Boasting over 200 million members, LinkedIn continues to be a must-do strategy for professionals, and accounting firms are no exception. While busy season can seem like a daunting time to do business development, it’s the most important time because your message will be most relevant to your audience in the next few months. Here are a few ways you can leverage your LinkedIn profile to increase your visibility during tax season and help identify some new opportunities:

1.    Share content daily. Sharing content on LinkedIn weekly used to be enough, but as the traffic and activity from your network continues to pick up, daily posts will become increasingly important for maintaining your visibility.

The good news is, the content you share doesn’t have to all be self-published. In fact, sharing third-party content is helpful for building trust because it positions you as a resource.

Short on ideas for content? Consider sharing a tax tip a day or highlighting various credits available. Place any disclosures on your website and add a reference to the link from your profile.

Tip: Use a tool like Hootsuite to schedule out your daily posts for weeks at a time. This will ensure you get your ongoing marketing in, but won’t have to think about it every day.

2.    Message your contacts. Have an event, article or new legislative update? You can message your contact directly to let them know about it. This is a great way to stay in touch, with the benefit that it will come across as an email, versus a status update that will not.

This is also a great way to share events your firm might be hosting or announce a new service, team member and more. You can also use this to reconnect with connections you haven’t spoke with recently.

If you are really bold, you can even send a more direct message, like the one I received prompting me to reach out to my connection if I was considering a change in my tax preparer.

3.   Build your connections. The more people you are connected too, the higher your visibility will be. This is a great time of year to build your connections on LinkedIn.

Taking a few minutes in between your client work can not only give your brain a much-needed distraction, but help with your business development. We recommend utilizing the “people you may know” section or doing an advanced search and filtering by group connections to find new people to connect to. As people connect with you, send them a short thank you and ask them if they would like to schedule a time to chat (after tax season).

Did you find this helpful? Or are you looking for more tips on LinkedIn? I invite you to connect with me on LinkedIn or follow our Company Page.

Sarah Johnson is the chief growth strategist with Inovautus Consulting, a firm that works with CPA, law and professional service firms to help them grow more effectively, and author of “Practical Ideas for Growth,” a blog dedicated to growing professional firms. Her counsel and strategies have helped move firms to the next level in their marketing and sales efforts. Connect with Sarah at 773-208-7170, sjohnson@inovautus.com, or www.linkedin.com/in/sjjohnson.