Informed Podcast by Mark Williams. The podcast for LinkedIn™️ users

Welcome to episode 124, this week I’m relaxing in Italy on vacation so I thought I would pre-record this episode of questions that I have been asked recently. Below are the 5 questions I covered in this episode, you will need to listen to the audio for the answers. Question 1 I recently decided to get rid of some dead wood connections, people that I'll never speak to that I either don't remember connecting with, or when I first joined and didn't really know what I was doing. I managed to get rid of 2000 people, mostly overseas, and now my news feed is looking better, and more relevant. I have noticed one significant change though, when I had around 5,000 connections, I'd get maybe one person sending me connections requests every week, they could be anything from people I actually recruit for, or SEO specialists wanted to sell to me. Now however, since dropping a couple of thousand people, I'm getting about 8 per day, which seems very strange. Do you know if the less connections you have, the more you appear in searches, or that people can find you easier? I've never heard anything like that but that's all I can think of Any clues would be greatly appreciated. Question 2 Hi Mark, as an active job seeker I am curious to know what Recruiters think of LinkedIn endorsements? Question 3 Hello Mark, I have a question I hope you can answer. I am wanting to add links to several web pages with Lead boxes. I have tried to do this under my summary but the thumbnail image is the same for all three. How can I change the image that LinkedIn selects? Thank you. Question 4 Hi Mark, I have a question about invitations. Where can you see a list of people who you have sent an invitation to connect? Thanks Question 5 Hi Mark, I want to change my status to read ‘open to opportunities’ but I can’t recall where this is done. Can you help? That’s it for this week. If you have any questions please feel free to send me a voicemail (link on the right edge of this page) or email me at mark@linkedinformed.com. In case you are curious, the website I used for the voices in this episode is http://www.fromtexttospeech.com/

Welcome to episode 123, I’m back in my office this week with plenty to talk about. Interesting stuff I saw this week LinkedIn are in the process of rolling out a new feature that automatically makes you a follower of someone when you invite them to connect. If that member subsequently rejects your invitation by selecting ‘ignore’ then you will cease to be a follower. Also Interview with Jeff Weiner where he refers to some skills endorsements having a greater value than others. New profile views limit warning. Does this mean that LinkedIn are now tracking views by the IP address used? This could be a problem to those using Google searching as a workaround to the commercial use limit.

Welcome to episode 122, the weather has been amazing this week so I thought I would venture out and record the show in one of my favourite spots in Delamere forest…I think the BBC call these things an ‘outside broadcast (OB)’! I tend do this once or twice a year as I’m really unproductive when I try to stick behind my desk in hot weather! Using LinkedIn with Empathy Some people are naturally empathetic and some find it more of a challenge, I believe it is a great strength to have when using LinkedIn. Definition The ability to share someone else's feelings or experiences by imagining what it would be like to be in that person's situation (Cambridge dictionary) Some people just have an instinct to know how someone else would feel whereas others need to stop, take a step back and think about it. Whichever you are, it pays to practice empathy in social media and especially on LinkedIn. In this episode I talk about some examples of where empathy can be important on LinkedIn; Invitations to connect Liking or commenting on someones post or update Reaction to profile viewers Group conversations Introductions Quote “It is literally true that you can succeed best and quickest by helping others succeed” Napoleon Hill Other interesting stuff I saw this week: Koka Sexton announces he is leaving LinkedIn Millennials are Thriving in the Workplace, According to LinkedIn Data LinkedIn enhances Sales Navigator, adds CRM, email, mobile The enforcement of the 30k connection limit probably means you have lost some connections and as a result some visibility.

Welcome to episode 121, we are back after a break last week which was due to work commitments requiring me to be out of the office every day in Ireland. Interesting stuff I saw this week Google, LinkedIn strike stunning 'grand bargain' for property swap in Mountain View, Sunnyvale LinkedIn Top Attractors - UK list It would appear that the 3 most subscribed Pulse channels are now all Chinese language channels I was interviewed for another podcast this week. Andy Paul interviewed me for his Accelerate podcast which is a show for sales professionals; How to Use LinkedIn to Grow Sales. With Mark Williams. #198 LinkedIn profiles are just too boring! I want to encourage everyone to realise just how important your profile is and that, by just listing boring facts you are doing nothing to impress the reader…on the contrary, you might be sending them to sleep! Why not take a look at your summary and try to write something more interesting about yourself, something about you in a professional context but something that authentically shows how interesting you are. I think Gareth Burton does a great job with his profile It also occurred to me recently that profiles are going to become even more important soon as Microsoft start to integrate them into Outlook email, the 365 dashboard and Skype profiles.

Interesting things I saw this week Following on from the news that LinkedIn are now in forcing the 30,000 connections limit it has now been announced that all connection above the limit will be converted to followers This interesting thing is that for the first time LinkedIn have admitted that large networks cause them problems. Microsoft takeover. I was at a TEDx Event over the weekend and one of the speakers was Steve Clayton  from Microsoft. It was interesting to hear him say that Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella is much more collaborative than his predecessors. Perhaps this could be a positive sign for LinkedIn? LinkedIn published posts and Pulse. It seems that the new format for published posts has now been rolled out to everyone with many people contacting me to ask about the new format. The Pulse page no longer shows under the Interests menu so you have to go to your home page feed and change is the order to recent Alternatively you could do what I did which is to create a bookmark for the Pulse page. If you want to find the Pulse channels you have to scroll down this page until you find some recommendations to personalise your news. Click on "Discover more to follow" and you will find the channels. It's been a very difficult week for those of us based in the UK following the ‘Brexit’ vote. I have never seen this country so divided and this has inevitably spilled onto LinkedIn. Whilst you may have strong views on the subject I would recommend avoid discussing such an emotive topic as this on LinkedIn.  At least for now and, perhaps in time it will become and easier subjects to discuss.

Working with Ali Ali is short for Algorithm, in this case LinkedIn’s algorithm. Whether we like it or not LinkedIn is constantly collating data about us. Which groups we join and which conversations we get involved in, what skills we have and how often they are endorsed (and by whom), which companies we follow, who we connect with and how much we interact with them. Ali also measures which status updates and publish posts we click, like or comment on. It may sound creepy but that's just how things are in social media and the wider Internet. Understanding this and understanding how to use it to our advantage is one of the key aspects to been successful on LinkedIn LinkedIn can only react to actions, it can’t (as yet) interpret feelings or opinions - just actions. I was reminded of this recently when someone contacted me to complain about the amount of inappropriate posts and status updates they were seen on their homepage. When I asked them what they were doing about it, their answer was that they were commenting in order to show the person that posted that they disapproved….BIG MISTAKE! Not only does this ensure that the post is distributed further it also teaches Ali that you are interested in this type of content….no wonder they were seeing more and more inappropriate content! In the links below you will find a link to a fascinating list of patents that LinkedIn have filed over the years, the most recent one relates to this very issue - i.e. how LinkedIn decides what to show you on your feed.

The Microsoft Acquisition  Welcome to episode 118 of the LinkedInformed podcast at the end of a truly historic week for LinkedIn. As you would expect I am going to concentrate all of this episode on evaluating Microsoft's acquisition of LinkedIn. Advantages for Microsoft Entry into the social media space. An area they have neglected to get involved with previously which was beginning to look like a serious weakness. An opportunity to increase sales of Office 365 via extensive integration with LinkedIn’s functionality. Dynamics (Their CRM solution) will benefit the most from this acquisition and potentially allow it to become the market leader (currently Salesforce). Content from LinkedIn publishing allowing greater advertising opportunities. Big data. Rich information about people and their online behaviour. Advantages for LinkedIn $26 billion! Greater resources to enable new products such as Profinder to be launched and rapidly expanded. $26 billion! Use of Microsoft’s massive cloud infrastructure. A way out of their stock-based compensation conundrum. $2.3 billion into Reid Hoffman’s bank account! Advantages for Members I expect the under-resourced help centre to improve significantly Skype integration Integration with Outlook 365 & Dynamics. Better distribution of published posts Disadvantages for Members Less Google optimisation Another secretive ‘closed’ culture Focus on corporates at the expense of SMB’s And …..

LinkedIn : Too many to-do’s to do Very interesting document outlining why LinkedIn are a bad investment from an Equity Research firm. Here are their main 5 reasons; (1) Lack of key functionality in its flagship Voyager app. (2) Relevance of proposed job openings or “Sponsored Updates” hasn’t improved. (3) A slow ramp to get the right content on lynda.com to make it more attractive to Enterprises. (4) High penetration of Hiring Solutions – translating into slowing growth in FY16. (5) The technical immaturity of Sales Navigator. Other highlights; • New company pages will provide salary data and allow for anonymous employee reviews (similar to Glassdoor). This could provide LinkedIn with a "Tricky balance” to find as many of these organisations are their biggest clients! • The SMB Recruiter product will be slow growth and likely to have a high cost of sales. • 20% of LinkedIn members are students. • Advertising solutions will be opening up their API to third-party operators. • New members are less engaged. • Less than 2% of members upgrade to a premium account. LinkedIn Changes • New Company Page insights. • More information on job postings. Other interesting stuff I saw this week • Is LinkedIn disconnecting us? • Contrary to rumours LinkedIn has not removed the connections download feature. • Some people are reporting a 403 error which may be due to LinkedIn being hyper sensitive about suspicious activity following the recent sale of passwords. It may be good advice to reduce activity in the short term until things die down. • The return of the Galek! The interview with our beloved infamous swimwear entrepreneur! • Exaggerated LinkedIn profile question.  

Hey! We have a new website! The url is still the same www.linkedinformed.com. Let me know what you think. It's Linkedinformed Episode 116.   News   Changes to LinkedIn How big should your network be? You Want More Business? So Get on the Phone!         Interesting Stuff I saw this week    How LinkedIn Is Able to Consistently          Increase Pricing                                         'Social worth' and creditworthiness: Need                  loans? Just raise your popularity level on                    LinkedIN   Question: "Recently, I have noticed my profile views are not good as they used to be. My target keywords are "Engineering Manager" and "Engineering Director". In the past when I search for those phrases my profile was always number one listed. Lately is buried deep down in the list.

Welcome to this weeks episode where we continue the discussion with Rosie O'Hara we started in in episode 110 regarding 'Words that change minds'. In this show we talk about; How to reply to accepted invitations What sort of message to send to someone who has viewed your profile The dangers of commenting without taking time out to calm down! The recent 'Gracegate' issue where a senior banking executive causes a storm by posting a screenshot of a comment made that she found offensive. Vote for the podcast I would really appreciate it if you could take a few minutes out of your busy day to vote for me in the UK podcast awards. This is a Facebook poll, click here and scroll down until you find LinkedInformed (and Winbusinessin if possible) and vote. As always you can find links, images and everything else mentioned in this episode at LinkedInformed.com Thanks Until next week....