From Directory

Effective LinkedIn Updates

By MarcFreedman

• Do you want your LinkedIn connections to love or hate you?
• Do you want your update emails to be read or automatically deleted?
• Do you network to make friends and build business or to be shut out from other people's networks?

Whether you have 10 connections or 10,000, your communications with your connection and indeed all your contacts is critical to your success. Having someone's email address is not a license to send anything and everything. Being a connection is an indication of networking support, not interest in your business and products. Take the time to effectively and accurately communicate and your network will respond in kind.

What to Send for LinkedIn updates to all your connections

In general do send updates on your networking and profile status that will be of interest to most people, regardless of location, title, or profession. This could include

• Important news about your personal life or business
• A new job or significant addition or change to your experience or profile
• LinkedIn-related news and information
• Occasional business news.  Remember, your connections are not opt-in business subscribers.  So do send an update once in a while, but  NOT monthly or more frequently.

Recommendations

• Be careful with DirectLinkedInUpdates.
• If you are going to be sending regular updates to your LinkedIn connections, read our ActiveNetworkersGuide. Ensure your contacts accept such updates. Provide a way for people to opt-in and out.
• Use tools like our recommended Software and LinkedInContactManager to target mailings to your connections by area, title, and other factors.
• Create separate and targeted mailing lists with full opt-in/opt-out for people interested in your products, local events, blog updates, etc. Such lists can be created and maintained on Yahoo Groups, Flickr, Meetup, and similar web sites.