More often than not, LinkedIn gets pushed aside as the boring older sister of both Twitter and Facebook. As a platform that has a USP of being specifically for businesses, it’s easy to see why in the early days LinkedIn was treated as something of a black sheep, after all, there was no way social media and businesses were ever going to amalgamate. Social media was for teenagers who were over fond of cats and things called memes, it was never going to be a means for businesses to engage with customers.

Well, as it turned out that’s exactly what happened and LinkedIn suddenly came into its own, leaving the other platforms to play catch up.

If you’re on Twitter, great, if you’re on Facebook, even better, but if you’re still pushing LinkedIn aside as unnecessary then you’re missing a trick and we’ve made an excellent case for why.

LinkedIn isn’t boring, It’s professional

The beauty of LinkedIn is that it's purely for business purposes, which means that even those companies that are still squeamish about using social media can appreciate the value in having a LinkedIn company page. There will be some traditional companies that still won’t have graduated to Twitter or Facebook and you can miss valuable opportunities if you discount good ole LinkedIn as a dead duck.

What’s more, there are 40 million students and graduates on LinkedIn, all bright-eyed and ready to get out there and strut their intellectual stuff, so if you’re looking for fresh talent you’d be missing a huge chunk of it.

LinkedIn acts as an online CV, a means of connecting with other professionals and a great way to job hunt or recruit. LinkedIn isn’t the boring older sister, she’s the highly regarded academic of social media.

It’s a great place to earn content kudos

If ever there was a place to put your content it would be LinkedIn. Think about it, it’s the equivalent of sending your paper to a specific journal; you are being judged by your peers and with any luck, praised by them too, which is priceless for your company’s reputation.

Not only does it get you brownie points within the industry, it’s a great way to start a conversation with your peers and potential clients. Putting time into good quality content is fundamental to your success and shows perspective customers and your business partners that you care about the industry you’re in.

It allows you to play Sherlock

Well. Sort of. The point is LinkedIn gives you a perfect opportunity to not only launch your own new ideas and promotions, you can also keep a weather eye on your competitors and what they’re up to. Now it’s true that they too can play at this game, but whether they do it as well as you is another kettle of fish.

With your deduction hat firmly on, it’s good to consider a few things when perusing your competitors pages:

• What is their general content strategy? Can you adopt or improve on it?
• Is there a lot of disruption in their employee structure? Could this be an opportunity to get some new talent for your own company?
• What are they discussing in their content? Is it on trend and are you as up to date?

There is infinite value in keeping an eye on your competitors and making sure you keep up to date with the latest changes and concerns within the industry. The fundamental point however, is this: don’t just notice, act upon your deductions.

Link In or Lose Out

Adopting LinkedIn as part of your business social strategy may seem like a chore, after all, it can be time consuming with just one platform. That said all the content you produce should be able to hold up on any platform, so those insightful and informative articles you’re sending out on Facebook will work just as well on LinkedIn.

Once you’ve set up your main page (which is a doddle and a great way to show off) then the rest is easy and you can even use a management tool like Sprout Social to upload content to multiple platforms.

With your deer stalker hat and armful of content you can make a huge impact on LinkedIn, so make sure you don’t alienate yourself from the wealth of opportunity it affords.