How I Earned My LinkedIn Top Voice Badge in 48 Hours

Welcome to episode 132 of Dawn of a New Era, and the exciting news is, is our podcast is now available every single week. Now, we made this move in association with our new branding, and we have an amazing new guest series coming up as well in the next couple of weeks. Now, in this podcast, we're going to talk about something that I have wanted for so long, and it's all about how I secured my LinkedIn Top Voice badge in just 48 hours. Crazy, I know.

For years and years and years, I have been using LinkedIn, and literally I have been with LinkedIn since it's evolved from a careers network all the way through to a full social network, and Probably around about maybe five, could be slightly more years ago, I hit the maximum amount of connections on LinkedIn. Now, you can only have 30,000 LinkedIn connections. Now, that seems a lot, but it took me a really long time to build it. Now, when I look at Instagram, which I only started like 20 months ago, and how quickly I've grown on that, it's a very different animal.

Now, on LinkedIn, I was absolutely committed to building a solid quality audience. It wasn't about numbers. I really wanted the right people in my audience. I wanted to really position myself as an expert in my field.

I wanted to be a thought leader in my industry and niche. And one of the things around that was it's not just about creating content, but there has to be a huge engagement strategy as well. Now, when we look at things like the top voice badge, I'd always wondered for so long how you could actually achieve this. Now, I had been dipping around contributing into other articles.

I'd been engaging in a way that I thought was meaningful. I'd been creating articles as well. Now, as I did my research, I started to really hone in on a specific skill set. So, as a business coach, I started to look at all of the different articles around business coaching, and this is really where it came into play, because once I became super clear what I wanted to be seen and known for and how that would work on LinkedIn, it all started to make sense.

So, I found all of the articles that were in my sector. This was definitely where I wanted to position myself. So, when we look at what I did over this 48 hours, I managed to earn a badge, and literally yesterday, I got a notification from LinkedIn saying, Congratulations. Congratulations, Dawn.

You have earned a top voice badge in business coaching. So what did I do? Well, here's how. Once I've chosen my focused area, I then started to target, say, five to ten relevant posts where you can add value.

And then you select a niche or industry such as, you know, it could be digital marketing or leadership. And then what you need to do is make four to six valuable contributions. And what you really want to be careful of, and this is a big part of LinkedIn because the algorithm can see it, people can see it, is you need to avoid generic content that lacks depth and definitely stay well, well clear of AI. Now, share specific tips and personal experiences, because then this really starts to build the story around you.

It really starts to position you as a thought leader and an industry expert. Now, as I started to do this, I could start to see I was getting traction, and then I was creating engaging content. So when I was doing my content strategy, I wanted to make sure that it was clear and actionable. I wanted to really pop depth and value into it.

So instead of just saying, like, you know, what I was doing, I was really kind of giving the detail around how, and then base it on your expertise and your own personal insights. This is your story. This is your brand, and this is your positioning. So format it for readability, because we know that online people scan six times quicker than they absorb content offline.

You want to use headings, bullet points, and short paragraphs, and I call it the Wrigley left margin rule, where we can see quite clearly that there's chunks of content. You know, I hate it myself when I'm scrolling through LinkedIn and I see something and there's just reams and reams of paragraphs, and our brains get tired after every hundred words. So make it super simple and make it accessible for everyone and make it scannable for mobile devices. Now, my additional tips around this is like your own contributions to boost engagement, and then focus on sharing unique perspectives rather than, as I say, AI-generated content.

I see this a lot, and one of the things that happened the other day is that because I give so much detail in the comments on content for engagement, someone said to me, you know, are you using AI? I was like, no, I'm not. I just use a very specific format that I keep the same. Now, why do I keep the same?

Because people then start to notice the way that I write, my style. Someone asked me, you know, is it AI-generated? I was like, well, I've never been called that before, but— But maybe because it's, you know, around a formulaic approach where it's got these sort of different breaks in, you know, even in the comments to make it readable. And also, I still want to add my value.

I don't want to just always say, oh, you know, thanks or great piece of content. I want to put my thoughts and my insights on the back of it so that, you know, I'm joining a conversation after all. If you think about it, when someone posts on LinkedIn, you know, if they were in a networking event, how would we converse? We would add our own, you know, thoughts and feelings and experiences, and this is exactly how you should treat your feed.

So when we think about your top voice badge and how you can get it, let's just summarize it, because I really want you to try this strategy to see if you can get it and if you can get similar results. Really be clear on choosing your focus area. Really make sure that you are not just contributing, but you're also creating content and you're also engaging on other content. We can't just show up on social networks, and this goes for all social networks, and just be voyeurs.

We really want to have some sort of meaningful participation, and of course it's different on each one. But for LinkedIn, where the value lies is really getting involved in the conversations and engaging in a meaningful, thoughtful way where people start to see you. Because if you think about it, where do I get followers from? Well, I get hundreds of new followers every day because I max out on the connections, but I'm still building followers, and I've got, say, another thirty-odd thousand followers.

So I've got a huge network on LinkedIn, and it's growing by a hundred every day. Why? Yes, because I'm creating content, but because I'm engaging and people are seeing my name. I'm getting onto people's radar because I'm engaging in the comments, and I'm not just kind of going on and following people.

I'm actually having a conversation and building the relationship. And I'm also contributing, so I might be creating articles. I might be putting my expert advice as a thought leader onto their articles. So you start to stand out from the crowd, and you cause this ripple effect.

Now, for me, my next strategy, my next aim and ambition is to really push forward. So once you get recognized as a top voice for an industry, you can go and choose other sectors that are relevant to you. And ultimately, over time, then this builds the gold badge that I've earned for business coaching into a blue top voice badge. Now, I saw some stats yesterday that said 0.

00004% of people achieve this badge. So if I get it, that is one epic feat and one amazing achievement. But I've set myself a target. I've focused myself in it.

I'm building a strategy around it, and I'm going to do my absolute best to get it. So I hope this podcast was useful for you, and I hope it's giving you a strategy to go and try for yourself. And good luck, and I hope you can get amazing results just like I did and earn your top voice badge. Thank you for listening to Dawn of a New Era podcast, and for your free checklist to find out how to boost your business for growth, profit, and success, and join our community, go to dawnmcgruer.

com.