Your First Step Toward Creating a Professional Online Network
One of the great advantages of becoming a PAL Affiliate is that you do not need to quit your job, rent an office, or spend every morning attending networking events to begin developing factoring opportunities. PAL Affiliates are typically very part-time participants in the commercial finance industry. Many have regular 9-to-5 jobs. Some live in smaller communities where there may be fewer Chamber of Commerce events, Business Expos, and traditional networking opportunities.
That does not mean opportunities aren’t available.
The PAL Affiliate’s greatest advantage is often simply being in the right place, knowing the right people and possessing enough factoring knowledge to recognize a potential Sales Qualified Lead when one appears. Today, one of the easiest places to expand those opportunities is LinkedIn.
LinkedIn allows an Affiliate living in a community of 10,000 people to develop professional connections throughout an entire region—and eventually throughout the country. You can connect with business owners, accountants, bankers, consultants, sales professionals, and other people who regularly encounter businesses with cash-flow problems.
And you can do much of it after dinner, on weekends or whenever your schedule permits.
First Things First: LinkedIn Is Not Facebook
New PAL Affiliates should understand what LinkedIn is designed to do. LinkedIn is a professional networking platform. Your profile isn’t primarily about your hobbies, vacations, or what you had for dinner last night. Think of it as your online professional introduction. When someone receives your connection request, one of the first things they may do is look at your profile. They are asking themselves:
Who is this person?
What does he or she do?
Why might I want this person in my professional network?
Your profile should answer those questions quickly. LinkedIn’s introduction area allows you to display your name, photograph, background image, headline, current position, location, industry and contact information.
Your LinkedIn Profile Is Your Online Business Introduction
For a PAL Affiliate, LinkedIn can become one of the most useful marketing tools available. Most PAL Affiliates have regular 9-to-5 jobs, and many live in smaller communities where traditional networking opportunities may be limited. They aren’t necessarily going to attend Chamber breakfasts every Tuesday morning or spend afternoons visiting local businesses. LinkedIn changes the geography. A PAL Affiliate sitting at home in a community of 10,000 people can begin developing a professional network containing business owners, accountants, bankers, sales professionals, consultants and others throughout an entire region.
But before you start making connections, you need to build a profile worth connecting with.
Start With the Free LinkedIn Account
You don’t need LinkedIn Premium to get started. Create a regular LinkedIn account and concentrate first on completing your personal profile. LinkedIn itself recommends a professional photograph, background image, meaningful headline and concise About section as important elements of a good profile.
Create or access your LinkedIn account
Your profile should answer three questions for someone seeing you for the first time:
- Who are you?
- What do you do?
- Why might knowing you be useful?
For a PAL Affiliate, the answer does not need to be, “I’m a full-time factoring expert.” In fact, if that isn’t true, don’t say it.
Your Existing Career Is an Asset
PAL Affiliates commonly have other occupations. Keep that experience on your profile. For example:
- Someone employed in transportation may already understand trucking companies.
- A bookkeeper understands small-business finances.
- A construction professional knows contractors and subcontractors.
- A salesperson knows business owners.
- An insurance professional may already have hundreds of commercial relationships.
That experience provides credibility and, quite often, a natural market for discovering factoring opportunities. You are simply adding commercial finance knowledge to the professional experience you already possess.
Choose a Professional Photograph
Your photograph doesn’t need to look like a corporate annual report. It should simply be clear, current, friendly and professional. LinkedIn reports that members with profile photographs can receive up to twice as many profile views.
Think approachable business professional, not Wall Street investment banker.
Pay Particular Attention to Your Headline
Your headline appears prominently with your name, so don’t waste it on something like:
PAL AFFILIATE
Most people won’t know what that means. Instead, communicate what you can potentially do for businesses:
Business Professional | Commercial Finance & Working Capital Resources
Or:
Small Business Advocate | Connecting Growing Companies With Commercial Finance Resources
For someone with an existing professional practice:
Bookkeeper | Small Business Advisor | Commercial Finance Resources
The objective isn’t to make an aggressive sales pitch. It is to give people another reason to find you interesting professionally.
Complete Your About Section
Keep this short and conversational. You might explain that your professional background has given you an interest in small-business growth and that you’ve expanded your knowledge into accounts-receivable factoring and alternative commercial finance. You can mention that you enjoy connecting business owners with resources that may help solve working-capital problems.
What you shouldn’t write is:
NEED CASH? GET FUNDED TODAY!
Remember what you’re building. Focus on a professional identity—not an advertisement.
Add Your PAL Affiliate Activity
You can add your commercial finance activity to the Experience section, but describe it accurately. Something such as:
Commercial Finance Referral Consultant / PAL Affiliate
Then briefly explain that you identify qualified B2B companies that may benefit from accounts-receivable factoring and refer appropriate opportunities for professional evaluation. This is an important distinction. PAL Affiliates aren’t expected to become full-time factoring brokers overnight. Their job is to develop enough knowledge to recognize a potential Sales Qualified Lead (SQL) when they encounter one.
Create a Professional LinkedIn Address
LinkedIn allows you to customize your public profile URL, subject to availability. Try to obtain something based upon your name rather than leaving a long string of unnecessary characters. You’ll eventually be able to use your LinkedIn address on your website, business card, email signature and other marketing materials.
Complete the Profile Before Prospecting
Don’t open an account at 7:00 tonight and begin sending 100 connection requests at 7:30.
- Build the storefront before inviting people inside.
- Add your photograph.
- Complete your headline.
- Write your About section.
- Complete your employment history.
- Add your commercial finance activity.
- Check your contact information.
- Customize your LinkedIn address.
Then look at your profile as though you were a stranger. Would you accept a connection request from this person?