Linkedinformed Podcast. The Linkedin Show

Well what a week I have had! Lots of interesting sessions with a variety of types of businesses this week. I’m so grateful to the driver from Uber who saved my skin!   The main subject I want to talk about this week is ‘Followers’ but first a few quick bits of news;   Now you see it, now you don’t…..and now you do again! This week many people reported losing the relationship tab for LinkedIn Contacts altogether - for everyone, including  1st tier connections! LinkedIn have officially stated that it was a temporary adjustment while they were working on improving the feature. I also saw (below) a report that a LinkedIn staffer had admitted that they are working on a better solution for premium accounts only. I guess we will just have to wait and see.     PayScale compare top tech companies. Interesting report fro PayScale, the highlights being; LinkedIn have the highest median pay for mid career employees They have one of the youngest workforces in the tech industry with a median age of 29 42% of staff are

Two main subjects this week;   How do you feel about your home page these days?   The future for LinkedIn?   Firstly there was one small news item worth a mention this week;   LinkedIn CEO donating his multi-million stock package to staff     Your LinkedIn homepage   We see it every time we log in but how much notice do you really take?   If you haven’t done so recently take 5 minutes to scroll through, you might be surprised, disappointed, amused or even angry at what you see!   Last week I talked about how to respond to an inappropriate posts   In this episode I discuss various aspects of the content of our home page feed;   What are your thoughts about the views expressed in this status update below? Should LinkedIn be blocking content and should we have a ‘dislike’ or not business button? Are you taking the opportunity to engage with your home page stream? These updates are from real people and everyone of them is an opportunity to build better relationships and raise your visibility. Engagement can

Back from a week in the sun and raring to go, this week’s show I address some important considerations about LinkedIn’s future direction.   Main Story “LinkedIn is now, at best, a business card holder. At worst, it’s a delivery service for spam” It’s been a tough month for LinkedIn, disappointing results have led to many commentators really questioning their strategy and direction. Amongst the many negative (sometimes harshly so) articles I read this week I found the following one from Techcrunch which includes the horrible quote above the most interesting; LinkedIn Problems Run Deeper Than Valuation   In response to al the negative press LinkedIn’s CEO gathered LinkedIn staff together to give them a motivational talk, amazingly they filmed it and released it on Slideshare! They didn’t go so far as to reveal the 7 year plan he refers to but I still have to applaud the openness of sharing this talk.   On a more positive note LinkedIn are running their first advert at the Oscars this weekend to an estimated aud

Now that we have passed 100 episodes, I thought it was time to give LinkedInformed a makeover. You will notice we have a new logo and the introduction music is different but more importantly we have a new format for the show. I will no longer have a specific news section but I will obviously always talk each week about any important events that have occurred, if nothing important has happened I will focus the episode on a specific subject. This will never be an interview show as such but I do plan to conduct more interviews from now on. I hope you like the changes. Main Story This week I focussed my attention on LinkedIn’s Q4 and full year financial results. A quick overview   Q4 revenue increased by 34% (vs 2014 Q4) to $862m and that brought the full year to $2,991. Talent solutions contributed 62% of revenue (this includes Lynda) compared to 57% last year Talent solution showed a 32% increase on last year - mainly coming from the field sales team. Online job postings continued to drop. Marketing solutions

News   LinkedIn retire their Connected app. Meet the homeless beggar who accepts credit cards and has a LinkedIn page. The Sun show their normal level of accuracy - just look at his profile  Manchester needs cameramen and Twitter experts, says LinkedIn Comments Episode 1 Episode 2  Episode 6 Episode 7 Episode 12 Episode 14 Episode 18 Episode 25 Episode 36 Episode 38  Episode 40 Episode 50  Episode 67 Episode 68 Episode 73  Episode 81 Episode 87 Episode 91 Episode 98  

News   LinkedIn is once again driving big traffic to publishers LinkedIn sees jump in referral traffic to publishers after app redesign The most read person in human history LinkedIn release a free e-book on social selling LinkedIn ask app users for feedback   Commentary   With all this controversy about how LinkedIn reports its post views numbers and how it distributes published posts I thought I would share my thoughts on readership, distribution and engagement.   Build your audience by doing the following; Write great content that your followers find interesting and useful. Build a strong and diverse network Ask people to follow you if a connection is not appropriate Get more profile views via activity including auto viewing Engage with other peoples content more, show people you are interesting. Promote your posts by sharing them via image status updates on at least 5 occasions. Promote you posts on other social media channels - Twitter, Facebook, Google+ etc   At the end of the day we should take r

News   LinkedIn hits 20 million members in the UK  How many users are actually active though? I estimate the figure is nearer to 6-8 million that are regularly using LinkedIn - still an impressive number! LinkedIn announce UK top 10 power profiles (most viewed) in 6 categories Is a LinkedIn takeover of the Financial Times as crazy as it sounds? Top Seven Stupidest Titles on LinkedIn   The 5C System. For a limited time I am allowing free access to module 1 of my new e-learning LinkedIn business development programme. All I ask for in return is some constructive feedback and, if you like it, a testimonial. Sign up for FREE access here   Commentary   How do you become a top ten power profile on LinkedIn? I might argue that Charlotte Proudman must have been in one of those top ten lists but she was excluded - maybe for good reason but who else was excluded? So what do you have to do to get profile views;   Being famous obviously helps! Laura Chetcuti isn’t famous and her posts are not very well read but she is

Welcome to a new episode of LinkedInformed, here are the main topics covered this week.   News   New feature coming - videos are starting to autoplay (without sound) in the homepage feed. This is not something I have seen first hand but John Nemo covered it in a recent post This guy wrote to all 1,109 of his LinkedIn connections last year. Are LinkedIn falsely reporting their page view numbers? Itai Leshem thinks he knows how they are doing it. The new social network called beBee (awful name!) that practices ‘affinity networking’ as detailed in this post from the excellent John White.   Episode 100   I really want to do something different for our 100th episode, I am still open to suggestions but one I had recently was that someone (maybe a listener) could interview me! Any volunteers or suggestions as to who would be a good candidate. Let me know at mark@linkedinformed.com   Commentary   The 5 things you may have missed on the new app. I have written a more detailed published post about this but as a s

The bizarre behaviour of LinkedIn users! Welcome to episode 96. Christmas seems a distant memory and I am very much into the swing of things again now. News   A lawyers LinkedIn profile is ‘not an advertisement’ states a US Bar Association. LinkedIn’s worst ever chat up lines. The new auto viewing tool called Profile Hopper I was interviewed this week for Motor Trader Radio. You can listen to the recording here   LinkedIn Publishing. What happens ‘post a post’!   Really interesting and revealing LinkedIn post from LinkedIn top publishing man Daniel Roth about what happens when you press ‘publish’ on your new LinkedIn post. Key points for me are; LinkedIn now accept that it’s OK to connect with someone you ‘want to interact with’ rather than insisting you must ‘know them well’. A post always appears on the home page feed of ALL of your connections presumably at the time it is posted (timing is therefore very important). An algorithm filters out suspected spam by looking for keywords associated to jobs or ev

Welcome to episode 95 and more importantly welcome to 2016!     News   French social network Viadeo has closed it’s Chinese LinkedIn competitor Tianji Data Shows How Google Drives Search Traffic To LinkedIn   A quick review of the main events of 2015   The biggest story of the year involved Barrister Charlotte Proudman rebuking a senior solicitor for complimenting her on her LinkedIn profile picture. This story went global and is still being debated by many people today. 2015 was the year when ordinary LinkedIn users really took to publishing posts. LinkedIn made a significant attempt to improve groups, upsetting many users, especially group managers in the process   Winbusinessin Podcast We are now in season 2 of my other podcast which focusses on social selling and business development on LinkedIn. On Tuesday we will be releasing episode 3 which is an interview with Christoph Trappe, a storytelling expert as part of our focus on content marketing.   Why not subscribe to the show on iTunes or go to Win

News LinkedIn revamps its job section. LinkedIn announced there top voices for 2015 and Paul Drury decides to crowd source his own list from real LinkedIn users (without editorial or commercial bias). Brynne Tillman and her social sales GPS team write an open letter to Jeff Weiner. Nintendo create a profile for Mario Bros which is quickly taken down by LinkedIn.  A London based recruitment firm posts a picture of its female staff at the Christmas party. All hell breaks loose as it goes viral which prompted this post from one of the girls in the picture. What do you think of this. Appropriate or not? let me know - leave a voicemail or drop me an email mark@LinkedInformed.com Commentary Why do LinkedIn insist on creating responses for us search appalling "Great post" message which can only be sent when someone has not read the post! I didn't have time to cover this fully in the episode but you can read my blog about it here. LinkedIn advertising Peter Gold updated us on his LinkedIn advertising experiment.

News   The new mobile seems to be getting decent reviews but these are from people who rarely use LinkedIn and are therefore not able to see it’s faults. Linkedin recruit 100 new people in Dublin and manage to persuade the Taoiseach Enda Kenny to attend an event at their offices by persuading his office that Dublin was LinkedIn’s ‘worldwide headquarters!   Commentary LinkedIn new iOS mobile app review First impressions of the app are really good, the design is more modern and the navigation looks more intuitive. The app is split into five sections. Here you will see status updates and publish posts from your connections and those you follow as well as sponsored updates. Unfortunately you cannot change from the algorithm driven order to ‘recent’ updates as you can on the desktop version. This means that you see updates from 15 days ago, then one from 3 minutes ago followed by one posted 20 minutes ago. The order is supposed to be tailored to your needs and interest and I guess we will be able to train t

Quote; “We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people."   [Remarks on the 20th Anniversary of the Voice of America; Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, February 26, 1962]” ― John F. Kennedy I’m back in the cold and windy this week after my lovely week away in Spain, I made a short video of what I learnt in the week away My Thoughts From Spain News Musician Walter Martin releases his new track on LinkedIn! The Most Valuable Social Media Tool You Are Overlooking - article about Slideshare in Forbes. LinkedIn confirm that member search in groups will be returning (see group post from a LinkedIn representative below). Interview with Peter Gold, LinkedIn Advertising Experiment.   You can listen to the initial interview I did with Peter regarding his LinkedIn advertising experiment in e

NEWS Naomi Lewis wrote an article for ‘Look Magazine’ Here is the new LinkedIn sales tool called elink. It looks expensive but maybe an option to Autopilot if your market is very active on Twitter. A LinkedIn success story. A start-up founder get his funding by connecting and building trust with someone in Australia who knew someone who wanted to invest.   Shocking sexist job ad by a company from Toronto that appeared on LinkedIn.   Three changes to LinkedIn this week;  The main font and colour scheme has reverted to the dull black and grey scheme.  You can now embed link to a wider variety of media in LinkedIn published posts  Invitation ‘cards’ have been redesigned making it easier to see a customized message. COMMENTARY I have found great success with my new VAR system.    V = View a profile (a lot with autopilot)  A = Accept the invitation (assuming they are a prospect)  R = Reply to their invitation  It certainly works well for me, why not give it a try.    QUESTION (From James from

News    3 charts that prove that LinkedIn is on fire! This article’s most interesting fact is the comparable rate of member/user growth amongst the three main social networks.  Woman creates fake LinkedIn profile to give credibility to her Disney scam. This is a timely warning that we should all check that the listed employees associated to our company pages are legitimate.    Commentary    I have gathered more feedback about the new LinkedIn app from Android users and it seems to be universally disliked!  Whilst I can’t make a judgment myself yet, it does seem shocking that LinkedIn are still unable to produce an effective mobile app! This week I enjoyed chatting with Sarah Santacroce about her LinkedIn challenge, which starts on 1 December. Thanks also to Kate Lister for her voicemail stating her reasons for connecting with someone. Kate is a florist in Grimsby who wins business from her LinkedIn activities, I interviewed Kate in episode seven of my Winbusinessin podcast.  Question    Th

Welcome to a new episode of the award-winning LinkedIn podcast. This week I covered a wide variety of topics.   News   LinkedIn announced their new Air Traffic Control (ATC) platform for improving the quality and quantity of messages and notifications we receive from LinkedIn.  LinkedIn appeared to have ambitious plans for Lynda.com  Profile view daily limits have reduced to an estimated maximum of 850 per day.  LinkedIn release their new mobile app on Android (that’s a first). Commentary  Will the LinkedIn groups go the way of the dodo? Excellent article from Bruce Johnston.  Who do you connect with and why? Do you follow LinkedIn’s advice to only connect with those you already know or do you just invite anyone? Please let me know, It will be really interesting to hear the views of everyone on this one. You can email me at mark@linkedinformed.com or simply leave a voicemail by clicking on the link on the right of this page.  Be aware that a scam email is circulating that looks remarkably like a Lin

News Tinder versus LinkedIn profile pictures Hillary Clinton and her views on LinkedIn in the past Ladbrokes are using LinkedIn to find customers LinkedIn has a new head of Europe  Legal problem of Linkedin on who owns your profile LinkedIn overhauled its strategy for Sales Navigator LinkedIn China’s new professional networking app Red Rabbit  

A big change of scenery this week as I take the podcast out 'on the road' to Amsterdam in the Netherlands. LinkedIn has always been very popular in The Netherlands and as a result some of the most respected LinkedIn experts in the world are found there so this week I jumped on a flight to go and have a chat with two of my favourite LinkedIn trainers Perry Van Beek and Petra Fisher. News Sydney university keeps suits for students LinkedIn profile photos LinkedIn 3rd quarter results; Total revenue of $780m broken down as follows; Talent solutions 59% (34% growth) Learning (Lynda) 6% Marketing 18% (28% growth) Premium 17% (21% growth) Revenue is predicted to be $3 billion for the year. Unique visitors have dropped to 25% of total members (27% in Q3 2014, 30% in 2013) 55% of unique visitors are via mobile LinkedIn announce their largest commercial deal ever - with EY for Sales Navigator licences (a sign of the future). Question: I am wondering if it is possible to see previously sent invites or messages a

News More details emerge about LinkedIn new ProFinder trial Have you played the LinkedIn name game? New thought leaders are invited to publish for the upcoming new app The LinkedIn plugin that works out how old you are! Group messages will return Is this the most authentic profile ever on LinkedIn? Commentary Group messaging is still possible - workaround hack How to post GIFs on LinkedIn Question