The information presented here barely scratches the surface of LinkedIn. Its capabilities expand beyond the confines of being just a social media site. It’s quickly evolving into a robust CRM (customer relationship management) tool for participants who understand and want to capitalize on the value of nurturing relationships for business.

With over 95 million registered users, the rate at which your network expands on LinkedIn is truly amazing.  A hundred strategic contacts could mean access to millions in a short amount of time.  Think about how many networking mixers you would have to attend to get those kinds of numbers!

Ultimately, if you want to position yourself as an industry leader and add to the open discussion on the issues in your market, LinkedIn is the way to do it.  With a little effort, it’s easy to become recognized as the go-to person in your niche utilizing this great tool.

Joining a LinkedIn Group introduces the opportunity to strengthen connections with like-minded individuals in an exclusive forum.  The Groups function provides a private space to interact with LinkedIn members that share common skills, experiences, industry affiliations, and goals.

Group leaders capitalize on this feature through providing additional benefits and access for each participant with the expectation of solidifying their overall brand and mission.  It’s a win-win situation. In most cases, invitations are sent out asking a person to join a group.

Nevertheless, you’re allowed to initiate the process of participating in groups.  For private groups, managers have the authority to accept or deny requests.  The Group Directory lists all the groups currently on LinkedIn.  To search the “Group Directory”:

1. Select “Groups Directory” from “Groups” menu on the LinkedIn navigation bar
2. Click “Search Groups” box
3. Enter a keyword or a group name in search box.  Narrow your search with the category and language selection.  Click “Search”.

LinkedIn Answers is an ingenious system where you can ask and answer questions submitted by the LinkedIn community.  Talk about an opportunity to rack up cool points in your niche!  Answering questions on LinkedIn is a savvy way to be positioned as the obvious expert without being pushy or annoying.

Access the LinkedIn Answers forum by:

1. Clicking the “More” menu from the navigation toolbar.
2. Select “Answers” from the drop-down menu.

Questions are kept open for seven days.  Multiple answers can be submitted by different LinkedIn members. The creator of the question picks who she thinks shared the best response. If you’re response is chosen as the “Best”, a green box with a star is posted on your profile page, and attached to your name in the Answer area, indicating you’re a proven expert.

All Answers are Valuable

The brilliant aspect of the process is that all answers are saved within the LinkedIn database.  So if at a later point in time a member decides he would rather search through previous answers, instead of submitting a new question, those responses will be returned.

With this capability, there’s no need to worry if your answer is not picked as the “Best” all the time.  All answers are logged and have the potential to generate interest and drive traffic to your profile.

How to Answer LinkedIn Questions

To answer a question:

1. Click the question.
2. Select the “Answer” button on the next page.
3. Input all details necessary into the entry form to thoroughly respond to the question.

Establishing yourself as an expert on LinkedIn takes more than a polished profile.  In the same way an offline networking group, like the Chamber of Commerce, expects more from its  members than handing out nice brochures, so is it with LinkedIn.  In particular, LinkedIn members want to see contributions specifically for the community.

Accomplishments of all kinds are great for earning attention from business colleagues.  Yet, receiving endorsements and praise from other LinkedIn members adds an additional layer of credibility.

Some strategic ways to demonstrate your expertise on LinkedIn are with Recommendations and participating in LinkedIn Answers.

Recommendations

Similar to testimonials, business partners can leave Recommendations on your profile promoting you or your services.  When you’re just starting on LinkedIn, it’s a good idea to encourage people you’ve worked with outside of the community to join and post their testimonials to your profile. A Recommendation stands as social proof from a third party that you’re a skilled professional.

As stated by LinkedIn:

Users with Recommendations in their profiles are three times more likely to receive relevant offers and inquiries through searches on LinkedIn.

If you choose to do so, recommendations will appear in two places on your profile page.  At the top of a profile, LinkedIn shows a Recommendation counter, while a detailed-view of each recommendation appears toward the bottom of a profile. Recommendations are visible to your personal network and Fortune 500 companies utilizing the LinkedIn Recruiter Tool.

The simplest way to get Recommendations is to ask.  Satisfied clients are usually more than happy to share their experiences.

To request a recommendation through LinkedIn:

1. Select “Profile” from the navigation toolbar.
2. Choose “Recommendations” from the drop-down menu.
3. Click the tab marked “Request Recommendations”.

After opening an account, creating a profile, and importing personal contacts you’re ready to move out into the larger network. LinkedIn works for you based on who you already know.  People you know and who acknowledge knowing you are bridges to new connections.

LinkedIn employs a tier system for organizing member’s relationships. A person’s position in relation to your personal network dictates the actions you’ll have to take to add them to your network.

LinkedIn’s hierarchy of connections is primarily structured in three levels.  Your direct contacts are marked as 1^st level,  the contacts of your first level contacts are marked as 2^nd level, and if someone is linked with a person who in turn is connected with one of your direct contacts that person is tagged as a 3^rd level contact. If you have no connection, then they’re identified as out of network.

Also, all of the contacts of your 1^st level contacts are made visible to you.  LinkedIn even reveals the number of shared connections you have with a person, and the identity of the shared connections.

Introductions, InMails and Invites

As you come across the profiles in the community, LinkedIn displays several methods for adding the person to your network. Regardless if you’re directly on a profile page or reviewing a listing of profiles from a search, generally these options are offered to initiate contact:

• Send InMail
• Get introduced through a connection
• Add to your network

On the profile page you’ll find this information in the upper, right-hand corner.  When working from a search result page, the listing has to be selected in order for contact methods to display on the right side.

Introductions: Have We Met?

Facebook has likes, Twitter has re-tweets, and LinkedIn has introductions. Designed around the principle of referrals, introductions are one of the best ways to meet new people on LinkedIn.  Introductions are highly regarded because they deliver built-in trust.

The basic idea is that if you don’t know a person who you would like to be connected to, find someone within your personal network who will introduce you to this person.  When a potential contact sees that you’re linked to someone who they know, it implies you’re a credible person.

You’ve Got Inmails

On the other hand, InMails are a paid feature of LinkedIn enabling you to send emails directly to a person’s LinkedIn mailbox, regardless if they’re in your network or not.  Depending on your account level, you’ll receive a credit for a certain number of InMails per month.  If you send an InMail but you don’t get a response from the recipient after seven days, then you’re account is credited for the InMail.

Although InMails require payment and you’re running a risk by contacting someone who doesn’t know you personally, it’s an effective tool for professionals to cut to the chase in developing targeted connections. Using InMails to meet a fellow LinkedIn Member is another way to show you’re serious about your business and willing to invest to grow your business.

Inroads with Invites

Technically, you can send anyone an invite at any given time.  With the invite feature, you don’t need a connection or a paid account to send one. However, it’s highly advised to use discretion with this method. Recipients can respond by stating they don’t know you, preventing you from sending the person an invitation ever again.  If you receive too many “I don’t know __” responses, LinkedIn may restrict you from sending invitations altogether.

Protecting member’s privacy is vital to an online networking community.  Especially for a professional social site liked LinkedIn, ripe with high profile contacts and industry leaders.  LinkedIn addresses this concern through its comprehensive privacy settings control panel.  Beyond the tweaks shared earlier for managing privacy in specific segments, on the privacy settings page you have the choice to customize all elements of your personal data.

Find the privacy settings area by:

1. Clicking your “Name” at the top, right-hand side of your profile page.
2. Select “Settings” from the drop-down menu.

Email Settings: Contact Settings, Receiving Messages, and Invitation Filtering

Settings worth paying attention to are the Email Settings.  Inmails and Introductions, found in the Contact Settings sub-category, fuel the ability for member’s to make connections through LinkedIn beyond their personal networks.  Later you’ll learn more about Inmails and Introductions, and exactly how to use them.  For now take note these features determine how accessible you are to the LinkedIn community.

Furthermore, avoid missing important Inmails and Introductions by customizing how you’re to be notified when you receive them.  The Receiving Messages feature presents a detailed time- grid to specify exactly when and how often notifications are released.

Just as it sounds, the Invitation Filtering function sifts invites based on your selection of whether or not to receive invites outside of your immediate network.  Depending on your personal reasons for joining LinkedIn, it’s advised to initially accept all invites to increase the chances of growing your connections.

LinkedIn offers a handful of applications to enhance your contributions to the community.  Applications act as digital automation tools eliminating the need to manually complete different tasks. Ideally, you want to spend more time networking instead of learning how to use applications.  At the same time, it’s best not to waste valuable energy clunking through busy work that can be minimized with the help of applications.

­­To add applications:

1. Click the “More” menu from the navigation toolbar.
2. Or select “Add an Application” from the lower right side of your Home page.
3. Or choose “Add an Application” from the sections area while editing your Profile page.

With the goal of highlighting your expertise on LinkedIn in a streamlined manner, here are some recommended applications to get you started.

Tweets Application : Tweets connects your LinkedIn Profile with your Twitter stream.  It’s a Twitter utility you can use directly from LinkedIn.  Quickly re-tweet and reply to tweets without ever having to leave the website. Personal updates and updates of people you’re following show up on the sidebar of your profile.

Events Application: Are you planning to attend or present at an upcoming conference?  Let the LinkedIn community know about your agenda with the Events application. Events recommends seminars related to your industry.  Even more, you can read others comments about a particular training. Easily discover which collegues plan to participate in the same events. It’s an effective way to demonstrate your commitment to continuing education and honing your professional skills.

WordPress: Common advice for enriching one’s experience with you on social media sites speaks to giving significant valuable directly from within the site-without requiring the person to leave the website. The WordPress application does this and more.  Broadcast your insights by syncing blog posts with your LinkedIn profile.  A special feature allows you to tag only the posts you want to display on your profile.

Status updates and announcements from your personal network are posted to the Network Activity portion on your Home Page.

At a glance, the Network Activity area keeps you on top of what’s going on with your connections. To make the most of your interactions on LinkedIn, this is an area to check regularly.

Respond directly to individual updates without leaving the Network Activity are by choosing either to “Like”, “Comment”, or “Send a Message” found below individual updates.

Strategic Tip: Indicating that you like an update or leaving a comment could be discreet ways to gain the attention of people in your network who may be hard to connect with otherwise!

To broadcast your own updates, Input messages into the empty conversation box and click share to send messages to your entire network.

A Little of This, A Little of That

In addition to Network Updates, the Home page notifies you of People You May Know, Who’s Viewed Your Profile, and the size of your LinkedIn Network, among other timely tidbits of information.

By default, LinkedIn assigns you a URL with random numbers and letters. For branding purposes, you will want to customize the link.  An easy-to-read website address increases the chance of people being able to remember and find you on LinkedIn.  Promote your signature link on your blog, Facebook pages, and through email signatures to drive traffic to your profile.

Customize your URL by:

1. Selecting the “Profile” menu from the navigation bar.
2. Click “Edit Profile” from the drop-down menu.
3. Scroll down the page until you see your “Public Profile” website link
4. Choose the “Edit” function to the right of your link.

All LinkedIn website addresses begin with www.linkedin.com/in/. On the next page, enter your preference for a unique URL to the LinkedIn prefix.

Now that your profile is finished, it’s time to import contacts.  Looking for people one by one could waste valuable time better spent networking. You could use the site’s search box to locate possible prospects, but LinkedIn provides several ways to streamline this process.

To import contact:

1. Choose the “Contacts” menu from the navigation bar
2. Select “Add connection” from the drop-down menu. There you’ll find several choices for importing data.

Whether you decide to have LinkedIn sync with an online email, manually enter contacts yourself, or import from a desktop email, this networking tool makes it simple.

Also you’ll have the opportunity to approve and decline the additions of emails as LinkedIn searches the designated online email box.

Furthermore, you can upload .csv, .txt, and .vcf files.  Most desktop contact management applications, like Outlook, let you export address to one of the file types mentioned.

To use this feature, click on “Import your desktop email contacts”.  From there you can browse your computer files and attach the document. As with the web email function, you can accept or deny email addresses.

Importing information does not automatically connect you with people.  After importing, each person will receive an invite from you to join your network on LinkedIn.  If they accept the invitation then you’ll be connected.

Adding the first round of contacts seems like a hassle.  Even so, you’ve got to start somewhere.  Keep in mind that all it takes are a few connections to gain access to professionals with the resources to help you realize your goals-whether personal or business