Anyone Use LINKEDiN?

LinkedIn is intended for business purposes. I'd expect people to contact me for business-related things.

 

I use it for business purposes. It is a great tool for job-hunting, as you can stay in contact and grow your network through it. You can also use it to prep for job interviews (research the company and especially the people you will be interviewing with). When you create your "profile" you can specify what types of contacts you wish to happen (eg "getting back in touch", references, etc).

 

I use it every single day, it is a great business tool and I contact tons of folks for that very purpose.

It is a great biz to biz tool.

DD

 

I use it. Great way to publish your resume. Use it for business purposes. I wouldn't be angry if a vendor contacted me for some business opportunity.

 

I use it for marketing the company I work for - directing web traffic. Just one good post gets you 60-140 clicks per week. It definitely has good business value.

 

for once, I agree with DD

 

I would be quite annoyed if a vendor contacted me through LinkedIn because I don't have any procurement responsibilities or powers in my company whatsoever. But for someone in procurement, it's probably acceptable. Someone who is too senior may also be annoyed because he has people to handle that stuff. I suppose I'd say it's okay when you have good confidence that the receiver is a legitimate target. Of course, illegitimate targets are probably unlikely to affect buying decisions anyway, so maybe it doesn't hurt to spam them.

 

You can...

A. Join groups where your target market is. Use that group to make posts, do your content marketing, deliver your value prop. - just make sure you provide value, don't troll.

B. Answer questions in your realm and subtly include your biz info. *LinkedIn has a Q/A section like Yahoo and Quora*

C. Direct approach.

D. Create a group your target market might join, use it to generate leads and deliver content to them.

 

I would say that's the purpose.
I do get some cold calls too that do piss me off. For example, I change jobs and thus my company on LinkedIn. I get a cold call from financial manager regarding rolling over my 401k etc. My number is not on LinkedIn so that means they called the receptionist and asked for me directly. I guess it's a creative way to get new business but annoying to me since it went from something online to real life spam.

 

if you're doing contracting this is the right tool..

 

Yeah, Linkedin is the best way I've found of connecting with old employers, co-workers or counterparties. The only thing I would avoid are industry or professional groups because they get bombarded by headhunters. Another problem I have is that I use a paid email service after my gmail blew up on me, and now on my People You May Know search I'm getting executives from these companies.

Unfortunately, this will probably be ruined by spammers the same way Careerbuilder and Monster.com were.

 

"Rocket River (who's really the guy from accounting that I used to smoke weed with on lunch break) displays great qualities as a leader. Working (I mean smoking weed) with Rocket River has been a good experience in team building (err passing joints) and Rocket River is a good team player"

"Rocket River (who's really my friends frat brother from college) exemplifies hard work and discipline ( in slamming beers) at workplace."

does anyone really fall for this shiat??

The real joke is their valuation of the site itself. Nice idea sure, but not worth what they were saying.

 

I got my current job via linkedin.

 

I occasionally get emails for job opportunities through Linkedin. Pretty neat site that I recommended if you're looking for something better.

 

You might want to start searching for recent blogs/discussions/Twitter, etc... that discuss a problem your product solves, then, subtly and naturally dropping your info into the conversation. Maybe even behind the shield of a 3rd party.

Or you can even start the conversation yourself. Here's a blatant example of a company doing it - http://community.dice.com/t5/Contractor-Issues-Archive/MBO-partners/td-p/51556

I think that particular post may be more geared towards brand visibility and lead generation than a direct sales pitch, but you get the idea.

 

I just get "such and such person knows you and wants to connect to you via LinkedIn" emails... and they just become "linked," butI don't know if that means I'm going to be working with them, later, or what...

I am linked to everyone who used to work with me... but I've been in the same job since 1996.

 

Anyone else get weird, out of the blue connection invitations from people not in their industry?