Are you using LinkedIn?

I'm an avid networker on many different social networks. My main focus, however, is LinkedIn for professional networking. Currently I have 275 LinkedIn connections that result in over 3,000,000 total connections or roughly 10% of LinkedIn. If you are not on LinkedIn send me a request and let's get you started. You can find me at http://www.linkedin.com/in/tomstaskiewicz.

A little further investigation of LinkedIn shows that I have 5800 different companies in my first and second level contacts. The fact that not only do I have these companies but I can find out who has the contact is awesome. Granted some of these contacts will be stale, but it is far better than anything I had previously and it's always a great starting point and opportunity to learn about the culture.

I am amazed as I look at the LinkedIn page for some of the people that I know are currently seeking a new job and I find them with 20, 50, maybe 100 connections. What is with that? You're telling me that you only know 20 people that are on LinkedIn? Either no one likes you and you don't like anyone else, you live in a hole, or you're really not interested in finding a new opportunity. To have less than 150 contacts is ridiculous and shows me someone that is not making any networking effort.

Things to do:

1. Find at least 100 people on LinkedIn to add to your network.
2. Commit to adding 5 to 10 people per week.
3. Join at least 5 groups in your areas of interest.
4. Obtain at least 5 quality recommendations. I will define a quality recommendation in another post.
5. Build a profile that tells a story about you and what you have to offer.
6. Monitor the statistcs that tell you how many people have viewed your profile and how many times you have appeared in a search.