The benefits of belonging to the Linkedin Community

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

1. 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 

2. 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 75m+ people in the same club! 

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

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

5. You can set up your own network club within LinkedIn where you find issues of common interest. LinkedIn call them groups. 

6. 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. 

7. 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, it can ceate many more cross-selling opportunities 

8. 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.

Enthusiasm is vital for business development

“Flaming enthusiasm, backed up by common sense and persistence, is the quality that most frequently makes for success.”

Dale Carnegie – author of How to Win Friends and Influence People

"When you love what you do, you can’t help being enthusiastic

The word simply means intense enjoyment, interest and approval. When you’re in this state you just love spreading the word about how to make things work better. You’re committed to results, passionate about solutions, fanatical about helping others achieve their goals. And don’t you want to spread your message far and wide using any and every marketing tool you can get your hands on? The enthusiast gets business from all corners because so many people hear about them and their innovative problem-solving approaches."

If I lined up ten of your friends and associates, would they all report that you are passionate, even fanatical about the work you do and the difference you make? I know mine would.

Most professionals and business owners may love what they do, but more often than not, they come across as tepid, hesitant, and uncommitted.

When they talk about their work or their business they are often as inspiring as a wet sponge.

“What do you do?” The person answering will say, looking at his shoes (or yours if he’s not a total introvert!) “I’m an accountant”  with an apology thrown in for good measure.

Look, I'm not out to insult you, but to challenge you.

If you are not passionate about what you do, excited by the difference you make, keen to share with others, eager to add value, inspired by your clients and moved by the abundance of opportunities and possibilities afforded by your expertise, you are missing the boat.

And what's perplexing to me is that this is the very last thing that professionals and business people focus on.

If you want to be an all round professional you just know not only have you to be good technically (that’s taken as a given) but you’re expected to contribute to business development. Many people will do very little to nothing. “Not my job, leave it to the marketing people.” Others may study everything they can about marketing. Still others will work hard to make external changes to their marketing. But very few will do the thing that makes the biggest difference of all:

 Expressing Authentic Excitement about Your Work and Your Business!