LinkedIn Know How: Top 5 Ways to Get the Most Out of Your LinkedIn Account for

Intermediate and Advance Users

Presented By Audeliz Angie Perez of OnTrack Mentors

About Ms. Perez

Ms. Perez is a Weichert, Realtors Sales Associate and Social Media Marketing Mentor for OnTrack

Mentors. She has built a very successful real estate business on her social media and internet

presence. When Ms. Perez started real estate, she was 24 years old and eager to learn the business.

Not having a large sphere of influence or network, she had to build her book of business from cold

contacts and referrals. She is currently seeking has her real estate broker’s license and intends to

continue to coach or mentor other small business owners in the areas of social media, sales and

marketing. She enjoys reading, especially legal thrillers and novels like Harry Potter. During her down

time, she enjoys long walks alone the Raritan canal and playing with her puppy, Roxy. You’ll have to

visit her LinkedIn profile to learn more about Ms. Perez at http://www.linkedin.com/in/angieperez.

*****At the end of the session, ask about Angie’s one on one LinkedIn Crash Course.****

So you’re on LinkedIn like 43 million other users and you might be wondering to yourself: What am I

suppose to do next? I set up my profile; I’ve connected with some friends or co-workers; I’ve been

recommended and given recommendations. Now What?

The following are 5 ways to get the most out of your LinkedIn account for intermediate and advance

users.

1. Profile Must Haves:

A. Set your profile settings to public and attached as many email addresses as you can to

your account, including inactive email addresses. One of the main reasons to be on

LinkedIn is to be found. If you worked at Barnes and Noble in college and your email

address then was aperez@bn.com, yet you on longer work there, you want others

who might be searching for your old BN account to find you even if it is an inactive

account.

B. Customized URL: When you first set up your LinkedIn profile, your profile contains

unique characters and numbers to help to indentify your profile.

In this case, a unique profile URL is easier to remember and searchable on major

search engines: Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc. http://www.linkedin.com/in/angieperez

C. Be Personal Yet Professional: People buy People before they buy products and

services. Your profile should have a professional photo of you and it should give a little

insight into your likes so that other people have an easier time connecting with you.

Example: If you have a blog, instead of using the common label My Blog, rename it to

something specific as My Blog about Spiders. The same is true for your website.

Rename your website to Business Name or Functions of Business.

D. Keywords and Phrases: It is important to populate your profile with the words or

phrases in which people might search for you or your business on-line so that they can

find you on the first page of major search engines. For a monthly fee, LinkedIn will

promote your profile.

E. Detailed Contact Settings: Add a business number to your profile along with

acceptable times to call in case people want to connect with you immediately. Also,

choose as many contact options as apply. Contact setting should be updated

periodically. If you have a job that you dislike and you are looking for employment, you

should only select career opportunities when you are ready to make that information

public. But, if you have a job that you love, don’t select it. It could send mixed

messages about your true intentions regarding your LinkedIn membership.

� career opportunities

� consulting offers

� new ventures

� job inquiries

� expertise requests

� business deals

� reference requests

� getting back in touch

2. Use Introductions to get to know other people and ask your first tier or 1st

degree connections

to make introductions for you with a specific reason in mind. You can also send your

connection’s profiles to other people on LinkedIn as a way to reciprocate the networking

experience.

1st

Degree connections are people who know your email address and name.

2nd

Degree connections are friends of friends.

3rd

Degree connections are friends of friends of friends.

3. Use LinkedIn to search for employment and collaboration opportunities, but use your level of

degrees to get to know the hiring manager.

4. Groups, Answers and Events: Social networking must haves.

Look for groups with lots of prospects.

Ex: Realtors might join groups with buyer and seller leads: Homeowners Associations, Realtor

Referral Groups, Investing Clubs, Mortgage Services, local networking groups.

If you are a member of a group ask the admin to become a manager and lead a subgroup that

meets in person.

Participate in discussions, posts news articles and links of interests within the group get to

know members within your group.

Answers: Post questions and give feedback on topics that demonstrate your expertise. Set up

RSS feeds for Answers/questions that interest you. Average turnaround time for responses is

24 hours or one business day.

Events: Post and invite contacts to various events to get more exposure for you or your biz. Or

attend events that might interests you.

5. LinkedIn is a long term networking strategy. It is supplemental to your networking habits and

should not replace face to face networking.