Social Media

Social Media’s 3 main avenues are Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. LinkedIn is a World Wide gated-access social network which works on multi-tiered contacts, particularly for professional people and boasts over 5.5 million users. It seems to be used mostly for people to :

• Connect to people from prior places (jobs, education etc)
• Online resume for job hunting
• Connecting for business and business opportunities.

So the big question is how to get the most out of LinkedIn and make it work for you? You can of course read the internet instructions, but they only tell you how functions work, and are in my opinion quite generalised. From my own quick research and experience I have a few ideas, and I’ll share what I’ve discovered so far:

1. Complete your profile fully and do include a photo. I’ll admit that profiles without photos or hardly any information don’t draw my attention … how do I know what that person does, their services, their point of difference, if they have zilch in their profile? This is a form of advertising, so sell yourself. 
2. When you link with someone check out their connections and see if there is anyone you know, or want to know, and link with those people too.
3. Use LinkedIn to search for someone specific you want. Let’s say you are looking for an Accountant, you can search this category and then see if you have any mutual connections and ask for a referral to that Accountant. 
4. When you meet someone, or get their business card, check if they are on LinkedIn and connect to that person.
5. If you connect with someone on LinkedIn who you really think will be a great lead, then be sure to follow up and invite them out for a cup of coffee – to give both you, and the other person, the opportunity to learn more about each others business and to ascertain if there might be the possibility of a good strategic alliance.
6. Update your profile regularly … not only adding new material, but keeping it up to date so that you appear on the regular LinkedIn Updates and your connections grow. I believe in many ways it’s about being seen and touch points, so allocate regular time each week to keep your profile working.

So, these are my ideas … I would love to hear from anyone with any additional suggestions or ideas, similar to this, on how to make LinkedIn work – I’m sure of everyone out there, some of you have some fantastic ideas and suggestions you’d be happy to share. Thanks in advance. :) Donna