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  • How to Use LinkedIn for Networking and Marketing

    How to Use LinkedIn for Networking and Marketing

    Everybody wants to be on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, the platforms companies and businesses use for trendy advertising and marketing. However, investing so much time and effort in platforms that don’t benefit your career is unnecessary. A lot of people overlooked LinkedIn in the past. Ignorant of the many opportunities abundant on this site. There are life-changing opportunities for those looking for jobs, entrepreneurs, startups, investors, or fresh graduates. Here are some pointers on how to use LinkedIn for networking and marketing.

    Marketing/Networking on LinkedIn

    Just as a strong first impression counts in in-person encounters, so too does having an impressive LinkedIn profile for successful online networking. Before engaging in any LinkedIn networking activity, make sure your profile is complete and optimized.

    Build an Impressive LinkedIn Profile

    Start by including a professional-looking profile photo, as this has a big influence on profile visibility and interaction. The next detail to add is your headline. Creating an attention-grabbing headline for your LinkedIn page is similar to creating a CV. This title should communicate your areas of expertise and must be professional.

    Next is a profile description that will help you build your brand by, outlining your strengths and how you can bring value to potential clients or employers. It’s best to keep the summary brief and simple to read. Include relevant keywords to improve visibility in your area of interest. Avoid copying and pasting information from your CV while summarizing your work history on LinkedIn. Rather, concentrate on experiences that are relevant to your business or your desired career path.

    Add reputable recommendations and endorsements to your profile to increase its credibility. You can ask for referrals from people you’ve had good working connections with, such as clients, supervisors, and coworkers. These recommendations build your authority and trustworthiness and even serve as employment references. Getting more recommendations also makes you appear more credible to other users on LinkedIn.

    Make Connections

    It’s time to interact with other users on LinkedIn after building your professional presence. Refrain from adding connections randomly. Make connections with individuals in the field that you might want to collaborate with in the future or who might offer useful information on your business or career.

    When sending a connection request, make sure to add a customized statement and stay away from sending an automatic LinkedIn invitation. You can build connections with your new contact by sending a brief message introducing yourself or outlining your reasons for wanting to connect. By doing this, you’ll avoid giving the impression that you’re just adding things at random to increase your numbers. Remember, potential recruiters on LinkedIn are watching.

    As soon as your requests get accepted, you have to start forming personal or professional connections. You can engage their posts, celebrate a milestone, or simply reach out to them. Make an effort to reply to every communication you get on LinkedIn, and don’t ignore people trying to connect. To strengthen and build relationships, ask contacts to meet you offline at an event that’s open to the public.

    Create Posts/Join Groups

    Posting on LinkedIn is an important part of growing your career. Whatever your niche or industry, always make posts that engage and inform. You can start by writing your thoughts linking to your websites, and reposting pieces from others. As you grow, you can run ads on LinkedIn posts. To help people learn more about you and your business, think about providing a link to your blog to contacts. Provide a link to your subscription pages in your posts to your connections and followers.

    Become a member of industry-related LinkedIn groups to get visibility and establish valuable relationships. You may be able to connect with experts in your field if you join many active groups and share your profile. For any LinkedIn group you join to be effective, you will need to participate in them. Engage in and, provide helpful responses to queries. Instead of trying to promote yourself, concentrate on becoming an important group member.

    Benefits of LinkedIn for Employees/Businesses/Students/Job Seekers

    LinkedIn is a widely used platform for professional networking, offering numerous advantages for those seeking to expand their connections. Firstly, its ubiquity among professionals across the globe provides a direct channel to engage with crucial business contacts who may otherwise remain undiscovered.

    Many recruiters and hiring professionals use LinkedIn to find and connect with potential candidates. Users can often see job postings and recruitment-related content on the platform. Like many social media platforms, LinkedIn also allows users to run ads. Members come across sponsored content, job ads, or other promotional material while browsing their feeds. Companies and individuals can use LinkedIn’s advertising services to create targeted campaigns, promoting their products, services, or job opportunities to a specific audience.

    Most of LinkedIn members use it for business, not for informal engagements like Twitter. Networking on LinkedIn increases the chances of finding and getting opportunities. A well-constructed profile that includes relevant experiences, accomplishments, endorsements, recommendations, and information improves your professional image. Writing articles, sharing educational links, and participating in thought-provoking conversations in LinkedIn groups are other advantages of using the platform.

    LinkedIn serves as a valuable information repository, essentially presenting each user’s profile as a comprehensive resume. This helps you see the backgrounds, abilities, experiences, skills, motivations, and beliefs of potential customers, partners, investors, and other stakeholders. The search tools help to identify prospects and streamline your job search according to your interests.

    LinkedIn is not only free but also unrestricted, a feature that allows users to engage with their contacts regardless of work hours or geographical time zones. The potential opportunities that can be found on LinkedIn and from connections are far too many. Everyone looking to secure their business or career should create a LinkedIn account and use it.

  • LinkedIn Profiles – Are they Really “Responsible”?

    LinkedIn Profiles – Are they Really “Responsible”?

    The use of LinkedIn “Creative” profile is gradually fading to oblivion. The company is releasing its list of the most overused buzzwords in 2013, based on the words that appear most frequently on the professional networking site’s profiles. In 2011 and 2012, the most overused word was “creative”, but this year “creative” was beaten by “responsible.” On one hand, that’s less obviously self-defeating than describing yourself as creative. On the other hand, it’s more than little … uninspiring.

    Personally, I find the whole idea of pumping up your LinkedIn profile with flattering adjectives to be kind of strange, but then, my profile says, “I write stuff,” so what do I know? However, in LinkedIn’s own press release, the company’s “career expert” Nicole Williams says that including buzzwords in your profile isn’t a great idea: “If you sound like everyone else, you won’t stand out from other professionals vying for opportunities.”   And if you’re staring at the buzzword list below with dawning horror because it’s basically the same as your entire LinkedIn profile, well, the company has some suggestions. Among other things, it says you should let other users vouch for you (given the random requests and recommendations I get, I’m not crazy about this feature either, but, uh, let’s move on …), include actual work or results that show you’re creative or (bleh) responsible, and be more specific in your wording so that it’s better tailored to the jobs, companies, and industries you’re interested in.   Anyway, here’s the top 10 list:   1. Responsible 2. Strategic 3. Creative 4. Effective 5. Patient 6. Expert 7. Organizational 8. Driven 9. Innovative 10. Analytical   This article first appeared on techcrunch.

  • Legal Battle Over LinkedIn Breach Could Be Costly

    Legal Battle Over LinkedIn Breach Could Be Costly

    LinkedIn, the professional social networking site facing a $5 million-plus lawsuit for a massive breach earlier this month, may win its impending legal battle. But victory will probably not come cheap. Legal bills mount up quickly, especially with an “aggressive” defense, which LinkedIn has promised. Unless the suit, filed on behalf of lead plaintiff Katie Szpyrka and a potential cast of millions of other coplaintiffs, is settled quickly and quietly, it is likely to provide regular public reminders, for months or possibly years, of what happened and why. That, as marketing people say, is not good for “brand identity.”
    The 6.5 million member passwords, which were posted on a Russian hacker forum, had been easily decrypted because LinkedIn was using only a rudimentary hashing algorithm that is not even close to the current industry standard. And that encryption weakness is what the lawsuit cites repeatedly in its seven allegations, including violation of California business and professional code; violations of California civil code; breach of contract; breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing; breach of implied contracts; negligence; and negligence per se. Szpyrka, listed on LinkedIn as a senior associate at the Chicago offices of UGL Equis, a global real estate firm focused on business clients, is represented by Sean P. Reis of Edelson McGuire LLP, a law firm in Rancho Santa Margarita, Calif. The suit is seeking certification as a class-action lawsuit on behalf of all LinkedIn users compromised by the hack. The suit doesn’t allege violations of any specific cybersecurity law, but complains that the company violated its own privacy policy, which asserts that it will, “safeguard its users sensitive PII (personally identifiable information), specifically that: ‘All information you provide will be protected with industry standard protocols and technology.’” By its own admission, LinkedIn was not in compliance with the industry standard, which is to “salt” the hashes — merge the hashed passwords with another combination and then hash them for a second time. LinkedIn, however, invokes the classic defense in data breach cases to contend the suit is “without merit.” LinkedIn spokeswoman Erin O’Harra told Cameron Scott of the IDG News Service: “No member account has been breached as a result of the incident, and we have no reason to believe that any LinkedIn member has been injured. Therefore, it appears that these threats are driven by lawyers looking to take advantage of the situation.” So, now that the dueling sound bites have been issued, how vulnerable is LinkedIn really? The likelihood is, not very much. The courts have so far declined to award damages to plaintiffs who cannot prove actual damages. Legal experts viewing a string of lawsuits, also in California, over breaches of personal medical information, told CSO in April that judges are well aware that 100-percent security on the Internet simply does not exist, due to the rapidity and sophistication of attacks. There are numerous examples of breaches of companies that are in compliance, which makes it much more difficult to prove negligence. Indeed, the Oregon Supreme Court recently struck down a class-action suit against Providence Health Systems that had been settled six years ago, finding no evidence that any of 365,000 patients whose data had been on disks/tapes that were stolen from a Providence employee’s car had suffered any financial loss or other adverse consequences. “We are aware of no other jurisdiction that has allowed recovery for negligent infliction of emotional distress in circumstances where the alleged distress is based solely on concern over the increased risk that a plaintiff’s personal information will, at some point in the future, be viewed or used in a manner that could cause the plaintiff harm,” the court said then. The suit against LinkedIn goes to some length to assert that actual damages have occurred, arguing that, “plaintiff and the class members … have lost money in the form of the value of their personal data. They have lost property in the form of their breached personal data, which is of great value to LinkedIn, LinkedIn advertisers and malicious actors. SubClass members have lost money in the form of monthly membership fees.” But it does not offer specifics — only that the PII, “…has ascertainable value to be proven at trial.” It is not certain, of course, that precedent will prevail. Rebecca Herold, an information security, privacy and compliance consultant known as the “Privacy Professor,” said while the precedent so far is not to award damages that cannot be proven, “I see the trend will likely be changing as judges, courts and lawyers come to understand better how such breaches can have damages long-term, in many downstream systems that were attached in some way to the breached system.” For example, she said, many LinkedIn users may use the same password on other systems as they used on LinkedIn, even though that practice is strongly discouraged by security experts. But those other accounts may now be breached, even though the LinkedIn account itself may not have been breached, Herold said. Todd Thiemann, senior director of product marketing for Vormetric, said when the breach became public that among the still unanswered questions were, “How did the bad guys get this information? And if they got that, what else did they get?” Those questions will be at the heart of the pending litigation.