Why you network = Why you use LinkedIn

In my opinion, LinkedIn is for you because it’s …

· proactive business development
· a great way to raise your personal profile
· your best personal marketing tool
· an effective use of your networking time
· brilliant for cross selling
· a help to reinvigorate relationships
· a comfortable way to grow your network
· going to get you more new business
· for people who don’t like networking
· it’s here to stay

I have studied LinkedIn for 12 months now and realise that when you understand its power, it’s as close to real live networking as won’t make a difference.

Im sure most of you will agree that we attend business events to;

(In alphabetical order)

• Find a new employee for your team
• Find out what the competition is doing
• Find someone who supplies….
• Gain useful information about…
• Get known by others
• Get others to know what you do
• Help others with their business challenges
• Increase your knowledge of…
• Introduce Jack to Jill for their mutual benefit
• Make new friends both social and business
• Meet key people and decision makers
• Raise your own and the company’s profile
• See if an existing client needs other services
• Spot potential new business

All of these can be done using LinkedIn also!! Over the next couple of weeks, I will be looking at each of these in more detail, and showing how you can incorporate LinkedIn into your existing networking strategy, starting with;

Finding out what the competition is doing...

Not only does LinkedIn focus on individuals but also on companies. When you click the ‘More…’ button and click ‘companies’ you see will see a detailed overview of companies, including a search facility, plus you can browse companies by industry and those in your extended network. A great way of keeping up to date with the latest developments in your industry.

Please don’t cause embarrassment through LinkedIn relationships!

Networking, whether it’s face-to-face or online, requires patience and suitable timings. It takes time to build relationships. Get to know someone, start to build rapport, find common ground and see what you can offer or give someone early on. Create trust by becoming reliable and then watch the relationship start to blossom. I do find sometimes people are too quick to;

• Want to link in even though you’ve never met
• Request recommendations from you
• Ask for introductions to others

Request a FREE copy of my special article on how get it right using LinkedIn.

Dont forget...

Building relationships can be a sensitive and vulnerable time in our lives. Getting it right produces mutual benefits and comforting long term associations. Getting it wrong can sometimes cause upset, embarrassment and disappointment. It’s simple really; try to give something first and get your timings right!

Take care who you link in with...

You have 5 choices to make when someone invites you to join their network

• Accept but always send a personal message immediately thanking them for inviting you to join their network
• If you’re not sure about this person click the ‘reply’ button and send them a message asking them to remind you where you met or why they want to link in with you
• Archive the request …and hope they forget and won’t ask you again!
• Click the button ‘I don’t know this person’
• Click the button ‘flag as spam’

Beware of LIONS!

There are people out there who appear to be going for the world record of how many people they can link in with. They are called LIONS- LinkedIn Open Networkers. When people request to link in with me and I know for certain we have never met I always click one of the last two. I am reliably informed this information goes back to LinkedIn headquarters who decide to cancel these spammer’s (oops sorry people’s) profile on LinkedIn. I believe this does not happen where people announce to the world they are a LION in their profile.

Did you know that you can export your LinkedIn connections to your address book/desktop?!

VIEW IN FULL SCREEN MODE

This is just one of many LinkedIn tips and ideas included in our "How to Get the Best out of LinkedIn" training program. We now run in-house training, web seminars and public seminars on this exciting business development tool. For more information, please visit http://www.linkedintraining.co.uk/.

Job Hunting on LinkedIn

Getting your profile accurate and attractive just has to be one of the best ways of marketing yourself and if you can get past employers to post testimonials ( LinkedIn call them recommendations) this surely must go along way to raising your profile and increasing your chances of getting back into/ looking for a new job.

Visit www.linkedintraining.co.uk for more LinkedIn tips and ideas.

LinkedIn requires the same politeness as offline networking…

Whether you network online or offline you need to be polite, courteous and friendly. LinkedIn offers you default messages which are generally short, sharp and unfriendly! Online and offline networking is precisely the same; it’s simply building relationships. By all means use standard messages (with some personal bits added) but don’t use the ones LinkedIn give you!

Good manners, courtesy and respect are the basis of building new and maintaining existing relationships. Act in a similar manner with your LinkedIn connections as you would when working the room at any business event.

I have written a special report on this, including several personalised messages that can be tailored for your LinkedIn business development. Contact me if you would like a copy.

This is just one of many free LinkedIn tips and ideas available from www.linkedintraining.co.uk, or by joining the Kintish Business Networking Skills LinkedIn Group

Recommendations on LinkedIn

One of the best marketing tools is to get satisfied clients and customers to say positive words about you, which, if allowed, you can send to prospects. Get those words on your website and all other marketing materials so you have third party endorsements.
Recommendations (normally known as testimonials) need to be an important part of your profile. In fact, to have your profile at 100%, which increases your standing in Google, you actually need three recommendations. I have over 50 recommendations which I can use as part of my marketing.

A cynical friend of mine recently suggested if you get too many recommendations people start to get suspicious and maybe check you out further. ‘Ah, the reason he gets lots of recommendations is because he has joined a mutual appreciation society!’. In some cases it might be true but not for me. I would never give anyone a recommendation just to get one back. I give them to people in my network where I genuinely believe they deserve it.

This is just one of many free LinkedIn tips and articles available on www.linkedintraining.co.uk.

Networking and using LinkedIn

We have been networking throughout life’s journey – it is simply the process of building relationships. Having that ‘light bulb moment’ late 2008 I realised I could now collect together all those people I have met through my life to date; well the ones who have signed up for LinkedIn anyway! And as I write, 40m + connections are now in the system; not all my personal connections, I might add!

The two networks to focus on are the ones we have built over our lifetime and their networks. How many times do we ask or consider asking our existing clients to recommend us to others having done a great job for them? However happy they are, as soon as we leave their presence they get on with what they’re doing and forget us. But when we’re able to look into their little black book and see some of their contacts we can focus on people who we’d like an introduction to. When people in your network like and trust you they generally will be more than happy to introduce you to their contacts.

Visit www.linkedintraining.co.uk for more useful tips and information on LinkedIn. Kintish is fast becoming the UK leading authority on LinkedIn. We run public, in house and web-based seminars for this exciting online networking business development software.

Baby chicks in the nest!

Are you busy? I hear lots of people say,” What do you think, we’re in recession? No, fees and sales are well down and the phone’s not ringing like it used to.”

I hear this so much and depending who I’m talking to I sometimes suggest they ought to be busier than ever…marketing. You should either be earning the fee or making the sale or taking action to find more work and create more sales. By way of a summary ask yourself.

1. Who your target market is?

2. What you are offering and how your clients and customers will benefit as a result of doing business with you?

3. What is your marketing message? This is what you say to your target market about your defined service to get them interested and wanting to know more. The message must be crystal-clear and promise a clear and valuable outcome.

4. Do you have effective marketing materials? This can be a good website which can include audio or video. Are you involved with social marketing to ensure you raise your profile to a global market place? Do you keep in touch with your existing clients to ensure they remember you’re still in business and what new offerings you may have.

5 Are you attending the appropriate business events to get your message across and build new or on existing relationships?

When you do none of the above your business behaves like the baby chicks in the nest!

If ever there was a time to be very busy and more proactive than ever, now is that time

www.kintish.co.uk

How much time should you be spending on LinkedIn?

When I mention LinkedIn and other similar online social media tools I often get the response, “Oh I haven’t got time for all that; I’m far too busy.” The attraction of LinkedIn is when you understand it and use it effectively it really is a pro-active, time saving, profile raising, business development tool. When people say they haven’t got the time I reply ‘You mean you haven’t got the time to go to business events or do any networking?’

When you use Linkedin to best effect it really is the best use of your time. No travel time or hassle, no carbon emissions just pure premium time carrying out proactive business development. Like every aspect of our lives the mantra ‘What you put into it you get out’ equally applies to using LinkedIn!

Visit www.linkedintraining.co.uk for more on how you can use LinkedIn as part of your business networking strategy.

Are you getting the best from LinkedIn?

Kintish have developed a new training programme on how to get to grips with the online networking world, particularly the LinkedIn online global community. When it is used in combination with face-to face networking it can really help gain new business and build your own and your businesses profile. After all, with the growth of the internet, we are now in a global marketplace meaning that anyone in the world can buy your products and services.

Our brand new training CD-rom will show you how to ...

• get started
• feel comfortable with the technology
• build your personal, and your organisation's global profile
• build your network
• make introductions
• connect with 40m+ people
• get lots of testimonials
• raise your profile

The result?

At the end of the training cd you will fully understand the important benefits of LinkedIn, and be fully au-fait with all of its features. This will lead to you raising your own and your business's profile to ensure that, in the long run, you create more business.

BUY NOW AND TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THIS SPECIAL OFFER OF JUST £27+VAT!!

LinkedIn Top Tip - Profile Detective!

The activity we carry out most is viewing other people’s profiles. If you’d like to find out who has been looking at yours, watch this video.

This is just one of many free LinkedIn tips and articles available on www.linkedintraining.co.uk.

LinkedIn Q and A Session, Tuesday 11th August 2009 - 1pm-2pm GMT

Kintish will be running a FREE, one hour question and answer session on Tuesday 11th August 2009, to help you with any LinkedIn problems or questions that you may have.

I will be on hand to answer any questions, so please have them ready before the session. If you can't make it, feel free to send an email to willk@kintish.co.uk with any of your LinkedIn dilemmas!

For more information or to reserve your place, please contact reta@kintish.co.uk.

PLEASE NOTE: This will be a web based Q and A session, you can participate either through a microphone enabled headset, or by dialling in to the session using a given telephone number.

Social Networking in Plain English

A short explanation of social networking websites and why they are popular...

I haven't got time for this!...

LinkedIn is a 40m person network, but within that large number lies 275,000+ groups. A LinkedIn group is a specialised community of likeminded people who interact and network amongst themselves. You can find a group for just about anyone or anything!
I believe that by joining groups in your target markets, becoming involved and answering questions, you are building your online presence, whilst also furthering your business development. As we say here at Kintish, you should always be looking for your "Ahaa moment" - and you never know where this may present itself!

But I haven’t got time for all this!

I hear this regularly. All I say is it should simply be part of your business development in general and networking in particular. When you attend events or your professional conferences and seminars, you spend lots of time travelling. Set aside some time each week to suit you and I believe it will be time well spent. It is pure bulls-eye focus on building new or on existing relationships.

This is just one of many of my LinkedIn tips and ideas, Kintish are also running 'live' seminars to help you get the best out of LinkedIn, visting Manchester on July 1st and London on July 7th, please visit www.linkedintraining.co.uk for more information.

Who do you want to be referred to?

The daddy of modern day networking is a pioneer called Dr Ivan Misner. He came up with the idea of breakfast networking clubs and his is still the biggest –BNI (Business Networking International). He says unless you know who you want to know very few people can help you.
When delegates ask for referrals far too many people say “I am looking for anyone who needs an accountant/ plumber/ circus ring leader” which leads fellow networkers’ minds to go blank. When you ask “Does anyone know anyone at Smith & Co?” you either do or you don’t.

This is the beauty of LinkedIn. You have to be specific when seeking referrals; your computer won’t put up with the nonsense of you saying to it ‘any accountant anywhere’. In fact I’m wrong –if you ask LinkedIn to ‘find me a profile with the word ‘accountant’ in it, at this time of writing LinkedIn comes up with 286,436 times. Go through those if you’ve nothing else to do!
This is where the advance search comes in useful; it means you can be bulls-eye specific.

For me, you will get the best out of LinkedIn when you know your target market-you need to know who you need to know. So there you have it, no more “Do you know ANYONE…..!”

For more LinkedIn tips and ideas, visit http://www.linkedintraining.co.uk/. Kintish is fast becoming the UK’s leading authority on LinkedIn. We run public, in-house and web based training seminars for this exciting online networking business development software.

If ever there was a time for you to be doing something different - NOW is that time...

For more information visit www.linkedintraining.co.uk

"Im on LinkedIn - now what?!"

So many people I meet are on LinkedIn but don't know how to use it to its full potential. Why not see my eight tips on using LinkedIn, and how this can go hand in hand with your 'live' networking in order to become a more proactive business developer?

Kintish are now running workshops to help you get to grips with LinkedIn and online networking. Please visit www.linkedintraining.co.uk for more information on what is covered, and seminars in your area.

LinkedIn is your best online networking friend

LinkedIn is a global networking community and when you master all it’s uses it can make it a big difference to your business. For me the benefits are;

• When you use it actively and with a positive frame of mind you become part of a very large and valuable network. Being part of the same club means members tend to keep in touch with each other and the system will update your current situation and contact points

• You build your own brand when you use the profile page carefully. This tells the LinkedIn world who you are, what your business is all about, what services you have available and how people rate you. It’s great marketing and profile raising to 35m+ people in the same club!

• You have the best referral system possible, again when you approach it professionally

• You have many people to whom you can give your advice or get advice from. This is available when you use the ‘answers’ section.

• You can set up your own network club within LinkedIn where you find issues of common interest. LinkedIn call them groups. We have the Kintish Business networking Skills group where we regularly send them free online and offline networking ideas. (Why not join it?)

• You can find new advisors and suppliers. Using your network and the testimonial section you can check out these people first. This is no different when you’re in the pub and you ask someone to recommend a reliable builder.

• When you’re in a bigger organisation it is a great tool to find out more about colleagues across other divisions or even countries. Visibility creates more success in big companies and when you put an effective profile up, who knows who will find you and what benefits it might bring?

• IT’S FREE! Unless you want to use certain features many more times than the average user, yes it’s free. Even after that the costs are not high.

Want to get to grips with LinkedIn and find out how it can benefit your business development? Kintish run LinkedIn training seminars, to compliment your face-to-face networking skills. Visit www.linkedintraining.co.uk for more information.