Association Leadership - January/February 2008 - (Page 27) technology Site provides online business opportunity LinkedIn.com serves as worldwide address book and database By TJ Scott, CAE Independent Bankers Association of Texas You’ve probably heard of social networking Web sites like “MySpace” and “FaceBook.” These sites are about having fun and communicating with friends and family. However, the new site, “LinkedIn” – www.linkedin.com – if used correctly, focuses on business connections and potentially lucrative networking opportunities. Think of LinkedIn as a worldwide address book and database. Not just for your acquaintances, but all of your contacts’ acquaintances as well. Think of the last networking event you attended. Maybe it was the TSAE annual conference at The Woodlands, or perhaps the ASAE convention in Chicago. You talked with 100 people. You introduced yourself. They told you what association they were with and where they were from. You even exchanged business cards. Now, you’re back in your office and looking for a new color copier. You think the Brand X copier is a good fit, but you’d like to know who else has it. If you were on LinkedIn, you could do a search for color copiers, or even the Brand X color copier, and if any of your contacts – whom you met at the annual conference – have included their preference for the Brand X copier in their profile, you could send an e-mail or call them. If you have Theresa Parsons from TCASE in your circle of contacts on LinkedIn and you do a search on color copiers, you will see her name with the line “We are currently leasing Minolta copiers, one color copier and one blackand-white copier from Amerx.” And you’ll see my name. Because you know Theresa and Theresa knows me, my name comes up with a “2” next to it, letting you know we are connected, once removed. If you narrow then your search to Amerx, you will see 13 connections, one with a “2” next to it. If you click on “Kevin Kelly” you see a little diagram like this: How you’re connected to Kevin You TJ Scott, CAE Kevin Kelly The other 12 people with Amerx in their profiles all have a “3” next to their names. So, if you click on “Jay” you will get this kind of diagram: How you’re connected to Jay You å å TJ Scott, CAE Jay’s connections Jay Chaffe Which is saying that you know Theresa, Theresa knows TJ, and TJ knows someone that knows Jay. The secret is including lots of information in your profile and getting your contacts to do the same. Use company and product names, so when your contacts are looking at those same systems they can use you as a subject-matter expert. Make sure you use acronyms as well as the company or organization names. If you are a member å å å of Texas Society of Association Executives, don’t just list it like that, but also as TSAE. I recently deleted my employment with the U.S. Army from my profile, because LinkedIn kept telling me that thousands of people from the Army were now connected on LinkedIn. None of them have any reason to be on my business lists. The same goes with my education at the University of Maryland. If I were interested in having a social network, then yes, I may want these people on my list. But for my uses, LinkedIn is for business only. To get started after you join LinkedIn, do a search for people you know by name and then click to be connected to their network. Hint: If you search on CAE in the people search, people with CAE in their names will come up. Check out the advance search to find helpful keywords. I use the free version of LinkedIn. There is also a pay version, but I have not yet found a cause to spend the $20 a month for additional services. ◆ January/February 2008 | Association LEADERSHIP 27 http://LinkedIn.com http://www.linkedin.com
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