The LinkedIn Social Selling Index (SSI).

#LinkedIn launched it in 2014 to measure our effectiveness using the platform.

We cannot manage what we cannot measure, has been my ‘alma mater’ always.

To me the social selling index is a daily guide to keep focused and on track.

It helps me to remember the very purpose of LinkedIn in all my activities on the platform daily.

I always only share insights and ideas that will help make the lives of those in my network easier, whether I post content, send messages, or simply just engage with others content.

Maybe we should use this nifty tool to keep us on our toes and focus more on adding value daily.

Becoming more client centric… focusing more on them.

Using the social selling index will fix that for you…

 The Social Selling Index

LinkedIn describes its Social Selling Index is a “first-of-its-kind measure of a company’s or individual’s adaptation of the four pillars of selling on LinkedIn, based on a scale of 0 to 100”

Each of the four pillars has a maximum score of 25, and the compound score therefor is 100 and is your Social Selling Index. According to LinkedIn it is a tool focused on measuring the LinkedIn user’s social selling skills and execution, and that the statistics reveals that as your social selling index rises, so does your sales success.

The LinkedIn SSI score measures your or your company’s performance in four key areas, also known as the LinkedIn Social Selling Index pillars.

1.           Create a professional brand

LinkedIn looks at the elements that reflect your professional presence on LinkedIn including:

• Do you have a complete and professional-looking profile that includes a cover photo?
• How many endorsements have you received?
• How many LinkedIn Publisher posts have you written?
• How many followers did you gain from your articles?
• How many page views are your posts generating?
• How many overall followers are you gaining?

2.           Find the right people

Are you finding the right people and reaching out to relevant people with useful information? It considers the data related to your connections and the acceptance rate of your connection requests.

• People searches (on LinkedIn.com or in Sales Navigator)
• Lead Builder / Advanced people searches (in Sales Navigator)
• Profile views (on LinkedIn.com or in Sales Navigator)
• Prospecting profile views (third degree or out of network)
• Inbound profile views
• Leads saved (in Sales Navigator)
• Days active (on LinkedIn.com or in Sales Navigator)

3.           Engage with insights

Do you discover and share valuable information to initiate or maintain a relationship? Simply put this measures engagement. It looks at the number of shares, likes and comments your posts receive. It also looks at the messages you send and their response rate.

• Shares (short form posts)
• Engagements given and received (likes, comments, reshares)
• Engagements received on long-form posts (likes, comments, reshares)
• Messages sent + InMail response rate (multiple types)
• Groups joined
• Accounts saved (in Sales Navigator)
• Research views (account page views + homepage scrolls in Sales Navigator)

4.           Build strong relationships

The fourth pillar measures how successful you are at expanding your network to reach not only your prospects but also those who can introduce you to prospects. LinkedIn factors in the number of people searches you have conducted, profiles you have viewed and days you have been active.

• Connections
• VP+ connections
• Internal connections (with other coworkers)
• Acceptance rate for connection requests sent

Final Word

How important is the LinkedIn SSI score?

LinkedIn claims the higher the score, the more successful that person or company is at reaching their sales goals. For example, it says that highly active LinkedIn users:

• gain 45% more sales opportunities
• are 51% are more likely to hit their quotas
• are 80% more productive.

To me using LinkedIn as a social selling tool to grow my business there are only 3 measures that works for me:

1. Value driven consistency, daily. Did I add value to my community today?
2. Conversations. How many conversations did I have today?
3. Leads. How many off LinkedIn appointments did I schedule today?

For the rest – content views, likes, shares, comments, profile views, page follows etc. are only indicators of areas to improve – nothing more!

How do you measure your LinkedIn activities?

If you need assistance to setup your LinkedIn profile, our LinkedIn Marketing Strategy Makeover service will be the answer.

This how we do it for you

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Final Thoughts

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