LinkedIn operates the world’s largest professional network on the Internet with more than 175 million members in over 200 countries and territories.  LinkedIn members did nearly 4.2 billion professionally-oriented searches on the platform in 2011 and are on pace to surpass 5.3 billion in 2012.  Headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., LinkedIn also has U.S. offices in Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, Omaha and San Francisco. International LinkedIn offices are located in Amsterdam, Bangalore, Delhi, Dubai, Dublin, Hong Kong, London, Madrid, Melbourne, Milan, Mumbai, Munich, Paris, Perth, São Paulo, Singapore, Stockholm, Sydney, Tokyo and Toronto.

LinkedIn is a great professional network and is a little bit more on the complex side to set up correctly.  So, I thought I would give some insight as to people’s behavior on LinkedIn and some tips on improving your profile. 

Just this year, LinkedIn and TNS conducted a great behavioral study on the difference between social media networks and professional networks, giving great insight into the differing needs and interests between the two.  What they found is that emotion plays into both networks, but not in the same ways. The report states, “Perhaps one of the biggest myths in B2B branding is that the nature of the decision process is so rational that emotions do not play a significant role.” In fact, emotional campaigns seem to generate two the response and ROI versus a campaign that appeals primarily to reason. 

The study goes even further in-depth to explain that most social networks are about socializing, staying in touch, entertainment, killing time, and sharing content.  Professional networks are about maintaining identity, making contacts, searching for opportunities, staying in touch, and keeping up to date on topics relevant to the user’s career. 

Let’s shift gears for a moment and focus on your profile.  Why? 

• As of June 30, 2012, LinkedIn counts executives from all 2011 Fortune 500 companies as members; its corporate hiring solutions are used by 85 of the Fortune 100 companies.
• More than 2 million companies have LinkedIn Company Pages.
• LinkedIn represents a valuable demographic for marketers with an affluent & influential membership.
• LinkedIn members are sharing insights and knowledge in more than one million LinkedIn Groups.
• As of June 30, 2012, 23 percent of unique visiting members come from mobile apps, versus just ten percent a year ago. That number reaches 27 percent when including mobile visits to the website.

Here are a few easy changes to boost your profile's searchability:

• Use the profile description to not only have your job title, but include areas of expertise - SEO, SEM, Social Media etc. 
• Ask for recommendations and give recommendations to your peers. 
• The skills and expertise sections has recently changed to allow you to give and receive one-click “endorsements” for various skills. 
• Agreat way to become a trusted business advisor is to give great recommendations/advice to questions posted to groups.  And, if you have not joined any groups check out the Groups you may like under the Groups tab at the top of your page.

Please feel free to shoot me any questions you may have about LinkedIn.   Bob@cleriti.com