LinkedIn Refresh: A New You for 2020

January 15, 2020 by 1 Comment

By Janna Neequaye, Senior Marketing Communications Manager

The holidays are over and it’s time to get back to business! Have you taken stock of your own personal branding and how you want to portray yourself lately? When is the last time you spent some time reviewing your LinkedIn profile and updating it?

How you present yourself in LinkedIn is important to your professional success – especially if you are in sales or business development. Not only do you check out others, they’re checking you out too! Think about it — your potential customers check you out. Your peers, friends and acquaintances in your social circles even check you out.

So, why wouldn’t you want to present yourself and your accomplishments in the best possible light, with the most up-to-date information? Read more of this post

Filed under Government IT Sales Summit, Marketing, Sales Tagged with , ,

6 ways to transition to the new administration

December 12, 2016 by Leave a comment

Allan Rubin 65x85transitionBy Allan Rubin, vice president of marketing for Arrow ECS North America

The election is over, but uncertainty about the future of Washington still looms. Despite high-level picks already announced by the new President-elect, no one really knows the makeup of the future administration.

This creates some big questions for the IT industry: Who will stay and who will go in government, and how do technology companies navigate the transition? It’s tricky, but there’s a lot of opportunity (and risk) for us during this brief window. It’s a question your executives at corporate are probably asking you about already.

Read more of this post

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The LinkedIn Factor

April 2, 2013 by 2 Comments

photo_Allan-Rubin_65x85by Allan Rubin, Vice President, Marketing

I’ve been a long-time devotee of LinkedIn. I crossed the publicly-posted 500+ connection benchmark years ago, and I’m involved in a number of groups as time allows. But I don’t hold a candle to LinkedIn power user Mark Amtower.

Mark posted a compelling article, “Is Your CEO Afraid of LinkedIn?,” on WashingtonTechnology.com yesterday in which he made the case for why LinkedIn needs to be a key part of your B2G marketing arsenal. He called out how LinkedIn can be used for:

  • Prospecting for new business
  • Account penetration
  • Defining and defending a niche competitive advantage
  • Expanding your network
  • Getting on (and staying on) the radar of influencers in your market niche

If you’re reading this post, the chances are pretty good you found out about it via one of my LinkedIn posts. Month after month, we’re seeing LinkedIn generate an increasingly larger share of traffic to the immixGroup Web site and to this blog.

Mark is right to point out the importance of social media in reaching government audiences, particularly in light of the “interesting times” in which we find ourselves,” due to:

  • Radically reduced budgets
  • Travel restrictions for all feds
  • Restrictions on feds attending events
  • LPTA, FSSI and other procurement “innovations”

We’ve heard directly from high-level government IT executives how these issues are changing the way they consume information and learn about new solutions. More and more, they are turning to each other to request recommendations and insights on products that can solve their business problems. Mark referenced a Forrester study that confirms that point: 58 percent of decision makers turn to social networks to learn from trusted peers.

While you’re not too likely to find a CTO posting a pseudo RFI in a social media group, you can follow key individuals and see what they’re talking about in peer groups on LinkedIn, GovLoop, MeriTalk, and others. Remember that top executives often rely on influencers in the trenches to bubble up new ideas and commercial technology solutions. And you can increase your influence by being part of the discussions that are happening every day. The key is not to spam the message boards, but to listen, share good quality content (not marketing fluff), and track what’s being talked about—and by whom. Stalkers will not be successful, but contributors can build relationships and learn what their customers really care about.

Beyond just being there, you also need to commit to social media as a marketing investment. It requires a solid plan, a continued focus on metrics, and — this is a big one — training to make sure your sales reps know how to use tools like LinkedIn to their advantage.

Social media is becoming a larger part of the immixGroup marketing portfolio each month. I hope it’s part of yours.

Filed under Marketing Tagged with , , , , , ,

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