So much is being written about the benefits of Linked In and the uses and abuses of that great professional networking platform. I personally am I great fan and use it daily to gain insight, keep track of my network and contacts, help my clients in their transition to new roles and, of course, to find great talent for my clients who are seeking new hires.
I’ve written before about my beef with the ‘endorsement’ feature so I won’t bore you with how very much I hate that particular feature and how annoying it is to get endorsements from people who cannot attest to my work. I simply delete their connection from my mine and we’re done.
But today I want to talk a bit about the Linked In invitation feature. I use it all the time. How else would I have 2500+ connections. If you’ve ever gotten an invitation from me that was NOT personalized, it’s because I was too quick on the trigger to hit ‘send’ and it’s never been when I’ve sought you out specifically and wanted to connect. It’s happened a few times when a potential connection’s picture pops up and asks if I want to connect. If I have been too quick to accept, I might have agreed not realizing that the invitation goes out ‘as is’.
My reason for saying this is this: If you want to add someone to your professional network on Linked In, you MUST personalize your invitation. Tell that person why you want to connect or how you know that person — through whom for instance. If you can’t (or won’t!) take the time to do this, why should someone agree to connect with you? I believe that if you won’t take the time, it’s because you really don’t care about making that particular connection and are doing so just to add to your connections. Of course, people who just want to gather connections will accept but where’s the value in that connection?
It’s not a race. It’s not that the person with the most connections wins. In fact, it’s the people with the best connections who win. Your connections are a reflection of you. It’s not dissimilar to your friendships growing up (or even now!). My parents were always telling me to pick my friends wisely — they were a reflection of me. This is true here. As a recruiter I have a lot of connections and many of those folks I don’t know personally. But I can honestly say that I think before accepting each and every connection (what’s in it for me? what’s in it for them?) I now decline more than I accept.
If I don’t know what the connection is and you don’t connect the dots for me, I will not accept the invitation. Am I missing out on a great contact? I don’t think so.
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