My LinkedIn Snapshot (2020-2023)
Hello there. I’m Adebola Zoe Williams on LinkedIn but you can call me Adebola. I am a Biochemist turned Marketing Creative — my storytelling expertise lies on the borders of Content, Growth, and Product Marketing.
I graduated from the Department of Biochemistry at The University of Ibadan in 2016 and went through my NYSC service year. By 2017, I was back home and as clueless as a child. I got my first paid job as a Caregiver at Dainty Oaks, a Montessori creche and school. I had a wonderful experience taking care of toddlers and learning about Early Childhood Development but I knew it wasn’t my primary interest. So after a year and a half, I decided to deprioritize it and set my gaze on discovering what my primary interest was.
In 2018, I moved to Lagos — still clueless, hungry and nervous. This was Lagos; the city that never sleeps. My options were limited because I was an average student and the only work experience I had was from a Creche.
But somehow, my hunger led me to Segun Abodunrin, who is the CEO at Tdx Agency (formerly Teras Doxas) and I must have impressed him because he took a chance on me. He gave me a job.
I was SpongeBob between 2018 and 2019. I soaked in everything I could find in that one year. I started off with social media content for one of our lifestyle brand clients. It was the easiest client on our payroll. She blogged about Women's Health and hygiene, Fashion, Food, and Lifestyle. I would ideate, design, create videos, write blogs, and do basic SEO for the blog website. After a while, he added another brand for me to work on; a private school brand. Then after a while, I was also in charge of the agency's social media.
I learned Digital Marketing, Paid Ads, Content Marketing, SEO writing, Website Management, Campaigns, Design, Market Activation, User Research, Copywriting, and so much more all in one year.
The things I achieved at the agency were so mindblowing that by the end of 2019, I was in charge of 5 widely different brands and they were all doing well. Also, I was more involved in the entire Brand Marketing — this is where I got my Experiential Marketing and Offline Advertising experience.
By the end of 2019, I knew if I wanted to learn more or narrow down on one of these many things I knew, I needed to go somewhere else. So I waited till the new year and my last day at the agency was the last day in February 2020.
I decided to venture into freelancing especially since COVID-19 happened. One of my strategies to get clients was LinkedIn. I tried the popular freelancing websites back then but creating an account was complex or there was just too much going on. I took LinkedIn content creation seriously in 2020.
The first article I published had no engagement whatsoever
But I continued to publish posts at least 3 times a week, publish an article at least once in 2 weeks and I did these consistently for 3 years. In those 2 years, I got over 50 speaking and training engagements from LinkedIn; collaborated with some creators, got a few awards, and got poached by numerous companies. I also found a few friends.
Maybe these are the reward for consistency.
By February 2023, I stopped being consistent for 3 reasons:
- The strategy I had for 2 years worked well to help me get to the level I needed to. I felt 2023 was going to be a different year and consequentially, I needed a different strategy. If you’ve ever had to strategize before, you know that strategy development requires a lot of thinking. I needed time to figure that out.
- My role at Moni has become more growth-focused and if you’ve followed my career journey, you know I’m a content-focused marketer. So, there was a lot of learning to be done. Along with its corresponding mistakes.
- I was also tired. Not of creating content because I’m always creating content but of engaging, connecting, answering questions, and responding to tons of messages. Every time I go on LinkedIn, I would have at least 10 messages to attend to. It became overwhelming. Messages that offered opportunities got buried under other kinds of messages.
So, I decided it was time to pause and reflect on who I wanted to be in the next phase of my life. Once I decided, I would work on a strategy that fits and roll up my sleeves to do the work.
When I wanted to get serious with LinkedIn in 2020, I read a bunch of articles on how to use LinkedIn and most gave pointers on writing a killer headline bio, having a great profile picture, and optimizing a profile to be found by recruiters. These articles also said if you did the right things; LinkedIn would:
- Help you get a job
- Become your online resume
- Help you establish your voice as a leader in your field
And so much more.
These are all true and I experienced them firstand, and more.
While I was on my #linkedinhaitus, I expected radio silence from that end but there was always constant notifications. I learnt three important things:
My profile is a resource bank: People were reading my posts, sharing them, leaving comments. People were reading articles as far back as 2021 and leaving questions in the comment sections. I wasn’t actively posting or publishing articles but I had touched on different topics that everyday there was something valuable for someone to discover.
LinkedIn is full of people too: Over the years, LinkedIn has become a lot more relatable and personable. People also shared failure stories, people argued, people publicly stood for what they believed even though it wasn’t the popular belief. People reached out to me in my DMs asking if I was doing okay. People even reached out to me on Twitter and Instagram, making sure that I was doing well. I mattered to some people and that was a good thing to know.
The algorithm will work for you: I had 5 months of not consistently posting content yet I was coming up in searches and I was still receiving connections and followers request. I was connecting with top talents from all over the world.
Now, that I’m back out of the hiatus, what’s my plan?
The usual! Try to take over the world.
