To successfully sell online courses, you must have effective marketing and promotional strategies. Most course creators turn to platforms such as Instagram and TikTok, but you may be missing out if you’re not promoting on LinkedIn. 

LinkedIn is a large, unique social networking platform. It’s for industry professionals and businesses, unlike other popular platforms. 

Although course promotion on LinkedIn is less straightforward, you can still increase your reach and success.  

Let’s take a look at why and how you can use LinkedIn to promote online courses. 

Why use LinkedIn to promote online courses?

As a business-oriented platform, LinkedIn caters to people in professional industries. People use LinkedIn for a variety of reasons, whether they’re seeking their next role, skill development opportunities, or new connections. 

This is great for online course promotion because LinkedIn users are more likely to take courses that would help them professionally. And besides potential learners, you may find other industry professionals you want to collaborate with on initiatives like webinars. 

With this mind, you can leverage LinkedIn’s one billion users by sharing your knowledge. This will help you: 

• Position yourself as a thought leader 
• Build credibility 
• Create a community 

LinkedIn has numerous ways to do this. You can write long-form posts, publish articles, and interact with others. 

Once you gain momentum on LinkedIn, you can even cross-promote other products and services or start advertising. In fact, LinkedIn has some of the most robust targeting capabilities, which we’ll discuss more later. 

How to promote online courses using LinkedIn 

Now that you know why you should be on LinkedIn, let’s explore specific ways you can use the platform for course promotion, whether it’s for existing courses or your first one. 

Optimize your professional profile 

Your LinkedIn profile should reflect your professional skills, education, and experience. After all, it’s what others are going to look at when they want to know more about you or your course. You want to show them that you are an expert to be trusted. 

Here’s a list to get you started:

• Name and pronouns. Use your full name and pick your preferred pronouns. 
• Profile picture. Select a clear, professional photo of yourself. 
• Cover image. Your cover image could be a tagline about what you do. Use your branding and include a logo if you have one. 
• Headline. Your headline should be a bit about what you do or accomplishments as it relates to your niche. For example, if you have courses about finance for entrepreneurs, you can say something like “Financial Coach | Founder at Company” or opt for a descriptive headline, such as “Helping entrepreneurs manage their cash flow and maximize profits.” 
• Location. Specify your country/region and city. 
• Contact info. You can choose to share contact details, including website links and other social media profiles. 

You’ll also need more professional information, including: 

• Your current position 
• Your industry 
• Education 

Beyond this, you can optimize your profile even further by adding the following:

• Services you provide 
• Featured link, such as your course landing page 

• Featured content, like articles or posts 

• About section
• Additional experience, education, certifications, volunteering, and skills

When crafting your About section, headline, and skills, try to use common keywords found in your niche. This will help you get discovered by others. You’ll also want to make sure everything is public, such as your name and profile picture.  

Share actionable and relevant content 

Unlike other platforms, LinkedIn does not rely on sounds, music, or short-form videos for engagement. Instead, posts with actionable and relevant information are preferred. Remember, users are on LinkedIn to develop their skills and knowledge–use this to your advantage and share valuable information to promote online courses. 

Here are a few formats to try:

• Long-form text posts
• Articles 
• Carousels 
• Images and text posts
• Videos like tutorials or course-related content
• Newsletters within LinkedIn

You can also share events, post about professional updates, get recommendations, or create a poll. Be sure to include relevant hashtags when possible, but keep it to a minimum.

Sharing your own expertise is the best way to build trust and prove your value. Consequently, learners will be encouraged to sign up for your online course. 

Beyond posting your own content, share news and updates that would be valuable to your audience and add your own perspective. These updates require less time, but still have an impact on your audience. 

Engage within your network 

As with all social media platforms, engagement is key to online course promotion. And LinkedIn is just the place to do it–people are on the platform to specifically meet others, build relationships, and grow their networks. 

On LinkedIn, your network can consist of potential learners, industry professionals, and other creators. By default, everyone in your network can see who you interact with. This includes sharing, commenting, and even liking or reacting to posts, so be mindful of what and who you’re interacting with. 

If you want to build your authority and increase course signups, you’ll need to engage with your network regularly. Always respond to direct messages, comments, and mentions. 

Join groups 

As mentioned, one of LinkedIn’s primary functions is networking. What better way to meet new connections than to join groups? 

There are numerous groups to join, so consider searching for ones that feature:

• Your industry or niche 
• Your target audience 
• Local networking 
• Other relevant topics or interests 

Some groups require an invite from an existing member while others are public. You can even create your own group, but that does require an existing or growing community. 

Once you’re in a group, be an active participant by interacting and posting when appropriate. Avoid being direct when it comes to promoting your online courses. Instead, build organic relationships and let others sign up for your course when they’re ready.  

Curate your feed 

Just like others in your network can see what you interact with, you can, too. Therefore, you want to find and follow relevant industry leaders, companies, and publications. This allows you to:

• Stay updated on the latest trends and news 
• Quickly share relevant content to your network 
• Boost your visibility 

Try to keep your feed to your course topics. You may find opportunities to plug in your course or other content! 

Run paid ads 

Paid advertising is a great way to quickly promote your online courses, and LinkedIn Ads are no exception. Before you get started, note that advertising on LinkedIn typically costs more than other platforms. You’ll also need a LinkedIn Company Page in order to run ads, but it’s free and easy to set up. 

Here are a few more things to consider:

• Goal. LinkedIn offers objective-based advertising in the form of three categories: Awareness, Consideration, and Conversion. 
• Format. LinkedIn has multiple ad types, including sponsored content, sponsored messaging, lead gen forms, and text and dynamic ads.  
• Budget and schedule. The minimum daily budget for any LinkedIn ad is $10. The minimum lifetime budget for a campaign is $100, which increases depending on how many days it’s scheduled to run.
• Target audience. LinkedIn offers robust targeting capabilities, including job title, company name, industry, interests, and more. 
• Creative. Depending on the format you select, you’ll need to upload your creative assets, such as an image, video, URL, and more. 

If you decide to run ads, you’ll use LinkedIn Campaign Manager to create and manage campaigns. Remember to track your metrics so you can optimize your campaigns. 

Build on LearnDash to promote on LinkedIn

Creating a professional, engaging course is important, but so is promotion. Fortunately, platforms like LinkedIn make online course promotion easier. Give it a try to see if it works for you. 

If you haven’t created an online course yet, a learning management system like LearnDash LMS can give you all the features and flexibility you need. Create, launch, and sell online courses with features like a drag and drop course builder, course creation wizard, and much more. To see them in action, try the LearnDash demo.

With a beautiful, functional course and a LinkedIn promotion strategy, you can sell more of your online courses.