In this episode of #TBNE Rob shares his top 3 Tips to Grow Your Social Sphere of Influence and leverage your social channels. Check out as Rob shares how to: Optimize your profiles Make a conscious effort Focus on engagement Tune in for the tips and tricks as well as hear about what Rob has been up to with his travel and what is to come next on the pod. Don't forget to subscribe and leave a review.
In this episode of #TBNE Rob shares his top 3 Tips to Grow Your Social Sphere of Influence and leverage your social channels.
Check out as Rob shares how to:
Tune in for the tips and tricks as well as hear about what Rob has been up to with his travel and what is to come next on the pod.
Don't forget to subscribe and leave a review.
Connect with Rob:
Show Produced by: Niranjan Deshpande (Nick), Broken Frames Studio, www.brokenframesstudio.com
Creative Director: Maxim Sokolov, www.maximsokolov.com
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00:00:07:18 - 00:00:33:01
Rob Napoli
Bear nation. How we doing? It’s your host Rob Napoli hopefully you're having a wonderful day in week at the time of listening to this and I'm excited and I'm excited to wrap a little bit with you today. Today I'm going be sharing my three biggest tips for LinkedIn and how to leverage it. And not only is this for LinkedIn, this is going to be same for using Twitter, same if you use Instagram.
00:00:33:08 - 00:00:56:20
Rob Napoli
It's my three best tips for your social profiles and how to leverage your social soul to drive connection, drive, business, drive, growth, drive followers, drive everything. So that's what today is all about. Before I get into that, I'm excited to do a sell episode. It's been a while since I got to sit down at the mike and chat with you all.
00:00:57:09 - 00:01:23:11
Rob Napoli
It's been super busy at the time of reporting. It's the end of October. I just got back from quite a bit of travel, spent two weeks in Santorini, Greece was in. Santorini was in for Alexandros. Alexandros another Greek island with only 700 inhabitants. It's absolutely amazing. Highly recommend you stop by there. They've got some amazing beaches, awesome sunsets.
00:01:24:01 - 00:01:48:03
Rob Napoli
And then spent a week up in the north of Sweden up in Umea with my friends over at Umea Innovation did a one week program up there doing workshops with some of their founders. I did a couple keynotes, just got to hang out and work with some amazing companies and amazing people. And then I went to Stockholm for a couple of days and got to explore and a few companies there that I was working with.
00:01:48:16 - 00:02:11:17
Rob Napoli
And then I got to spend my 35th birthday with my twin brother down in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. They had a game, so head down and tailgated. And we had a if you all pay attention to the podcast and know me as a Harry Potter themed birthday party. So we had the house flags and all kinds of cool stuff.
00:02:11:17 - 00:02:34:09
Rob Napoli
So it was a lot of fun. Enjoyed all of that. Now, back in New York City with no plans to travel until January of 2023. So it feels nice to be at a stable for a little bit and back to recording some content. So let's get into it. You know, I wrote a book called The Social Soul and it's all about leveraging your personal, professional brand.
00:02:34:10 - 00:02:54:15
Rob Napoli
I get asked a lot and there's a lot of content out here on this and there's a lot of people talking about personal brand, how to leverage it, what to do their best tips and tricks. And so some this may seem pretty, pretty normal, but but I want to talk through it because I see it happen all the time and I see mistakes with it all the time as the first tip of mine is.
00:02:55:11 - 00:03:17:20
Rob Napoli
Profile optimization. First things first. You've got to set up a profile and that's across any platform right? You have key real estate on LinkedIn. You have key real estate on Instagram, you have key real estate on TikTok and you have key real estate on Twitter. First things first. Good picture. Have a clear, good headshot. You all have iPhones or whatever with really good cameras.
00:03:17:20 - 00:03:39:04
Rob Napoli
Get a really good kind of portrait mode, head shot it shouldn't be something you're crap it out. Somebody with the arm around you take the 10 seconds to two white background shoot a quick photo I have a yellow background I use pixel. You can also use Canva. I do it. So I tell people, look for the bearded man, but with the yellow background you're not going to miss me.
00:03:39:04 - 00:04:05:07
Rob Napoli
It kind of pops and stands out, but you can easily do with minus second your tagline in your headline, especially LinkedIn. It shouldn't just be CEO of this or SDR of that or a marketing executive here. All right. What are the things you know, what do you really do? What is the impact like training leaders for tomorrow, right.
00:04:05:22 - 00:04:26:20
Rob Napoli
So people know exactly the impact. Your like this is the place where you put it in all your Twitter, Instagram, what is the impact you want to make? Then you can kind of put your title if you want to write. So training leaders of two mile ahead of employee branding at X, Y, Z Company. So really make sure that that headline speaks exactly to what you're doing.
00:04:27:13 - 00:04:50:22
Rob Napoli
And that's why when people see your name, your photo and your headline maybe say to you engaging on a post they have, oh, I know who that is and what they do, not just what their title at the company is, and it makes it more attractive to want to chat with the next thing. Have a strong about me section, right?
00:04:50:24 - 00:05:15:07
Rob Napoli
If you get that real estate, especially in LinkedIn, the about me section is not about the company you own operate or work with. for myself a little louder for those in the back. It is not about your company, it is about you. What is your journey? What is your story? What are the things that you want to do? If you go to my LinkedIn profile and read my about me, you'll understand who I am.
00:05:15:07 - 00:05:33:18
Rob Napoli
You'll understand a little bit of what I do. You'll understand that you kind of have a few key things to chat with me about. Like I'm on a mission to find the best whiskey bar in Manhattan. I give you opportunity to know who I am, what I like, and also things to reach out to you about. That's not very standard.
00:05:33:18 - 00:05:55:11
Rob Napoli
So we take the extra 20 seconds to look at about me. You can create a really engage in conversation with me. So use that real estate in Twitter and Instagram, you know, quick, low once you have a less characters to do that and but you can still leverage that effectively in a way that makes sense for you to drive engagement and followers.
00:05:56:00 - 00:06:24:05
Rob Napoli
Right. So we've got a good photo, we've got a good tagline and then we have our About Me section are quick, kind of like heads up. So like all of my Instagram, it's ecosystem builder, trainer and strategist, author of the Social Soul host of the podcast, founder, entrepreneur, trainer, and it has my website. So really try to leverage people who want to follow me, understand that I talk about entrepreneurship and I have clear call to action to drive them out through my content funnels.
00:06:24:22 - 00:06:46:11
Rob Napoli
Same thing with Twitter. Also bonus points have a banner photo. You can use that as your company if you want. You can create something on Canva that's a passion. Talking about, you know, if you love New York City, put the New York City skyline. If you love the city you're in with the skyline, leverage that some way that makes it pop.
00:06:46:18 - 00:07:18:18
Rob Napoli
Just don't have the standard Twitter on LinkedIn. Put a custom banner in there, take the extra seconds. Right. And the last thing on the tip, everyone is optimizing your profile is setting a featured and tik-tok. You can pen posts right and LinkedIn you can pen featured post leverage those put your most authentic best foot forward there creates and feature content posted to the top of your page and allow it to work for you.
00:07:18:18 - 00:07:48:00
Rob Napoli
Because when people look, they take about 10 seconds to look at your profile. And that's right there. It's usually your photo name and headline and then it shows your feature content, your activity, your About Me section. Then it gets into experience. So make sure you have those things that are optimized first. It's the same thing on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Tiktok they see photo, the name a click about me and they see your content.
00:07:48:00 - 00:08:20:23
Rob Napoli
So good photo, good title headline usually about me section and maximize that premium real estate and make sure you have your kind of featured section or pen posts. So that's one is optimizing your profile. Step two is all around making your presence a conscious, conscious choice. Right. And what does that mean? So I talk about books about have I call it my kind of six C's.
00:08:21:10 - 00:08:42:17
Rob Napoli
The first thing is we have to make a conscious choice to care about the fact that we have a social profile that we want to leverage and that we put we put time and energy and effort into it. The second thing is connect. Connect with individuals. Connect with are you know, I say there's three groups that you want to connect with.
00:08:42:17 - 00:09:02:22
Rob Napoli
One is kind of your family, friends, colleagues, right, Two is those that you can learn from. Right. Who are you? Fine. Because they're any industry you want to learn from them and who can learn from you? Who are you connecting with? Because they're in the industry and maybe there's an exchange of value. Then three Who you’re selling to? like, why are you on the platform?
00:09:03:05 - 00:09:24:04
Rob Napoli
And you might say, Hey, Rob, not all of us are selling, right? We're all trying to connect and sell something, whether that's a new job, new business, whatever. We're trying to sell something. So we're connecting to those that we want to work with in some way, shape or form, and you should reach out to them. So we want to have those kind of three buckets to connect, right?
00:09:24:12 - 00:09:46:13
Rob Napoli
And then from there it's creating & curating. You don't have to be a content creator and talk about my, my, my final step here, but create and create in a way that you have to put some content out. You have to put some out to get you can't just put nothing. So it could be curating articles and things that your company is doing that could be working for things that you care about and share them with your thoughts.
00:09:47:01 - 00:10:16:08
Rob Napoli
Right? May reshare things that really highlight what you're passionate about, something that shows that you're active and moving, consistency, right? Building a social profile building and to leverage is all about consistency. It's a marathon, not a sprint. It takes time. Not just think if you post every day and you like cycle through and you use some automated tool to do your five posts a week and all this is just going to grow.
00:10:17:09 - 00:10:47:04
Rob Napoli
It takes time to really build that authentic influence and that all of us are trying to be content creators and that is okay, right? But you still have to care. You still have to connect, you have to curate, you have to create, and you have to really make sure you focus on that and then control. Right. One of the biggest fears about going online is that there's keyboard wires out there and it's really easy to emotionally respond.
00:10:47:04 - 00:11:09:01
Rob Napoli
But control how you respond to control, how you how you talk to people out there and people are talking shit. People are saying negative things. Take a step back. You can decide how you want to respond. You can respond negatively, you respond positively. You can just delete the comment but control how you respond. You cannot control how people are going to respond to you, your brand, or what you put out there.
00:11:09:01 - 00:11:29:16
Rob Napoli
But you can control how you respond to them. So focus on that. So to recap, my best step one how to optimize your profile to do is to make it a conscious choice. And then step three become and engager, not a creator first, right? So many of us want to try to be that, oh, I want to be a thought leader.
00:11:29:20 - 00:11:53:04
Rob Napoli
I want to be a LinkedIn expert. I want to do this. And we just start, create, create, create be an engager give value for those that you want to learn from comments, comment on their content. And this is amazing because X, Y, Z, what about this? Right. You can also engage in discussion. Hey, I really enjoy your point of view here, but what about this?
00:11:54:21 - 00:12:28:19
Rob Napoli
Especially if you are looking to grow a following or a community sometimes commenting on bigger players content and being that kind of top featured will give you a bigger connection and growth than anything else. So engage, engage, engage. Also, like if you want to do, you just want to put good karma out there, especially in your ecosystem. The best thing you can do to something your entrepreneur friends or friends that are looking for new jobs, whatever it is, just to like comment and share, just a quick help.
00:12:28:19 - 00:12:52:05
Rob Napoli
If nothing else, it helps the shit out of them right engagement matter, so become an engager. If there's one thing that everyone can take away, it's not for you and so many of you that listened to this podcast. I know our lurkers. There's a lot of lurkers out there. We use social, we scroll, we follow, we double tap that like and we kind of move on our day, take the extra time to engage.
00:12:53:04 - 00:13:11:16
Rob Napoli
And what I mean by engage, take the time if you want to grow any channel, want to talk what I said is to engage in five pieces of content a day and it's not lacking. It means put a comment, put a meaningful comment five times a day. You don't have to do on the weekends, but five days a week.
00:13:11:16 - 00:13:31:17
Rob Napoli
I know you're on social every day of the week, but do it five times a day, five days a week for a month, and watch your engagement, watch your profile views, watch your follower account increase. It's the easiest thing to do for your community, and it's the quickest, easiest and best way to show that you care and shows value.
00:13:32:13 - 00:13:52:17
Rob Napoli
Right? You want to give thoughtful stuff, right? But just by showing and being there and engaging, you are showing a community that you care. You're showing your community that you want to be there, you're showing that you want to engage and that attracts other people, right? So become an engager, so healthy that helps. But those are my kind of three top things to think about.
00:13:52:17 - 00:14:10:24
Rob Napoli
What goes in your profile. It's how to optimize it. It's to make it a conscious choice instead of common engagement. You don't need more thought leaders out there. If you want to do that, amazing take time to build that. You have to and you can't just take other people's shit and put it out there and be like, Oh, this is what I talk about.
00:14:10:24 - 00:14:28:20
Rob Napoli
But yet you've got one year experience. Yes, you can talk about it and people are going to see that and they love that. You're talking about it. But you also have to walk your talk. You have to show that you've been there, done that, you've done that, and show why people should listen to you. That takes time. Takes time, takes energy, takes effort, it takes consistency.
00:14:29:21 - 00:14:48:22
Rob Napoli
So whatever platform you're trying to grow, whatever stage of life you are, you can do it. It's easy, but it takes time and put conscious effort into it. Remember, this is your brand. For better or for worse. You want to share the good and the bad. Most of us share more of the good and we kind of hide the bad.
00:14:49:08 - 00:15:13:14
Rob Napoli
Right. But don't be afraid to put it off, though. Don't be afraid to talk about challenges you're facing, things and issues that you're overcoming, or go to your community and say, Hey, I have a challenge that I cannot solve. Who knows the answer? Don't be afraid to ask for help within your community because they're the ones that will respond and guide. Hopefully it’s helpful, that is it for me today?
00:15:14:14 - 00:15:34:21
Rob Napoli
If you like the episode, please make sure to subscribe, subscribe or leave a comment or review. Super helpful for the show. Makes you a tier one of the pod. We're trying to grow this to the moon and get some great stuff happening. We've got some amazing episodes coming up. Following this, we've got we talk about decarbonization and climate leadership with Matt Hooper.
00:15:35:11 - 00:15:59:05
Rob Napoli
We have the former president of Starbucks, Howard Behar coming on. I'd be higher of the book. It's more than just coffee. He was Howard Schultz. This number two, he was the other Howard. I got to sit down with him. Sit down with my friend Matt Sawyer to talk about how to make it in America. He's got a new book coming out about how do founders and entrepreneurs step into the U.S. market and want to focus on it?
00:15:59:06 - 00:16:21:11
Rob Napoli
That's coming up. So those next four episodes, we've got some really cool stuff heading into the end of the year, creating healthy lifestyles, talking about being more functional as we go into the year, and then looking at New Year's resolutions. And how do we find personal, professional growth coming out of it. So that is what's up on the pod.
00:16:21:19 - 00:16:28:06
Rob Napoli
I will talk to you soon. It's been a real thank you so much Bear nation until next time stay well and rise up!