Yesterday I got a new connection on LinkedIn from a guy called Justin, who I’d never met before. He sent the standard “I’d like to add you to my network” message. OK a little lazy but fine by me. I always follow up, as there must be a reason behind the action and I like to know why.
But Justin disappointed me.
With behaviour like the above, the constant arguments in my feed over what’s LinkedIn worthy, and under moderated groups becoming spam echo chambers, is there any value left in LinkedIn?
Discuss.
As someone who uses Linkedin a LOT to build networks and start conversations, I think that people like this are a frustration, but actually can serve to highlight the efforts of those of us who make an effort to send personalised, relevant messages with an open business goal. That’s what I keep telling myself, anyway!
I currently have Michael, Trevor, Rachel and Lucinda requesting I connect with them, whoever they may be, so I’m slowly coming around to the idea that Linkedin is truly worthless, with its proliferation of ‘look at me’ posts.
I try to use LinkedIn for good and ignore the bad bits. I’ve met some really great contacts by reaching out on the network. I tend to ignore the ‘Justins’ completely on LinkedIn, and elsewhere (i.e. email). On the flipside, I’m also happy for other people to ignore my messages, if they are not interested. It’s a saturated world out there and we’re all just sharing information, digesting information, and trying to make good decisions.
At least the bot called you Katie.
The more people use crap tactics like this, the more personalisation wins the day.
So I welcome a flood of AI or Bots on LinkedIN, it’ll make those human interactions much more meaningful!
Coming into this at least two-and-a-half years after the original post, I’d say LinkedIn still has its uses.
Not so long back I was able to run a very successful PPC campaign through LinkedIn which outperformed a similar campaign on Facebook by a country-mile due to a super niche audience that I wasn’t quite able to replicate using Facebook’s targeting.
On the flip side, I recently went through a solid round of being wooed by a wave or recruiters who ultimately mucked me around, shoved me towards jobs that simply weren’t even in the right ballpark and left me feeling pretty naff about the whole thing.
Perhaps a bot recruiter would have served me better? 😉