ALWAYS use a personal message in your invitation to connect with any other professional on LinkedIn. There is an art to networking, and it’s about building relationships. Never ask for a job. Job leads follow for those that are effective connectors. Whether you find a contact you want to outreach to on Groups / Alumni Search / Answers / Events / Companies / or an Advanced People Search…the key is to relate to the professional on the other side of the screen. Open Networkers or LIONs connect with others without a personal note, but for the rest of us on LinkedIn it can be deemed as rude.
When asking to join a new circle of influence try to connect with a common bond. Here are a few examples:
- “I am a Columbia Grad as well (Class of ’95). I noticed there are many of us employed in HR here in our Alumni group. Are you still in touch with Professor Akabas’? Her course on Organizational Development was great. I was just thinking about her…Is it ok to collaborate here?”
- “Hope its ok to connect here. I notice in LinkedIn Events you are going to be attending the Accounting Society Meeting next week. I am a new member, please tell me if you think that speaker is worth the drive?”
- “Your advice on internet marketing in the Unified Communications Group offered insight to my idea for a start-up. What was your biggest challenge to success? I look forward to connecting here.”
- “When I posted that question on LinkedIn Answers, I did not think I would get such a huge a huge response. Thanks so much for your feedback. I hope it’s ok if I join your circle here on LinkedIn? I look forward to your updates.”
- “Hope you had a great weekend, I look forward to connecting here. I am a 2nd degree connection. My father works in the Jersey branch of your company. I really liked the link you shared on Technology. I just applied one of the tips to my website. Let me know if you have other links to share.”
- “I just read a great article I wanted to share with you. Hope it helps with the work you are doing at IBM. I posted it to my updates. Please, check it out and tell me what you think. I welcome comments. Hope it’s ok if we connect here? I am always looking to collaborate with other professionals.”
I do not respond to the system generated connection requests I get on LinkedIn. But I do consider those where a note is included. LinkedIn has allotted 300 characters to the personal email message you can use for outreach to professionals. Make those words count by mentioning a common bond you share, offering your insight, or simply by giving thanks. People are more likely to connect with those that have given them a reason to be ‘online friends’ with. Your chance of finding job leads increases when you can build relationships. Job leads follow those that have built relationships in many different circles and know how to maintain them.
2 comments
Jawad
May 30, 2012 at 5:07 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Very true indeed.
Keith Warrick
May 30, 2012 at 3:43 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Preach, Bless!
This is right on point and thank you for writing this blog post.
A day doesn’t go by for me in which I’ll receive several generic requests to connect from people that I have never met and it just makes me cringe that folks don’t seem to realize that this is the incorrect way of building up a cyberspace community and network.
I feel the same way that you do about these type of invitations and even had to include a blurb in my CONTACT SETTINGS hoping that they would disappear but they only seemed to have increased.
I think I’ll start including a link to this post in my reply to them and hope that light bulbs start coming on – thanks!