If someone isn’t working on the Dummies book for LinkedIn yet they sure should be. (Rumor has it that someone is.) While I know there are some non-LinkedIn employees in Seattle making money from sharing the basics of using the tool with novice users, and I hope at least some tips ‘n tricks (which I believe is similar to charging people to learn how to use the bus!), I wanted to share this new stuff in the spirit of the PIF party model.
I just learned about a few new applications they have deployed and am once again blown away by just how smart these people are! I LUV LinkedIn!
Like many people, I was already impressed with the Company Profiles they recently added as well as the many creative ways you can utilize the information associated with these new features…..so much fun, I mean research, you can have. Providing more value to LinkedIn users as a way to thank them for all the data they’re providing (and maintaining within LinkedIn for free) is uber smart of these folks, and oh how I love working with smart people.
1) If you do a job search on SimplyHired and spot a job of interest to you with the little LinkedIn icon next to it, you can click on it, and after a quick authentication, see if there is anyone in your network that can potentially connect you to the company doing the hiring.
2) The other tool you can find by going to the Business Week site and picking an article to read. Somewhere on the first page of the article you’ll find a box of options offering what I call an “usual suspects list” of things you can do with the article (aka Story Tools), plus now a LinkedIn option that when clicked opens a new window and allows you to see if anyone mentioned in the article is in your network.
Ah, the possibilites……have fun!