How does LinkedIn work?
Now let’s take a closer look at LinkedIn. LinkedIn operates on the theory that anyone you need or want to meet is less than six degrees away from you. That means someone you know probably knows someone who knows the person you’d like to contact. LinkedIn provides an easy way for you to contact that person and have your message passed along to people who know each other until it gets to the person you’re trying to reach. LinkedIn works best when you’re connected to people who you actually know and have a relationship with because those are the people most likely to pass along your message. LinkedIn is like an engine for warm leads and introductions. Other things you can do on LinkedIn include • build an extensive resume of your work • add a status update that is seen in the news feed of all of your contacts • integrate your blog feed or Slideshare presentations or a number of new applications including Tripit to show your business travel • ask and answer questions of the larger LinkedIn
By creating a profile on LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com), you are preparing yourself to network with a vast community of over 25 million professionals. Your profile is similar to an online resume, as it highlights your professional experience, education and areas of expertise and interest. Once you have your profile set up, you then upload your email contacts into your profile, and LinkedIn allows you to see who else you know that is already on the site. You can then simply connect with them, which also gives you access to their connections and their connections connections. Basically, youre developing a network three tiers deep that is easy to access through online requests through a chain of connections. How can it help me? Depending on your situation, you can use LinkedIn in a variety of ways: New Job * Youve begun a job search in your current field and youre targeting 5 companies. You can search for people in your network currently working at these companies who can give you insight to
The LinkedIn community currently consists of approximately 1.2 million business professionals. Each individual in the service has a network of “trusted” friends, who each then have their own friends, and so on. For example, if you established a network of 20 individuals who you personally know and trust, and each of them created a network of 20 trusted friends, you now have access to 400 individuals across many different industries who all share a very high degree of trust. If you are then looking for a person to help you with a specific need, you can use the search feature of LinkedIn to see if you can find anyone through your network of trusted friends. If you find someone you wish to contact, you submit a request for your mutual friend to make an introduction. Through this “virtual handshake”, you now have access to someone you need, with an endorsement from a mutual acquaintance. This is the core philosophy that allows LinkedIn to function and why they say, ‘Your network is bigger
