LinkedIn Tip - Don't listen to the experts if you want to grow your connections
Hey everyone,
In 2014 I received an email from a guy called James Boughey. He was a client of mine and he was inviting me to connect with him on this all new business networking site called - LinkedIn. Like a lot of people in that era, I gave it a go, created my profile which felt like a cross between a resume and MySpace and then, well...... nothing.
Like so many people, I ignored all of the LinkedIn notifications for many years until I ended up deciding that I need to grow my referral base a bit more. I was a busy, stressed out tech entrepreneur with zero spare time and not a lot of marketing knowledge.
So I awkwardly started doing what I thought was right - posting content, tagging people in and making super-awkward connection requests. The result?
Crickets..
But one thing that I'm grateful for, is that I kept trying.
I kept trying a bunch of different things and like the nerdy software guy that I was deep down, I kept records of these tests. I did tests the way that software people do tests - I set out a goal, I wrote out what I was going to do and then I measured the results.
After a while I started getting more positive results than negative ones.
Sometimes the results felt amazing!
Now remember, this was all back in a time when most people infrequently visited their linkedin account and when they did, it was often to find a new job, or search for prospective employees.
Over this time I managed to do fairly well on LinkedIn. I collected a network of over 20,000 connections and taught myself to run live streams, how to write articles and how to create posts that people actually wanted to read.
I also learned the fastest way to get new connections. It was through one of my tests and it was NOT what all of the self-proclaimed LinkedIn experts were saying that you had to do. Here's a list of the advice that I'd been given;
- Just post good content
- Post every single day
- Use lots of hashtags
- Tag in influential connections
- Send long, thoughtful connection messages to new contacts using super formal language
For me, NONE of these things did much to increase my audience.
What I did do was this;
1. Installed the LinkedIn app on my phone (because its quicker to do this when you have a spare moment on your phone).
2. In LinkedIn, go to the MyNetwork section
3. Scroll to the More suggestions for you
4. Scroll through the list that are shown to you and clock on the Connect button to 6 different individuals.
5. Lastly (and this is more important than actually posting content!), hit the Home button and scroll through the feed and actively and sincerely engage with others' posts for the next 3-5 minutes. Write comments, hit the like button, repost stuff and perhaps even send a DM or two.
When I started doing these steps I had grown my network by about 3000 connections in the space of just a couple of months. Now the mathematician in you is probably doubting this because it does not add up, but the reason why this works is as follows;
- By connecting to a small handful of people every day, you're probably going to have 2-3 people accept. Each time a person accepts you, a group of people in their network will see you and your posts. That person will also see your recent posts and activity so your profile will become instantly more widely seen.
- By being a daily active user, the algo will start rewarding you by showing your profile in the recommended profiles section and you are going to start getting an influx of new connection requests. My advice - accept all of them. Give everyone a chance and if they're weird or send annoying DM's, just block them. Again, by being a person who accepts new connections, you are signaling to the algo that you are helping the network expand.
- The engagement part will help your relative reach grow exponentially as well. People are nosey buy nature so they'll see your comment and drop onto your profile.
That is it. That is my little hack.
I was coaching a small business in 2021 and he was brand new to LinkedIn. I got him to use this tactic and he grew from 1 connections to over 1200 in two months - from that group he gained a bunch of new clients and some new friends.
I hope this little hack helps you and I'd love to hear if you have any LinkedIn tips that you can share?
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