you already knew, let’s give you today's top-notch digital marketing tip! Optimize Your Site to Improve Search Engine Rankings Most small business owners know that their websites need to be optimized in order for search engines, like Google and Bing, to find them and rank them on the search engine results page. If you don’t know, that’s okay. You can learn all about Search Engine Optimization and SEO best practices here to help impr...

Top-Notch Digital Marketing Tip: Advertisements That Make Sense

MARKETING: 101 Looking for some online marketing tips to grow your business? Well, you’ve come to the right digital marketing resource ! Web Market Central has been doling out the proper DM advice for years. And as you already know, marketing to customers online is 100 times easier than using dated, expensive and traditional marketing tactics. Like seriously, who uses billboards in 2019? But you already know how effective Digital Marketing can be in the modern age. So now that you're totally convinced of what you already knew, let’s give you today's top notch-digital marketing tip! Advertisement Congruence If your business is running ads this is one of our most important online marketing tips! Ad congruence is when your ads and landing pages look alike or have the same message. Have you ever clicked on an ad and been taken to a page that looked nothing like the ad? When your ads look like the web pages they lead to, customers will feel like they are in ...

The Wrong Way to Build External Links for SEO

Anyone who's worked on search engine optimization (SEO) for any length of time understands the importance of building relevant external links to a website. But whether you do choose to SEO internally, outsource it domestically, or offshore the effort, it's important to get this process right. If you're doing it internally, follow established best practices for this effort (including the information below). If you outsource your SEO, ask your vendor exactly how they perform their SEO work. I frequently receive reciprocal link requests for WebMarketCentral.com . Some of the requests are well-written, some inelegant, some spammy. But I recently received the following message, which was among the worst I had ever seen: Subject: Link exchange Dear Webmaster, My name is (name), and I run the web sites.: http://www.clickatest.co.uk/(PR>2) http://www.clickajob.co.uk/(PR>3) http://www.freshpromotion.com/ I recently found your site and am very interested in exchanging links. Y...

What is CRO and How Can It Skyrocket Your Conversion Rates? Expert Digital Marketing Strategies Revealed

‍ Image Source: FreeImages‍ ## Introduction to CRO (Conversion Rate Optimization) In the world of digital marketing, Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) is a crucial strategy that can significantly impact your business's success. CRO focuses on improving the percentage of website visitors who take desirable actions, such as making a purchase, filling out a form, or subscribing to a newsletter. By optimizing your conversion rates, you can maximize the return on investment (ROI) of your digital marketing efforts. Why CRO is important for your business CRO is important for your business because it can directly impact your bottom line. By increasing your conversion rates, you can generate more leads, increase sales, and ultimately drive revenue growth. Instead of solely focusing on driving more traffic to your website, CRO enables you to make the most of your existing traffic by ensuring that a higher percentage of visitors convert into customers. In addition to boosting your revenue, C...

SEO Link Spam - What Is It and Who's to Blame?

Over the years, unscrupulous black hat SEO scammers have used a variety of tricks—keyword stuffing, link farms, white text and others—to try to manipulate search results, and the algorithms used by Google, Yahoo and the other search engines have evolved to identify and squelch the effectiveness of such nefarious tactics. A more vexing issue for the search engines is dealing with link spam, not only because it is difficult to detect and address algorithmically, but because there isn't even a clear definition. As a website owner, the term represents emails like this: Dear webmaster, As a part of ongoing campaign to increase the Link Popularity of My website I am looking for some good potential sites like yours. I review your site and find that, in SEO perspective your site is Perfect. Also, this would be a great resource for my visitors too. I would request you to consider listing my site. Title:- My Spammy Website URL:- http://www.indiaspamforyou.com Description:- mi...

Digital Marketeers Are Hurting Their Clients With Local Citations; Some Just Don't Care

Digital Marketeers Are Hurting Their Clients With Local Citations; Some Just Don't Care Mount Pleasant, SC — Marketers are adding their clients to directories. Many of these directories are designed to provide businesses with industry exposure. But marketers across the globe are fouling up or disrupting various directory platforms. By listing businesses in the wrong directory to get local citations. What is a local Citation? A local citation is any online mention of the name, address, and phone number of a local business. Local citations can appear on various platforms, such as search engines, directories, apps, social media, and blogs. Local citations help Internet users discover local businesses and can also impact local search engine rankings. Local citations should be accurate, consistent, and relevant to boost the local presence of a business, according to MOZ. Local citations have become critical to Google rendering accurate search results. Websites with little or no ...

Search This Blog