Everyone who knows me knows that I am one of the biggest evangelists for LinkedIn. While others turn to Twitter and Facebook, I keep reminding businesses that LinkedIn should be your hub for B2B social media marketing. And while the world is going crazy about Branchout, the Facebook application for professional networking, I find immense value in new tools such as LinkedIn Signal. But as a trusted networking platform for professionals, I find that LI is falling behind its social media counterparts in one important area: Privacy Settings. Here are 3 specific scenarios in which I believe it is in …
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Social media and your privacy is an intriguing topic that we should all be concerned about. On the one hand, Pete Cashmore of Mashable has already rightfully declared some time ago that Privacy is Dead. On the other hand, there are those who are actually still afraid to join a social networking site because of privacy concerns. It is these people that I want to address in this blog post. This week I got this question from my reader: I have always used alias names and blind emails everywhere online to protect my personal info from ID Theft. Because I …
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I signed up for Facebook several years after I joined LinkedIn. In fact, I even joined Twitter six months before becoming a Facebook member. A year ago you could of said that a Gen X guy on Facebook was not the norm. But now that there are as many Facebook users aged 25 to 54 as there are those that are aged 18 to 24, I would consider my demographic fairly average these days. So you can imagine how surprised I was when I uploaded my LinkedIn contacts to Facebook and found an acceptance rate of only 10 to 15% …
read moreAfter I recently wrote about why I am a LinkedIn LION, I have gotten positive response from a lot of the readers of this blog that they are starting to “see the light” despite the negative wrap that LIONs have traditionally received. At the same time, for those that want to slowly venture out and start to become a LinkedIn Open Networker, there is still a worry about keeping their private circle private. Which leads to today’s question: is it right for a truly Open Networker to close up visibility of their connections to others?
read moreI hope the title of this blog post did not shock you. No, I am not trying to sell you anything. But this is the question I have been asked twice now in the last month from a gentleman who is apparently living in Bulgaria. I was first contacted on May 22 and offered a database of 50,000 LinkedIn members willing to connect, and I was promised that “all 50K members are open for invitations and business offers.” The email went on to say that, with these connections, I could save “hundreds of dollars” by avoiding costly InMails. Furthermore, with …
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The following story of LinkedIn Profile ownership is a true one, and as with my other blog posts, I am hoping to get your feedback as to what the “right” answer to this question should be. Imagine that you began a job as a recruiter. Part of your job is, obviously, building out a network. After being hired you sign up to LinkedIn using your personal name. You start inviting your network as well as new contacts to connect with you on the networking platform. In order to better facilitate your sourcing activities on LinkedIn, your company starts reimbursing you …
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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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I was a little confused when I received this question recently from a former colleague. I mean, LinkedIn is really about getting plugged-in to a huge database of professionals. Why would you want to be part of this huge network but not want anyone to see your profile? I suppose that for some, the ability to find far outweighs the benefits of being found, so this may shed some light on his request. Or perhaps it was the reception of “spam” mails like invitations to connect, join this group, take this poll, etc. that caused my colleague to want to …
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