Social Selling Adviser

Welcome to Social Selling Adviser (SSA)

Unlocking the value in your LinkedIn Social Selling Index (SSI)

Download Social Selling  Adviser
Latest Version = 2.7
(
Released 9 Sep 2021)
Download Zip File
Download Excel File
Donate
Please doate to support further development
Links
Social Selling Adviser LinkedIn Showcase
Social Selling Index on LinkedIn  
   
             
   

What is the Social Selling Adviser all About?

Social media plays a big part in my search for work, as I find ways to promote myself and reach employers beyond the traditional application and CV route. Social media offers me the opportunity to share my thoughts and ideas on the management of technology, sharing passion for the application of service management and how this builds the stability and agility that enables transformation.

Social media also enables me to network and engage with others areas related to my work covering information security, export compliance, manufacturing systems, business operations, shared services, operations technology. Through engaging it helps me as I get a broader perspective on other aspects of business operations and areas which are not within my area of expertise.

Over the past couple of years my activity has increased, publishing articles, white papers, posts and responding to others.  Behind this lay the perennial question of what worked and why.  Part of this question was answered when I discovered the Social Selling Index (SSI). Here was a measure of my engagement and interaction split across four component areas.

  • Establish a professional brand
  • Find the right people
  • Engage with insights
  • Build relationships

I am driven by data and whilst we cannot know everything, I firmly believe the more qualitative data we have to hand, the better our decisions can be. I soon discovered limitations with SSI which led to the development of SSA. Measures were one thing, but what I really needed were KPI's where i could track my performance over time and link to key activity points on the LinkedIn platform. I also needed something that was simple to use, I do not see value in spending endless time collating data, value is analysis and what you do with the knowledge that data provides.

 See for yourself and compare the screenshots below to get an idea of the perspective and insight that SSA offers.


   
    The SSI snapshot view

LinkedIn

The LinkedIn Social Selling Index (SSI) offers a clear set of metrics aginst the four main component but is only a snapshot in time.  

Revisiting the page each time gave me an indicator of where I was but required something different to make the measures inot a KPI.

   
   

Social Selling Adviser

Social Selling Adviser (SSA) fills the gaps that creates perspective and purpose.

  • A history of my performance
  • An indicator of the effect of my actions on component areas.
  • Where had I improved and by home much
  • What should I think about next
Social Selling Adviser KPI and Action Dashboard    
   

Using Social Selling Adviser

To run SSA, you need a standard LinkedIn account and a copy of Microsoft Excel.

Bearing in mind that marketing and brand creation are built around campaigns, SSA is limited to 50 entries per copy to keep the metrics meaningful.

One-time Setup

The Setup tab is used to record reusable parameters, such as your objectives as well as your network and industry average. These values rarely change, so can usually be left once settings have been applied.

Recording Your SSI

Your SSI is a direct transcription from data in your LinkedIn SSI score. You can set your own frequency, although anything less than a day is not advised as the score only tends to change once every 24 hours.

  1. At the start of your day, open SSA and select the SSA Tracker tab.
  2. In the first available line, update the fields using the data from your SSI score and your LinkedIn Feed

Recording Your Activity

Activity is measured in blocks, with ranges being specified in the Setup tab. These ranges can be edited to match your preferred levels of activity.

Open SSA and select the SSA Tracker tab. Using the available drop down menu select the item that match your activity.

My Comments Comments are made to the posts of others
My Posts Posts you have created and published
My Articles Articles you have created and published
Connection Requests Requests you have received from others
Connection Invites Invites you have sent to others
Notes / Comments Free text for additional information that you may find useful, such as links to posts or articles

Why no Automatic Data Collection?

Supporting different platforms with Microsoft Excel is relatively easy as everything is handled by the endpoint application, making it available for both desktop and mobile platforms. The same ease of use cannot be said for external connectivity. e.g. Microsoft Excel on Windows currently uses an Internet Explorer (IE) web connector and LinkedIn does not support IE. Added to this, Microsoft will be withdrawing support for IE.

Keeping SSA safe and secure to use meant applying some design constraints, protecting your identity and avoids the need for any special technical knowledge.

  • Protect privacy by limiting connectivity to external services and control the amount of personal information that is stored.
  • No macros or VBA, which could block the application from being downloaded or is restricted due to policy restrictions.
  • Avoid external connections that might involve having to support 3rd party products, browsers or other integration.
  • Avoid any necessity for authentication through LinkedIn or 3rd party services.
  • Make the tool available for use on a broad variety of desktop and mobile platforms.

Comments and Feedback

Please submit any comments or feedback through the Social Selling Adviser showcase page.


How Much is Social Selling Adviser?

Social Selling Adviser is free to download and use. I hope you find SSA as useful as I have and offers the insights into how your activity through LinkedIn is being measured and received.

If you find it useful, please visit the donation page and make a contribution toward the time taken to bring this to you.

Privacy and security is taken seriously

  • SSA does not store any Personally Identifiable Information (PII) to get full use of the functionality.
  • SSA does not use macros or include links to external sources, other than Courthill (this site) and LinkedIn.
  • SSA does not require any special subscription from LinkedIn to access the Social Selling Index (SSI).

For any questions about the privacy or security, or any other questions relating to SSA, post a question in the SSA showcase page or contact the creator, Clive Porter-Brown


Thank you to Gabriella Parker for her ongoing mentoring and support as well as designing the graphics.

Designed and built by Clive Porter-Brown, Social Selling Adviser is not endorsed by LinkedIn or its partners.

 

   
         

Courthill Home | Privacy | (c)2021, Clive Porter-Brown