As we are in the midst of the COVID-19 outbreak, online networking has never been more important to stay top of mind and build connections – whether you have a job or are looking for one.

There are three essential building blocks of LinkedIn – your profile, your connections and your interaction on the platform. I find that many professionals focus on the first one – creating a strong profile, but they don’t take it to the next level by strategically building their network (meaning sending and accepting connection requests) and maintaining a consistent presence through liking, commenting and sharing posts.

Here are some ways you can fire on all cylinders when it comes to strengthening your LinkedIn presence. Remember that LinkedIn is where business professionals gather, do research and look for information especially now.

I am often asked by friends, industry colleagues and lawyers about how they can become stronger social media marketers both for themselves, their lawyers and their firms. I always say that that it’s not hard to do if you are committed and resourceful – it just involves being more clever and creative about the content and visual assets that you do have. It also involves a significant time commitment to stay top of mind in order to effectively engage with clients, prospects and other key influencers to strengthen your brand and to generate real business. If you’re willing to do those two things, mastering the techniques is easy. Now let’s get to work! 

I have a few favorite go-to content marketing tricks and tips that help guide every post and article I create that help me engage my target audiences. They also make the content I have work smarter and harder for me and my team, which makes us more efficient and strategic. Incorporating these tips into your content strategy will help enhance lead generation and brand building (but don’t tell eveyrone about them – let’s keep them our little secret)!

I keep updating this story because the hashtag follower counts are rapidly changing and rising. Here’s an updated version of the chart and the article as of 4/19.

Hashtags are great tools to help your content become discovered on LinkedIn, but only if you know how to correctly use hashtags and you use the most effective ones.

If you’re writing about the coronavirus on LinkedIn, you should be using hashtags so your content can be amplified and have a stronger impact. The content you post should have your target audience in mind and be designed to help them navigate this unprecedented time.

But first off – what is a hashtag? Just like on Twitter or Instagram, a LinkedIn hashtag is any combination of letters, number or emoji that follow the # symbol such as #coronavirus. Any spaces or symbols used within the tag will break the link, so that means you can’t include apostrophes, commas, exclamation points or hyphens in your hashtag.

Hashtags help users find content on a specific topic. If you add hashtags to your posts, they’ll help you get discovered by other users, including those not connected to you (2nd and 3rd degree connections). This is because individuals now search for content under hashtags and click on the hashtags in posts. In addition, you can follow hashtags on LinkedIn, meaning that posts containing the ones you have selected will appear in your news feed.

Being sensitive to current market conditions and disseminating content and programs that are designed to inform your clients and help them navigate this unprecedented time should be your only guiding principle during the coronavirus outbreak when it comes to content and digital marketing.