LinkedIn is a professional social networking site and has just surpassed 100 million users.
Nearly 60% of LinkedIn users hold executive-level or consultant positions therefore it has the highest percentage of decision-makers than any other social network. LinkedIn is growing at roughly one million new members every week, the equivalent of one joining every second.
As with all social media you should use the white hat approach and attempt to interact, engage and help the people rather than blatantly advertising your services or asking for work. Your goal with LinkedIn should be to establish yourself in your industry or niche. Make connections with customers and colleagues that you already have a relationship with and build from there.
One of the best ways of doing this is with LinkedIn Groups.
Posting links to multiple LinkedIn Groups
Here is my video on how to post links to multiple LinkedIn Groups to drive traffic and reach thousands of targeted professionals with one click.
There are over 870,000 groups on LinkedIn whose membership varies from 1 to 377,000. The majority of groups are business related, although there are currently 128,000 groups for both academic and corporate alumni.
One of my favourite groups on LinkedIn is the WordPress group. They are a lively and knowledgable crowd and have answered and commented on every question I’ve put.
Every sort of job you can do or application you use will be represented by LinkedIn Groups. I have joined groups for Illustrator users, Photoshop users, Mac users as well as some general design and marketing groups.
Are you on LinkedIn?
If you aren’t on LinkedIn I strongly suggest you join. As mentioned earlier, the people on LinkedIn aren’t there to browse through their friend’s photos, they’re there for business and networking. It’s a fantastic place to make connections, do business and learn.
Spend a bit of time updating your profile so it explains exactly what you’re about and what you’ve done. Make sure you get a few recommendations. The best way is to offer to write a recommendation for somebody you know and get them to do the same for you.
And hook up with friends and colleagues and don’t forget to connect with me on LinkedIn!
Other LinkedIn ideas
We are only really scratching the surface of what you can do at LinkedIn. You can use LinkedIn as a one stop shop for growing an audience and getting business. Here are some more fantastic things you can do on LinkedIn including optimising for SEO, adding video and running surveys.
- Run a survey to find out exactly what leading professionals are thinking with LinkedIn Polls
- Set up a company profile on LinkedIn
- Optimise your LinkedIn profile for search engines by customising the URL
- Ten Ways to Use LinkedIn to Find a Job by Guy Kawasaki
- Add video to your profile
Let me know
Are you on LinkedIn? What is your experience there? Do you have any other tips on how to best use LinkedIn?
Photo credit: Ravages
Rob, you’ve got a nice-looking blog here! And thanks for this information about LinkedIn. Many people don’t understand it and assume it’s just another Facebook, which is totally incorrect. LI is a valuable tool for business and for job-seekers if it’s used correctly.
Just out of curiosity, how often do you post status updates on LinkedIn? I usually post in moderation but some post frequently…do you think daily updates matter?
Hello Jill and welcome to RobCubbon.com! Really good question. I’ve hooked up my LinkedIn status updates to my Twitter feed which has pros and cons. It’s good because I’m always putting stuff out there. And bad because it might be a bit too frequent (10-20 a day!) for some people. It would be good hear other people’s opinions on this. Thanks!
thx
Great points Rob. Of all the social media sites out there, LinkedIN is my favorite because it is truly “business only”. The parameters are set and generally respected. One of the groups I’m currently involved with has such dynamic interactions that we will be meeting for a large parenting conference (for the public) in San Diego in the summer of 2012. It is not just a wonderful place to promote one’s own skills / services but to learn from others and grow.
You hit the nail on the head, Keyuri, when you said “It is not just a wonderful place to promote one’s own skills / services but to learn from others and grow.” If you use it just to promote yourself you’ll be disappointed. But promote, learn and grow – now you’re talking!
Great points, Rob. I’ve utilized linkedin as far as groups are concerned. It has helped me to establish relationships with people I would have never met. It’s made a huge difference in my design business and your post is very timely. Polls are on my to-do list. Thanks!
Great blog! There are so many things I don’t know about LinkedIn and have yet to learn.
Rob, thank you very much for sharing these thoughts with us. LinkedIn has proved to be the number one social network for “professionals” and as you mentioned, Decision Makers.
May I add a small tip, you can actually link your WordPress blog to your profile at LinkedIn easily with an application from LinkedIn called: WordPress which can easily import all of your blog posts as they are published.
Dennis, LinkedIn, as you say, enables you to connect with all sorts of people and is great for ideas.
Billie, I hope you learned something here.
Hello again, Ayman, yes, great advice, I activated that WordPress application on my profile long ago. It’s an excellent tip because anybody checking out your full profile on LinkedIn will automatically see your last few blog posts.
Hi Rob, I totally agree with you..LinkedIn has expanded and improved greatly and is now one of the best ways to connect with other like-minded business people. Actually, I feel it is a much stronger platform now than Facebook as I get better response to my posts and questions. Thanks for sharing…I do belong to many groups and need to use them more effectively!
Thank you, Nancy, I feel more at home in LinkedIn than at Facebook. But I’m perservering with Facebook.
Weird hearing your voice for the first time. I know you’re a southerner, but I imagined your voice would be deeper for some reason.
Hay, all I had to go on was your profile pic
lol, I think I was trying to sound interesting and it has the result of going up an octave or two! Once I did a vid after I’d be shouting at the dog and my voice was even higher and hoarse!
hey it was really nice and helpful.
thanks for sharing with us.
No problem, Vikash!
I signed up for LinkedIn a few months ago but never thought much about it. Today I decided to take a closer look and redid my profile to include more information. I also started to join many groups that interest me, both from an online perspective as well as a career one.
I’m still getting to know LinkedIn, but I can already see the benefits of interacting on the site.
Good move, Paul, I think you’ll find the groups both a vital source of information as well as a great way to deliver quality traffic and leads.
Thanks for sharing such a useful information about LinkedIn.
Glad you liked it!
Oh, Yes yes yes
. I will find this type tips , thanks thanks thanks dear
Thank you, Sabbir
Hi
Good Article ;
I got a question.
The above article shows how to post to multiple linkedin groups.
what are the steps to post a job to multiple linkedin group – job discussions?
Good question, Jake, I haven’t found out a way to do that. Nor how to post automatically into the Promotions section. This goes direct into the Discussions section. If you find out, let us know!