LinkedIn’s social selling index is a measure of how well your LinkedIn account can build a network, filter out good leads, and capture them for a sale. Why should you care about this? LinkedIn ads have double the conversion rate of other channels—so if you’re not doing social sales on LinkedIn, you could be missing out. Let’s look at what the social selling index measures, how it works, and how you can boost your score to start finding your audience and converting them to customers.
What is LinkedIn’s social selling index?
The LinkedIn social selling index assigns a number—called an SSI score—to a user’s effectiveness at social selling on LinkedIn. Social selling is a sales strategy in which marketers use a social media platform like LinkedIn to build relationships with their target audience by posting valuable content, starting conversations, or messaging prospects.
The LinkedIn social selling index score uses a formula that compares your LinkedIn account to others in the same industry and assigns points for various features of social selling. Your LinkedIn SSI score is a number out of 100; a high SSI score means you are a good social seller, while a low score means you may need to improve your personal brand or engage with your audience more.
Generally, brands who want to be social selling leaders aim for an SSI score of 75 or higher; this helps them secure a standing as a thought leader or decision maker in their space.
Why is social selling important?
Social selling is a huge market—in 2023, it generated an estimated $571 billion in revenue. That makes social selling a critical strategy. With effective social selling, a small business, ecommerce seller, or sales professional can build a professional brand, establish meaningful customer relationships, and make connections with a wider audience. Sales reps with a good LinkedIn SSI score can generate high-quality leads and boosttarget-audience traffic to their sites, which means more opportunities for sales.
What does the social selling index measure?
- Establishing your professional brand
- Finding the right people
- Engaging with insights
- Building relationships
LinkedIn’s social selling index measures four main categories of performance. While positive outcomes in these categories don’t guarantee success, having a high SSI can mean you have a solid foundation to work with as you build a following and pursue leads.
Establishing your professional brand
This metric evaluates the strength of your LinkedIn profile based on how complete it is. For example, LinkedIn looks at your endorsements and the amount of information in your profile.
Finding the right people
To measure your ability to find high-quality connections, LinkedIn evaluates your activity on its sales navigator tool (which is only for premium LinkedIn users). You’ll need to show you can create meaningful connections and build your professional network with relevant people using the tools LinkedIn provides.
Engaging with insights
The platform evaluates LinkedIn users on the posts they create and share, how active they are, and how much engagement they receive from their peers. This metric tracks posts (especially their frequency), comments, and even messages and connection requests to determine overall engagement on the platform.
Building relationships
This final metric measures how well you network in your industry and make connections with your audience. It tracks how often you reach out to other users and how successful those interactions are, both in messages and on public posts.
How to find LinkedIn’s social selling index
Finding your social selling index on LinkedIn is simple:
1. Log in to LinkedIn. Only logged-in LinkedIn users can view the SSI page.
2. Go to the SSI landing page. Visit the SSI page. There you will see a dashboard with your social selling index in the center of the page. At the top of the page, you’ll find your percentage rank in your industry and your rank within your network.
3. Review the details. In addition to your numerical score, you can see how LinkedIn breaks down your score according to each of the four pillars, providing insight into your strengths and areas for improvement.
How to improve your LinkedIn SSI score
- Establishing your professional brand
- Finding the right people
- Engaging with insights
- Building relationships
If you want to improve your social selling index score, focus on improving your point score for each of the four pillars. Let’s look at strategies you can use for each, and remember that each category allots 25 points for a total of 100.
Establishing your professional brand
For a good SSI score, your LinkedIn account needs a professional cover photo and high-resolution profile photo. Having a complete and current job history with job titles, details on your roles, and accomplishments can also significantly boost your score. Lastly, asking your prior clients and colleagues to recommend you for specific skills will fill out your LinkedIn profile and help bump up your SSI.
Finding the right people
To boost your score in this category, you’ll need to use the LinkedIn sales navigator to prove you can successfully find prospects. Be sure you’re using every tool the sales navigator provides to show the system you’re a pro—use the client relationship management system to manage contacts, and learn how to use automated messaging to your advantage.
Engaging with insights
Posting frequently—at least three times a week—tells LinkedIn and your followers you are active, boosting your engagement score. Plus, posting regularly increases your chances of having content go viral, which can add more points if other users like, share, or comment on it. The quantity of content you share is important for your LinkedIn SSI, and the quality is, too—the more your LinkedIn posts encourage conversations and interactions, the more points you receive.
Building relationships
Comment on the posts of other users with an insight or a question about the post to establish yourself as a thought leader. When you identify a good potential lead, dive into their direct messages and craft a unique and targeted message to grab their attention.
Social Selling Index FAQ
What is the social selling index?
LinkedIn’s social selling index measures how well a user performs as a social seller. Metrics include how developed your LinkedIn profile is, how often you post and engage with followers, and how well you build relationships.
How do I find my social selling index on LinkedIn?
To find your social selling index on LinkedIn, log in and visit www.linkedin.com/sales/ssi. There, you can view your SSI score and a breakdown with additional details.
How do you boost your social selling index?
To boost your social selling index, improve your score in four key areas: establishing your professional brand, finding the right people, engaging with insights, and building relationships. Each category allots 25 points toward your score, for a total of 100.
