By Rosalyn Eishen | @rosalynchoo LinkedIn is the ideal tool for reaching prospects in the B2B world, finding a job, obtaining venture capital, forming business partnerships and growing your business. Make sure you're using it the right way.

1. Company Pages- First thing’s first: pages should be detailed and updated often. Employees of your business should all link to you company page, as LinkedIn pulls statistics about your company from the profiles of employees. Services provided should be listed in detail. Put your logo on there and any contact information where people can get in touch. See example above.
2. Executive profiles- Make sure the executives in your company fill in their profiles thoroughly. Every single section needs to be filled in with detailed keywords about what it is that they do. Link back to the company page as well. Executive profiles are a great marketing tool for your company, and they can post updates to drive people back to the company page.
3. Uniform Profiles- Try to keep all of your employees’ profiles the same. Of course, each person is different and has different roles within the company, but make sure the verbiage about the company is uniform and profile sections are filled out in the same way throughout. A company training for LinkedIn profiles and effective use can ensure a common standard.
4. Groups- Have executives and other individuals in the company join groups relevant to your industry. More importantly, however, have them join groups where potential clients might be. For example, for a social media marketing agency, join social media groups, but also groups that have people that might need social media services (which could be companies in almost any industry). Individuals can then represent the company and post links about relevant topics.
5. Audience- Your audience should be very client focused. Your LinkedIn will be one of the first things most potential clients will see when searching for your company online (and yes, they will search for your company). Every profile, group and company page needs to be optimized for potential clients. This includes descriptions of your organization that appear on individual employee profiles.
6. Recommendations- These are essential to showing others that your company has impressed others. On a LinkedIn company page, you can send and receive recommendations for products and services. So go! Ask those references to write up a recommendation for your company.
7. Keywords- People use LinkedIn for search. In fact, 4.2 billion searches were done on the professional platform in 2011. You want your company page and individuals in your company to show up in LinkedIn searches for terms that describe what your company does. Fill in every section of your company page and employee profiles with keywords of what it is that you can help people with. The skills section of profile pages will also reinforce those keywords.
8. Linking- link to your LinkedIn profiles and company page often. Post links on your website, Facebook page, and Twitter, plus include your customized personal LinkedIn URL on business cards. People need to know your company exists on LinkedIn before you can start generating leads from it.
9. DON'T Forget about your profile- It’s a mistake to think that people aren’t looking you up on LinkedIn (or any social media site, for that matter). Don’t let your page just sit online after you create it- optimize your company the best you can, if only to let people know you’re out there.

LinkedIn is the largest professional networking website with more than 120 million members. It is also the most affluent social media platform. We offer services for LinkedIn consulting, training, profile optimization and group moderation.