Leaving LinkedIn Is Good for You: What’s Broken

Avoiding This Mistake Could Enable You to Get a LOT More New Clients

Business |Β Do’s & Don’ts | Lead Gen | LinkedIn

Daniel Alfon

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    The original headline of this post was β€œWhen to LEAVE LinkedIn”.Β But it soundedΒ soΒ dramatic I had to make it less clickbait-oriented. Glad you’re reading this now!

    I’m not going anywhere. Earlier this year I actually celebrated my 13th year on LinkedIn (a LinkedInΒ Bar Mitzvah– could that beΒ a first?). So chances areΒ it’ll take some time before I really leave LinkedIn.

    But I’d like to draw your attention to a simple, yet counter-intuitive idea: Often, you’ll getΒ better resultsΒ using LinkedIn – but thenΒ completing the process started on LinkedInΒ elsewhere.

    What do I mean? Let me ask you this question:

    When you see a hot prospect on LinkedIn, what should you do?

    Not this! Think.

    That’s what you’d better do.While checking your LinkedIn feed – you know, the LinkedIn home page can actually be scrolled if you’d like – you notice thatΒ Johanna, a connection of yours, has just connected withΒ Carol.Β 

    Looking Carol up, you see that Carol is the CFO of one of the hottest companies you’d like to target. Yay! Spoiler alert: if you message Johanna on LinkedIn or just send a dumb connection request to Carol, you’re not thinking !

    We’ll return to Johnna & Carol in a minute. Let’s switch to the problem itself:

    Ron, a successful Sales Manager, shared a problem at a LinkedIn Masterclass I ran for a sales team. Ron keptΒ identifying 2nd degreeΒ contacts who were interesting leads. But asking for the introduction did notΒ convertΒ into introductions. He was worried his connections no longer wanted to help him!

    When asked: β€œHow did you reach out to your connection, asking for the intro?”, Ron said naturally ,β€œI just message my connection on LinkedIn”.

    Nobody said anything for a few seconds.

    Then the VP Sales’ Personal AssistantΒ asked timidly:Β β€œWhy?”

    What you have to doΒ really is toΒ think and pick the most appropriate channel. LinkedIn is just one channel. Sometimes the best channel isΒ LinkedIn.Β Often it isn’t.

    Ask yourself: what’s theΒ best wayΒ to contact your connection? If you don’t recall ever seeing a Whatsapp message from your connection, shoot anΒ email.Β If you know you are going to meet your connectionΒ at an event next week, do nothing now – but add a reminder to yourself to askΒ about your leadΒ when you meet.

    Now let’s see the main reasons not to message people on LinkedIn, or, like the title of this piece asks, why leaving LinkedIn is actually good for you:

    1. Access

    Not all users get LinkedIn messages in their primary Inbox, soΒ  they may miss your messageΒ altogether. Even when delivered,weeks may go by before your connectionseesΒ that message: many users signed up with an email that is no longer their primary email, and everything LinkedIn sends them goes toΒ thatΒ email address.

    2. Stupidity

    β€œPress enter to send” is the default setting.

    Yes, you read that right.

    Many users only understandΒ it too late. Β A reply likeΒ β€œHi, Thanks for this! Yes, I’d like that! Does next Tuesday work for you? John” could mean they’ve sentΒ 5Β (read:five) annoying messages, sometimes showing up in your correspondent’s inbox 5 times, the first emailΒ  being β€œHi”, just because you wanted to go to a new line.

    You’re almost bound to take a false step.

    On desktop, you only see the beginning of the message and must click through to see the whole message.

    3. Time

    Answering is time-consuming – if it works.

    If you’d like to reply via desktop to a long message, you can’t just hit β€œreply” as it goes to a LinkedIn black hole andΒ notΒ your connection’s email.

    4. Fragmentation

    Sometimes you send a message,get a reply, reply to that reply etc – it becomes a thread.

    LinkedInΒ threadsΒ are even more challenging to manage.

    The messagesΒ  simplyΒ becomeΒ  unreadable.

    Access, Stupidity,Β Time and Fragmentation: those are the reasons not to use LinkedIn’s messaging.

    In other words…

    In short, if you don’t mind getting an answer to a non-urgent, non-important question, then LinkedInΒ messaging may work. ButΒ when was the last time you composed such emails?

    Wondering what’s coming next? Simple: β€œOK, I see LinkedIn messaging isn’t good. But what should I use?”

    I waited long for LinkedIn to fix this, but when it didn’t, I wrote about what CAN be done. Check it out here:

    https://www.danielalfon.com/leaving-linkedin-is-good-for-you-what-works/

    Posted onΒ October 17, 2017

    Posted onΒ October 17, 2017

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