LinkedIn Tips and Tricks To Get 500+ Contacts
I know many professionals use LinkedIn to connect with colleagues, partners, suppliers and pretty much anyone they wish to partner or do business with. Considering there are over 9 million users, this is a pretty powerful online business network.
But what happens when you are short contacts and want a passive way to generate more? I have some answers for you. I will also offer some tips on how to add contacts and also how to search for people you know. According to LinkedIn, people with over 30 contacts show up 75% more than others. This means, the more contacts, the more exposure and leads you can generate. Here is a good passive way to get people to contact you.
First of all, if you have not signed up, do so here: https://www.linkedin.com/secure/register
If you are registering for the first time, take this bit of advice:
For the “first name” field enter your complete name, first AND last (Geoff Simon) for instance. In the “last name” field enter an email address specifically for linkedIn contact requests (you@hotmail.com, gmail.com, or whatever email you want). Then proceed to fill out as much of your profile as you can, the more the better. Also add a picture, this gives it a personal touch and increases the number of times your profile is viewed. Now that you are signed-up, go ahead and look at your profile, it should look something like mine which you can find here: My Profile.
You will notice that you see my full name on the first line and my email on the second line. The email address is important because this is how many people add contacts. This passive little trick is used by many savvy LinkedIn members to generate additional leads. Now go ahead and click on the link in the orange outline at the top under the “Get Introduced” and “Contact Directly” box that says, “know this person – Add Them As A Connection. This will take you to a screen where you need to enter the email address for this contact, in this case it’s me, so type in gsimon@socialmediasystems.com. If you did not know my email, you would not be able to add me as a contact. By placing your email in the “last name” field, users can instantly add you as a contact to build their connection base.
As for other strategies to promote your profile, you can place an email signature which links to your LinkedIn profile. LinkedIn is nice enough to create this for you with a variety of different template options. You can find these if you click on the “my profile” tab at the top and then below that, “email signatures”. This way anyone you send email to, can add you as a contact or sign-up and add you if they are not already “LinkedIn”.
You can also check out your College or University and search for classmates by clicking on “classmates” at the footer of every page. This will allow you to search all members who attended the same school you did during the same time period. Another way to find contacts is to click the “Expand Your Network” button at the top right of the page. From here you can add friends, business partners, etc. but you need to put in their email address and name. They will then be sent an email prompting them to sign up, or add you as a contact if they are already registered.
You can also add customized buttons to your blog or web site for even more exposure, here is an example:
In addition, LinkedIn offers an Outlook Toolbar that you can download for seamless export/import features from your Outlook contacts into LinkedIn and vice versa. You can also download the LinkedIn Browser Toolbar.
If anyone has any other suggestions, please leave a comment, even if it is just one sentence. I hope this helps anyone utilizing LinkedIn as a business networking tool.
[tags]linkedin, linkedin tips, linkedin contacts[/tags]
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I have a Linkedin account with Gmail account and wanted to change it to New Yahoo account creating new profile. I want to import the contacts from the older account which already exists in Linkedin, I tried and searched all where but i did’nt get any answer. Can anyone tell me how to do it.
Yes: Join Plaxo, import all your contacts, run the deduper, export again. Simple, easy
Hi, great help – thanks.
How do i create more contacts if I don’t know or have any in Linkedin? I would like to converse with more business people, how do I access them?
Cheers – Iain
Got any suggestions for adding customized tags for your your connections now available in beta testing phase?
I’ve had my e-mail address included with my last name for about a year… I think it’s a great tip. Well, today I got an unsolicited e-mail from an individual that I don’t even know telling me that I’m in violation of the LinkedIn user policy ( which I didn’t realize, but apparently I am ) and that I “just don’t get it when it comes to using social media”.
Any thoughts, other than this guy has too much time on his hands?
Hmm, yea linked-in wants to stand int eh middle of the transaction and geti in teh way so that you wil buy in-mail.
Just in time, http://ideapals.org is FREE with No middle-man
If you put your first and last name in the first name cell, nobody will be able to search for you since they will put your last name in the last name search and you won’t match.
This is dated information, for new visitors I would no longer recommend this trick. You can modify your linked-in profile to show your contact information in the first frame.
Out of date info. Israel Rothman is correct.
I am familiar with these tactics as I originally wrote the piece when LinkedIn initially opened up shop. I agree with the sentiment that the information is outdated. LinkedIn has developed some really valuable tools to find connections and grow your network.
One that I would suggest is an addon for Outlook called Xobni, this will allow you to see, from your contacts and anyone else you have in your email, if they are a 1st, 2nd, etc. connection. It will also tell you how you know them, a colleague, group, and if it’s a 2nd connection, who you know them through. This is a paid service, but in my opinion, worth it considering all the other features built in to the system.
LinkedIn has also done a good job of using the “you might also know…” feature, usually these end up being people you work with or are working at a company you used to work for, or members of groups you belong to. Another great feature idea is to look for groups that have open networkers, no “I don’t know this person” bull. These groups are good to grow your network fast, but you might not get the best quality connections depending on what you are using LinkedIn for. Using a LinkedIn signature file is alright also.
A bit off topic but a Firefox plugin called wisestamp allows you to embed sig files w/ social links, rss feed rotators, one being a LinkedIn option. This is helpful if you use webmail a lot.
Anyway, Good Luck, the site has really grown. I see Solomon is getting more involved with the film stuff, looking good, I have been following the business and what you guys have been up to looks great.
Thanks Goeff, good to hear from you.
I believe that the true value of a LinkedIn account is the level 2 list of connections. I have downloaded and browsed my whole LinkedIn level 2 network (35 000+ contacts) and I am browsing the new contacts every other week, it gives me new leads all the time, very easy to contact. Took me some time the first time I got it all but now it takes me very little time to spot interesting leads in the updates (I am looking for very specific type of companies). The most interesting part is that my direct connections are working for me for free; each time they connect to new people, these people end up in my database and I just have to look at them to spot my sales lead.
It’s not a feature of LinkedIn, you have to use a third party service. There are several companies out there that provide this service. I am currently using Smart Bees (http://www.smartbees.biz), they have been very helpful so far.
Hi Israel, thanks a lot for those tips. I don’t know if you can help me…. My main profile is in Spanish as I live in Spain but I do business with other European companies.
Having an english profile is out of the question because people in Spain and France normally do not speak English.
Any suggestions on how to use my “mixed” contacts in a coherent way?
Kind regards,
Rob
very useful and helpful infox thanks! I’m new to linkedin and I haven’t made any connection yet.I want to send the first invitation to you plz accept it.And thanks again.