Back to Basics Tuesday: your company profile Page: it's not about you!

There’s another way to brand on LinkedIn. Start a separate company profile Page to speak about your firm (not you): value proposition, contact details, products, services, with a rotating spotlight on one of them.

The company profile Page is not the same as your personal profile, no matter how small the size of your firm. I need to make that clear, as it is one of the most common mistakes I see on LinkedIn personal profiles: using the company description to explain your current job there and no company profile Page in its place.

In my case, I am effectively the sole employee of each of the 3 firms I started, but each of my companies has its own brand and I have my own distinct personal brand, partially composed of my firms’ reputation and additionally with my persona.

I have to use my unique voice in each firm, depending on the role and the company from which I am serving the client. Multipreneurship has its definite marketing and branding challenges and one of its merits comes in the form of the company Page. So in my case, I have separate company Pages and an independent personal profile.

In each company Page, I assert the voice that will convey “why buy from my company.” I don’t copy-paste my website material here. I am speaking to a different audience on LinkedIn (savvy business pros) vs. the internet (the universe) and no one should read the same thing twice. I have an opportunity to speak to a finite audience about the company I developed and work in. The same about my other company Pages.

If you have employees who have any contact with the business public, be sure the message on their personal profiles and that of the company Page all are in synch; do not force them to be the same, or obviously contrived to be that way, but allow their personality differences to rise in how they express themselves; one apart from the others in their own ways, the richness of the company brand as a sum greater than its parts, and this will come across well, only when engineered correctly. Yes, it takes coordination. The public should not be confused by what they see.

Conversely, a single weak link in the company’s brand profile chain can create confusion and loss of focus to an attention-deficit reader, so be aware and review what your employees are saying on their profiles to keep the firm and personal brands on point. It takes coordination too.

Mission accomplished, only if you feed the company Page regularly.

The company Page is a searchable and important aspect of your company brand on LinkedIn.

Use it well and do not let it appear shallow or go stale. It’s one of the 2 essential parts of your LinkedIn brand.