LinkedIn Groups are great way to increase your visibility and make new connections that can ultimately help grow your business.

A lot of people don’t know how to effectively use LinkedIn Groups to build their brands and businesses but they work – if you allow them to. Here’s how.

LinkedIn Groups help you find, engage and connect with others. You can offer your expertise to solve problems and create conversations to showcase your expertise.

Perhaps most importantly you can directly interact with people who are not your first-degree connections, immediately expanding your network.

After you’ve joined a group, go to its Members page. From there you can run a filtered search and create a list of prospects based on specific job titles, company names, physical locations or other criteria. Use that list to connect with influencers, prospects and clients.

The key with success on LinkedIn Groups (and LinkedIn in general) is to not overly self-promote. Instead offer value to others.

Provide helpful content such as webinars and articles which in turn showcases your subject matter authority and makes people want to learn more about you.

You can also use LinkedIn Groups to find opportunities to share your expertise. When another member posts, respond with an insightful comment. This is an effective way to find and engage with people who are looking for the product, service or expertise you have.

So many people join LinkedIn Groups and then do the hard sell, which turns off people. so instead write and share posts on topics of interest to group members that highlights your expertise.

With so many groups on LinkedIn it can be hard to determine which ones are the best for you. Look through your connections’ groups for ideas as well as your industry associations. Your alma maters are also important groups to join. Just look in the main LinkedIn search bar for them.

So next time you have an upcoming webinar or a new article to publicize, take the action step of posting them in your top LinkedIn groups too.

Remember quality over quantity when it comes to how many groups you post in and join – you can join up to 50 groups but there is no reason to do that.

How are you using LinkedIn groups to generate leads and build your brand?