The Social Selling Index (SSI) is one of LinkedIn’s most polarizing tools. Some swear by it; others dismiss it as just another vanity metric. But here’s the thing—every action (or inaction) you take on the platform influences your score.
Unlike vanity metrics like likes, shares, and comments, SSI gives you a clearer picture of your social selling efforts. Instead of chasing engagement for the sake of it, you’re working toward a tangible goal: building real connections and driving meaningful interactions.
What is the LinkedIn Social Selling Index (SSI)?
LinkedIn SSI rates your social selling effectiveness from 0 to 100. Every action you take on the platform contributes to the score, which is divided into four key components:
Establish Your Personal Brand
If the people you sent connection requests to visit your profile, will they see content that addresses their needs? Have you collaborated with professionals in your industry on an article or post? Do you help your peers by answering questions in communities or groups you’re in?
Remember, LinkedIn is all about value-based selling. But value doesn’t mean posting content a hundred times a day—that’s just spam. However, sharing valuable content at least once daily can improve this score if you share the right content with the right people.
Finding the Right People
LinkedIn rewards you for engaging and providing value to professionals relevant to your industry. At the same time, LinkedIn can deduct your SSI score if your network has too many random or low-quality connections. So, check the connection requests that come your way.
Growing your network will always be about quality over quantity. That’s especially true when you’re doing outreach campaigns on the platform. You must improve your LinkedIn searches by leveraging tools like advanced search filters or Boolean operators.
Once you’ve found the right people, you have to engage them. Don’t leave them as contacts on a list. Start segmenting and curating content that provides the most value to the different groups in your network.
Engage with Insights
LinkedIn wants you to build relationships by sharing conversation-worthy updates. That means posting valuable content, joining discussions, and engaging with others. But here’s the key: your engagement shouldn’t stop at the LinkedIn feed.
LinkedIn’s latest algorithm update shows that your connections are 70% more likely to see your posts if you engage with them through direct messages. This creates a positive feedback loop—more engagement leads to even more visibility.
Let’s say you’re connected with John. You send him a quick DM: “Hey John, I just posted about {{topic}}. I would love to hear your thoughts!” John shares his insights on your post and a positive discussion just started.
Now, John’s network and the networks of those who comment might also see your post. Once you engage like this, you’ll have a strong foundation for building lasting relationships.
Build Relationships
Connecting with professionals in your industry or niche is the first step to building relationships. After connecting, share valuable insights through comments, posts, and messages.
Even sending a DM to a prospect after they accepted your invite already gives you a good head start. However, tracking request statuses and personalizing every message manually takes time. You could even miss messages from high-value prospects due to the workload.
Tools like Botdog allow you to automate nurturing without sacrificing authenticity and personalization. It can track all invite requests and schedule personalized messages when accepted, allowing you to focus on other areas that can improve SSI scores.
What Data Does LinkedIn Use To Calculate SSI?
Unlike the mysterious nature of Google’s search algorithms, LinkedIn is pretty transparent regarding the data they use to calculate your SSI scores. Here’s the rundown taken straight from the horse’s mouth:
- Data about your professional brand: LinkedIn evaluates how complete your profile is, including details like your experience, skills, and endorsements. It also considers your published articles and how many followers they have gained.
- Data about your relationships: Your connections matter, but quality is as important as quantity. LinkedIn looks at who you connect with and how often your connection requests are accepted. A strong, relevant network helps boost your score.
- Data about your engagement on LinkedIn: Engagement plays a significant role in your SSI. LinkedIn tracks your likes, shares, comments, and reshares, the number of messages you send, and the response rate.
- Data about your use of LinkedIn to find prospects: LinkedIn measures how often you search for people, how many profile views you generate, and how consistently you stay active on the platform.
For Sales Navigator users, LinkedIn will calculate your SSI score based on the following:
- People searches in Sales Navigator: LinkedIn tracks how often you search for professionals in your industry, potential leads, or decision-makers. Regularly using search tools helps expand your reach and find the right people.
- Lead Builder and advanced people searches in Sales Navigator: Sales Navigator offers advanced search filters to help you refine your prospecting. LinkedIn evaluates how often you use these filters to find high-quality.
- Profile views in Sales Navigator: Your SSI score reflects how often you visit profiles within Sales Navigator. Actively viewing profiles suggests that you're researching potential connections, leads, or business opportunities.
- Leads saved in Sales Navigator: Saving leads shows LinkedIn that you’re strategically tracking potential connections. The more leads you save, the more likely you are to stay engaged with relevant prospects.
How to Find LinkedIn SSI Scores for Free & Paid Users
If you’re a free LinkedIn user who wants to check their SSI, you must ensure that you’re logged in to your account and click the link here.
For people with Sales Navigator accounts, click the Sales Nav icon in the top right corner. Next, find your user dashboard in the top right corner and click Social Selling Index.
It’ll redirect you to a page where you can access your SSI dashboard. You can see a detailed score breakdown and how you fare relative to your team, industry, and network.
What’s a Good SSI Score & What Does Your Score Mean?
LinkedIn did a global survey with the results suggesting that SSI above 70 is strong, while anything below 30 is low. But what does your current score say about your social selling efforts?
Industry and Network Average SSI
It’s common to see low industry average SSI scores (0-30). That’s because LinkedIn calculates the average across all profiles in your industry—including inactive and unoptimized ones, which drag the number down.
A low network SSI suggests you're not connected with relevant people. This can hurt your score, especially in the 'Finding the Right People' category.
Low SSI Scores (0 to 30): Getting Started
If you have an SSI score of 0 to 30, you're either new to LinkedIn or not engaging much with the people in your network or industry. Ensuring a completed profile is the first step to improving your SSI score in this bracket.
To boost your score, start by optimizing your profile, connecting with relevant people, and engaging in discussions. Creating posts and providing insights in the comments can help, too.
Eventually, LinkedIn will give you an All-Star status. Once you hit All-Star status, your profile can get up to 40x more search visibility, so it’s worth all the effort.
Mid SSI Scores (31 to 70): Gaining Momentum
An SSI score between 31 and 70 means you’re actively using LinkedIn but still have room for improvement. If you’re in the 31-50 range, you might be liking posts, making connections, or sharing content here and there.
The key to improving your score in this bracket is consistency. And the best way to stay consistent is with the help of automated LinkedIn outreach.
Meanwhile, If your SSI is 51-70, you’re on the right track! That means you’re gaining momentum by frequently engaging and collaborating with your peers. To push even higher, focus on becoming a thought leader.
Instead of just reacting to content, start posting your ideas. Share industry insights, create articles, or participate in trending discussions. The more value you add, the more LinkedIn pushes you in front of relevant professionals' search results or feeds.
High SSI Scores (71 to 100): Becoming an Industry Thought Leader
If your SSI is 70 or above, then you’re a certified superstar on LinkedIn, practically a name-brand in your industry. People see you as a trusted voice in whatever discussion you participate in.
This high of an SSI means that you’re probably in the top 1% of your industry. All that’s left for you to improve your score's weakest components score.
But getting to the top is one thing. Keeping your spot is another. Remember, LinkedIn SSI scores update daily. So, stay on top of industry trends and LinkedIn statistics and regularly post valuable, updated content.
Best Strategies For Improving LinkedIn SSI Score
LinkedIn wants you to have a high SSI score—after all, the more people sharing valuable content and engaging in meaningful discussions, the better the platform becomes.
Since LinkedIn already provides a roadmap for success, all you need to do is follow it. Here are the five core strategies for improving your SSI score in each key component:
Combine Passion and Expertise To Provide Authentic & Valuable Content
The best way to grow a personal brand is to create content you’re already passionate about and are an expert on. That’s because consistency becomes effortless when you create content you genuinely enjoy.
Instead of feeling obligated to make content to have a high SSI score, you’ll be excited to share insights and start discussions with your peers. So, ask yourself:
- Are you sharing insights to generate leads, or are you aiming to educate and support your network?
- Does your content spark meaningful conversations and provide tangible takeaways?
Prioritizing authenticity and value will help your content gain traction naturally. Over time, you’ll build a substantial content library that resonates with your audience and excites you.
Make Your First Impression Count
When you send a connection request, the first thing people do is check your profile. They want to know if you’re credible, relevant, and worth connecting with.
If your profile is incomplete, lacks a vague summary, or lacks visible engagement, they’ll likely ignore your request. To make a strong first impression:
- Use a professional, forward-facing headshot: People connect with faces, so a clear, approachable photo helps build trust.
- Optimize your headline: Highlight your value proposition. For example, instead of “Sales Manager,” try “Helping Businesses Scale with Targeted Sales Strategies.
- Write a compelling summary: Your summary should showcase who you are, what you do, and why it matters. Keep it conversational, clear, and focused on providing value.
Reach the People Who Truly Value Your Insights
Your valuable insights won’t mean much if they don’t reach the right audience. So, when doing LinkedIn lead generation, find people who get the most value from your content. The best way to do this is by defining your ideal audience. Here’s a checklist to help you out:
- What problems does your content solve?
- What demographic are you targeting?
- Who’s already engaging with your content?
- What type of content generates meaningful discussions?
- Are your followers and connections aligned with your goals?
After defining your ideal audience, use LinkedIn’s advanced search tools to find and connect with these professionals. Tools like Botdog can also automate this process. You only need to copy the search link, and Botdog will handle the connection requests and follow-ups.
Grow Your Network Through Sustainable Automated Outreach
Automation tools can help you free up much-needed time, but you can’t use it to abuse the system. Sustainable automated outreach requires tools that understand the nuances of LinkedIn’s guidelines and limitations.
That’s why we built Botdog. Our LinkedIn automation tool mimics human behavior as it automates outreach. It also adheres to all guidelines to keep your accounts healthy and safe.
But don’t just rely on automation. You also need to put in a bit of elbow grease. That means joining discussions, answering questions in comments, and responding personally to messages.
Nurture Your Existing Network
Strong, lasting relationships aren’t built overnight. They grow through consistent, genuine engagement. Instead of letting your LinkedIn connections collect dust, engage proactively with your network and cultivate a community that values healthy discussions.
You can do this by liking and commenting on relevant posts or sharing your perspective in discussions. Even small gestures like tagging a contact in a comment and saying, “Hey, John, I thought you’d love this post!” already go a long way.
Don’t forget to try to check in with your contacts personally. A simple LinkedIn message asking how they’ve been can keep you top-of-mind. You can also provide value by sharing helpful articles, inviting them to free webinars, or asking for opinions on your posts.
Key Takeaways
A high LinkedIn SSI score is the byproduct of providing excellent value to your network. Luckily, LinkedIn doesn’t gatekeep the formula for improving SSI. To recap, here are the four core components that make up your SSI score:
- Establish Your Personal Brand: Optimize your profile and share valuable content to position yourself as a trusted voice in your industry.
- Finding the Right People: Connect with relevant professionals who align with your goals and can benefit from your insights.
- Engage With Insights: Actively participate in discussions, share meaningful content, and provide thoughtful comments to build credibility.
- Build Relationships: Foster genuine connections by consistently interacting with your network and offering value without expecting anything in return.
Improving your LinkedIn SSI Score requires a long-term and sustainable outreach strategy, especially if you want to grow your network. And it’s not as difficult as it sounds. You just have to be consistent with providing value. That’s what Botdog does for you. Try it out for free today!
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