I have had the opportunity to engage with many lawyers recently, both in person as well as online through LinkedIn, and the sudden interest in social media that they seem to have has been surprising to me. I had always envisioned the legal profession as more of an old-school, conservative group of people that would not have an interest in social networking. The interest from them that I have seen clearly shows that LinkedIn, and social networking, are phenomenons that are here to stay. If you are in the legal profession and are already on LinkedIn, you may not be …
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This question may sound confusing, but since there are now more than 260,000 (!) LinkedIn Groups, maybe there is one that is actually officially affiliated with the site that could be an interesting one to join to learn more about LinkedIn? I am happy to report that there is at least one official LinkedIn Group that exists. The catch is that you may (read below for more details) have to be a Group Manager to join, but if you are, I highly recommend that you join the LinkedIn Groups Product Forum. This is an amazing Group where both internal employees …
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I once answered this on this blog when I answered the question “Why Do So Many People Keep Their Connections Private?”, but since it has been awhile, and since this question was asked from a different perspective, I think it is important to revisit the topic. First of all, in order to even potentially be able to browse anyone’s connections, you first have to be directly connected to that person. I realize that in other platforms like Facebook the option exists to allow everyone to browse your friends, whether or not they are connected with you. Remember, LinkedIn is different …
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This is a funny question, and I think it is only asked because LinkedIn has not done a good job branding this functionality in their user interface. Let me explain in more detail. Branding problem #1: LinkedIn Applications were introduced on October 28, 2008. This introductory blog post mentioned nine applications that were released. But in the video of the same day, there is talk about ten applications. What’s going on here? After doing some research, “Polls” was added to the list of nine applications to make ten. Which raises the question: Is “Polls” an Application or an afterthought? Branding …
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It is amazing how often I not only get asked this question of how to disconnect from someone and remove LinkedIn connections from my own personal network but also how frequently it appears on LinkedIn Answers. If you think of connecting to someone as their joining your virtual world, if the relationship does not work out because you feel you are being spammed or for another reason, you do have the option of disconnecting from them and removing them as a connection. Connecting with someone is not a marriage by any means! Hopefully this gives those who want to build …
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I often see this question of “What is a LinkedIn LION?” on the LinkedIn Answers section, and I already provided an answer on this definition back when I first started this blog in the summer of 2008. It was an honor that the author of the first real good book on LinkedIn, I’m On LinkedIn…Now What?, Jason Alba, quoted me in his blog when he blogged about the same issue: http://imonlinkedinnowwhat.com/2008/07/31/im-a-lion-hear-me-roar/.
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As more and more people start to realize the value of contributing to the LinkedIn Answers feature through asking questions and providing answers, it is a good time to think about the proper etiquette for participating in the LinkedIn Answers forum. Now I am no Miss Proper, but there are a few things that I have noticed having experienced both ends of the stick that I would like to share with everyone and make some etiquette recommendations.
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When you open an account at LinkedIn, the default setting is that your connections can be viewed by anyone. I used to have my connections open, until one day when I was doing some searching in a particular industry for companies to work, I noticed that all of the salespeople had decided to hide their connections and kept their contacts private. To me, this made sense, as they didn’t want their competitors to get their hands on their contacts. I asked myself if there was any advantage of keeping my own connections open or closed.
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