If we can make a parable about social media, LinkedIn is the “quiet little golem” compared to other “titans” like Twitter, Facebook or Google+. However, LinkedIn has been quietly modified and upgraded its system and continuously build up a larger and larger user base.
Many business owners and marketers are still thinking about LinkedIn as a nice place to get a backlink for the business and a great place to build up one’s own personal brand. However, things have changed recently. If you haven’t been paying attention, you’ll probably be surprised to discover it’s become a robust social media platform with many features that trump even the others. LinkedIn’s engineers have been busy to get you a better dealing. Users now find that a feature that was there yesterday is gone today, and that other features have been completely changed. Take a look in this infographic:
Basically, LinkedIn has four main key points:
- Personal Brand
- Company or Organization
- Content
- Relationships
Personal Brand
Everything in LinkedIn revolves around the contact: you create your own profile and connect with others. If you make a comparison between LinkedIn and Twitter, Google+ or Facebook, you can see that LinkedIn offers the most solid connection with others.
The personal profile component is where most individuals are active on LinkedIn. Several features have been enhanced, such as publications and projects, where you can add others that participated with you. This feature create a cross-connectedness of relevance and reminds those individuals of your own existence as you add them as well.
Many LinkedIn users aren’t just adding a book they wrote or a particular blog, but individual articles and blog posts, too. Each of these additions is another opportunity for keywords to be introduced that increase your chance of appearing in search results. While many of us only have a handful of different jobs over decades, LinkedIn’s projects feature allows you to add individual projects. You can add the project and, like publications, include the names of other participants. When you add others, they are notified, and can allow that project to show in their own profile.
Companies Or Organizations
Companies are, of course, made up of people. As each person adds their various jobs, projects, and publications, the system creates connections with the appropriate companies along with everyone else who is connected with the organization. Companies can add services and products, various images, connect with groups, and can share updates.
When it comes to search, LinkedIn has a long way to go. Many have discovered that it isn’t difficult to apply techniques that have long been considered black hat SEO, by stuffing their profiles with keywords.
What’s the benefit to businesses? Josepf Haslam of DragonSearch recently said, “I’ve received over half-a-dozen inbound sales leads just in the past three weeks.” I, myself, have received several inquiries from journalists and conference organizers. LinkedIn also lets you know who’s been looking at your profile. With that information in hand, you can see when and if potential or existing clients have been doing their due diligence.
If you are like many, you might still believe that LinkedIn is a place where you seek out or are found for your next career. Its human resource value is huge, but quickly taking a back seat to the potential of a mighty social media platform connecting individuals and businesses in even more ways.