LinkedIN #Fail ? (Maybe Not) Part 3

There wasn't going to be a Part 3 to this story.

But I received a phone call after 4pm yesterday from Angie at LinkedIn.

I'm not sure which of my various conversations prompted them to act.

I started the story on Twitter last week.

Continued with emails on Monday.

Posted the saga on this site Tuesday and Wednesday.

Tweeted, others ReTweeted, it was on Google+ with several comments.

Wednesday afternoon, Angie called and I was offered the 30 day trial.

Not for all five of us, but for me.

Angie sent me a confirmation email:

Hi Scott,

It was a pleasure speaking with you today.

As we discussed, I have granted you full use of the Executive account for the next month. We will also send you a remind email when you free month is about to expire so you can upgrade if you would like to continue at the Executive level.

I am also including the link below so you can sign up for our Premium.

Thank you and have a great day.

Regards,

Angie
LinkedIn Customer Service Supervisor



I will use my 30 day trial and perhaps we can then sign all 5 of us up for the program.


I will chalk this one up to the power of social media.


ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

LinkedIN #Fail ? Part 2

I'm going to continue this story about LinkedIn's failure to be social with a bit of background.

As a new way for our business development team to find the right people to connect with, we want to use LinkedIn at the Executive level.

LinkedIn has been sending promotional codes for 30 day trial upgrades for a while. When we decided to upgrade 5 free accounts, we discovered that we just missed the deadline for the last promo code, so I started looking for a new code.

Googling LinkedIn Promo Codes led me to believe that they had changed their promotional pricing strategy recently. I searched their website and found nothing, so I decided to reach out to LinkedIn and double check. I tried Twitter and after getting no response, decided to try the old fashioned way, a phone call.

Yesterday, I shared the story of calling LinkedIN.

Here's the rest of the story:

Monday, I followed the instructions given to me over the phone by customer service.

I submitted a ticket and waited for a response.

We have 5 people on our team that we want to upgrade to the Executive level. However we are looking for the first month as a no charge, say 13 months for the price of 12, to persuade our CEO to invest in this for us.

And their response:

Hello Scott, We appreciate your interest in upgrading to the Executive level on LinkedIn. We offer a substantial discount on our annual Executive membership. If you upgrade to the Executive level and pay the one time annual membership fee of $899.55 for each account, that would be a savings of $20 per month or $300 over the year for each account, if you spread out the savings. Times that figure by 5 accounts and your boss will be saving approximately $1500.00. for those 5 accounts over the first year.

In effect that is 15 free months at the Executive level account as it is normally $99.95 per month with the month to month membership. Please remember that there are no contracts to sign and can be canceled at any time. You would be prorated back the amount of any full months that are unused.

If you have further questions, please feel free to reply to this message.

Wendy LinkedIn Customer Service

When I read this, I was disappointed. Wendy simply spouted a canned sales pitch tailored to my request. Except she there was a problem with her offer.



Here was my email back to Wendy:

Thank you for your quick response.

However, this is still the standard pricing that is offered online. Actually, it is a few cents more expensive, online annual price is $899.40, not $899.55 that you quoted.

As an internet solutions company, we know that all of this is negotiable as there are limited hard costs to this service.

We are also considering doing LinkedIn Ads if that will help open the doors.

Again, we are looking at upgrading 5 basic accounts, including our CEO, to Executive level which means $4497.00 for simply saying yes to that 13 months for the price of 12 by offering us the 30 day trial for the first month.

That was Monday. It is now Wednesday. I have not heard back from them.

So what do you think?


ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

LinkedIN #Fail ? Part 1

Call it a "partial fail".

Big Companies are used to forcing you to go thru the proper channels to get your questions answered and problems solved.

Big Internet companies do this all the time.

Due to the volume of inquiries we ask that you first search our F.A.Q. and if you still need help, submit via our Q & A form, blah, blah, blah is what often happens.

Those that do it differently are often rewarded substantially.

Zappos for example.

Here's my LinkedIN story:

We are a small company, but larger than most in our field.

30+ employees. 5 on the sales side. We want to upgrade our 5 basic (free) LinkedIn accounts to the top paid level. 5 Executive accounts would currently cost $4500 using the annual membership option.

We want more.

We want a free 30 day trial. In other words, we'll pay the $4500, but we want 13 months, not 12.

We may do some LinkedIn advertising too.

I wanted to talk to a live person about this.

But you can't.

Unless you are clever.

First I asked the LinkedIn Twitter account for help.

3 days later, absolutely no response.

So I searched for the phone number, thanks Google, and called the LinkedIn office in California.

It's 650-687-3600.

The female voice recording told me that for customer service I need to go online.

I decide to "hack into their phone system".

Option 2 when I called was to use their company directory. I decided to see if they had a Scott working for them, punched the appropriate keys, and found several. I picked one and he answered.

Scott told me he was not in customer service, but he would try and help by connecting me.

After 10 minutes on hold, he came back and apologized for it taking so long but he was still looking for the number.

I figured if this was an endurance test, I had 45 minutes since I was multi-tasking.

The next time he comes back on the line, Scott tells me customer service will be calling me directly, since they have my number from caller id.

Sure enough, someone from customer support calls 4 minutes later, wanting to know how I got through their phone system.

I told him.

He laughed.

Then he told me that I really did need to use the proper channels which involves, scrolling down to the bottom of my LinkedIn page, finding the little HELP CENTER link, and clicking on it.

Told him I had already discovered that and if my question wasn't on the F.A.Q. list, there was no live link to contact sales or customer service, or Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIN.

Then he told me how to make the contact us link live and fill out a ticket to get response to my questions.

On one hand, I understand why they want to keep my crazy Aunt Sally from calling to fix something that is in their F.A.Q. But come on now...

This story will continue tomorrow, but why is a social media company being so unsocial?

ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

image from http://arabcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/Linkedin-blocking.jpg

Transitioning from Play to Work

At my last job, they really didn't care how I spent my time as long as I was on target with the goals they set for me.

Social Media was not a means to an end, at least for my bosses. It was just one more thing to do, but the bigger question was, "Why social media?"

Their version of Social Media was Facebook.

And Facebook was either:

1. A waste of time spent that you should be working instead of playing Mafia Wars.
2. A competitor, but not really because who is really going to advertise on Facebook?

A couple of my bosses set up LinkedIn profiles but they were never serious about using the LinkedIn channel for business.

And Twitter? "The Twitter is really stupid and is going to die." Words spoken by one of my former co-workers.

My new employer, Cirrus ABS takes all of this internet stuff more seriously. Net-Centered Marketing is the basis for all the activity that my 30 co-workers do for our clients.

The first couple of weeks that I have been with Cirrus, I have been transitioning from the web and social media being an extra activity in my life to an essential component to my earning a living.

Yes, I will still be my usual self online, but I also now get to offer more than just advice, I get to offer online solutions as I consult with folks about their marketing.

That's why I've added the contact me info below:

ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS. You can contact him here:

Social Media is Mainstream

Friday I posted a story about the Online Revolution extends beyond Social Media. Click here to read more.

But Social Media continues to explode as I'm sure you'll agree after watching this 4 minute video:

More LinkedIn Tips

Last Tuesday I was at a LinkedIn Lunch at Cancer Services of Northeast Indiana.

The presenter/teacher is my friend Anthony Juliano and he offered these tips on his own website which I suggest you subscribe to.

Slim down your LinkedIn news feed ajjuliano | June 3, 2011 at 9:01 am | Categories: Uncategorized | URL: http://wp.me/p10gsk-qJ

When you log on to LinkedIn, one of the first things you see is the news feed--a list of updates from your connections. It's a great way to efficiently catch a glimpse of what's important to those in your network.

There's one problem with the news feed, however, the default settings feed you EVERYTHING--status updates, new connections, events your contacts are attending, etc. Some of it's great, but a lot is just filler that makes your news feed less powerful.

How do you make sure you're only getting fed the good stuff? Like almost everything else on LinkedIn, you can customize it. Here's how:

1. Log in to LinkedIn

2. In the upper-right-hand-corner, hover the mouse over your name, then click “Settings.” (See below.)

3. Click on the "Accounts" tab on the left hand side and then click on "Customize the updates you see on your home page." (See below.)

4. Uncheck the boxes of anything you don't want to see. I omit "New connections in [my] network" and "Groups [my] connections have joined or created" (mainly because I don't use LinkedIn Groups all that often).

That's all there is to it. Feel free to post any questions you have about LinkedIn in the comments, or contact me directly.

Linking With Twitter

At the very moment this article is scheduled to appear on ScLoHo's Social Media Adventure, I am sitting in a presentation on LinkedIn.

Here's how it came to be, from Anthony Juliano:

What collaboration looks like on Twitter ajjuliano | URL: http://wp.me/p10gsk-rv

June 14th, I'm making a presentation at Cancer Services of Northeast Indiana*. While I'll be speaking about LinkedIn, there's an interesting subtext: the event might have never happened if not for Twitter. Here's how it came about:

On April 27, I was part of an Asher Agency seminar at the Greater Fort Wayne Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber's Jon Swerens got things rolling by Tweeting before the seminar. Then, when I was discussing LinkedIn, Asher's Lauren Zuber jumped in:

Shortly thereafter, others joined in the conversation as part of the backchannel that was going on while I presented. I didn't realize it was happening at the time.

After the seminar, I thanked Amber, Joe, Kristin and Lauren for their comments:

And then an idea--would anyone want to get together to talk a little more about LinkedIn?

The group was receptive, and then something cool happened: Jennifer (@23skidooooo) and asked if she could participate:

Which led to another idea: why not open it up to others?

And why not ask for a nominal admission fee, with the proceeds to benefit the organization Amber works for, Cancer Services of Northeast Indiana?

Jennifer said yes...

So Amber and I started to talk details via direct message...

And then something else really cool happened: Kevin Mullett offered to present another topic to benefit Cancer Services:

And the next day, less than 24 hours after it was first proposed, Cancer Services was Tweeting the details:

I think this example shows the true power of Twitter: a group of people with a similar interest quickly creating something out of nothing. Everyone had a role:

• Jon got it started. The first Tweet sets the table for others to join in.
• Lauren mentioned her need to do more with LinkedIn.
• Joe, Amber and Kirstin, all of whom I trust, revealed the opportunity for a conversation about LinkedIn.
• Jennifer showed that the interest may be broader than just a few people.
• Kevin proposed that it didn't have to be a one-time thing.
• Cancer Services presented an outlet and made it all come together.

All of this goes to show that while you can certainly waste a lot of time on Twitter, you can be pretty productive, too. All it takes is some good connections and the desire to listen and engage.

Are You LinkedIn?

I admit, I haven't used LinkedIn as effectively as I could. But that will change in the weeks ahead.

A recent article from CopyBlogger.com:

16 Smarter Ways to Use LinkedIn to Build Your Business

With its recent IPO debut, LinkedIn is hot news this week.

We’ll let the financial press drool over the rapid first day rise of its share price. There’s actually a lot more about LinkedIn you should know.

While most people think of LinkedIn as a glorified job search board, this social media site is actually an amazing business-to-business marketing tool.

If, that is, you know what you’re doing.

With a little bit of time and effort, the following guide can help you turn LinkedIn into a lead generation engine and give you the inside track to generating more business with LinkedIn.

Start with your profile

Your profile on LinkedIn is the single most important element on the site. It’s your “enhanced” business card –- a quick and easy way for people to decide if you’re relevant or not to what they care about.

LinkedIn provides a rich feature set to make your profile stand out. Use these tips to create a profile that gets your message across without losing readers along the way.

1. Don’t get clever with your picture
No one will recognize you if they can’t see your face. The best pictures have solid color backgrounds with your face taking up as much of the frame as possible. The image upload tool in LinkedIn includes a cropping feature to make this easier.

2. Headlines matter (as always)
The Professional Headline that appears below your name is included on every reference about you on the site. Make sure it includes your title and your company. Again, don’t get so caught up in trying to be clever that you’re hard to understand.

3. You are more than your job
The biggest mistake people make with their profile is excluding their non-work related experiences. If you belong to a local networking group or other affiliations, add them.

The more experiences that you add, the easier it will be for LinkedIn to connect you with others within their network.

4. Create connections that matter
Schedule some time every few months to update your contacts within LinkedIn.

As general rule of thumb, ask yourself, would you feel comfortable picking up the phone and calling this person? If not, don’t add them to your contacts.

One of my favorite ways to add contacts is using the People You May Already Know tool. Of course, the “trick” is to make sure you have done a thorough job of adding all of your work and non-work experiences to your profile.

While you’re busy adding contacts, don’t forget to prune a few out as well. By using the “would you call” benchmark, you may find that are a few names to drop. Keep your contact list relevant.

5. Work your recommendations
An easy way to enhance your reputation is to obtain as many recommendations as possible. Lots of recommendations add up to social proof that you’re a professional others can depend on.

The best way to get recommendations is to ask for them. The Request Recommendations tool is simple to use, but take the time to edit the default message by tailoring it for your audience.

For people you know well, a simple subject line could be “I need your help.”

(I wouldn’t recommend “You are not alone” for this one … you might make your colleagues a bit nervous.)

For other connections that you may not know quite as well, include a point of reference to jog their memory.

As for the message itself, be short and to the point. A good way to start your message is to acknowledge how much you value their opinion. Vanity is often a great motivator.

And if your requests for recommendation fall flat? Start writing recommendations for others you know. You will be pleasantly surprised how many will reciprocate.

6. Don’t waste your summary
Don’t waste your summary area with a lot of empty verbiage about your “team-oriented, results-focused goal setting” qualifications.

Instead, use the summary as a place to answer a simple question — Why do you do what you do? Think of your summary as the human element of who you are, the backstory to everything you’ve done so far.

7. Flesh out the details
A new feature of LinkedIn is the Add Sections tool — a way to modify your profile with additional details about your qualifications from other online sources.

One of my favorite features is the ability to add content from SlideShare.net, Twitter, and WordPress.

Give your LinkedIn viewers a well-rounded sense of your digital presence.

8. Drag the conversation along
With one click and a mouse move, you can substantially control the narrative that people view when visiting your public profile page.

Next to every section heading on your profile page is a directional arrow icon that allows you to re-order and emphasize the sections of your profile for viewers.

Front-load your page with the most exciting content. For example, if you have great recommendations, drag them to the top so viewers see your most positive details first.

9. Don’t forget SEO benefits
If you make your profile page public, search engines like Google and Bing will index it.

Take the time to optimize your summary, using your full proper name versus “I” or “me.” You might also want to enter links to websites you want to highlight.

Also, give your profile page some link juice by creating a link from your website biography page to your LinkedIn profile page.

Now you’re ready to start promoting your business on LinkedIn

Having a solid LinkedIn profile is a crucial ingredient — but it is only the starting point. LinkedIn gives you lots of tools to drive interest and traffic to your business — so use them.

10. Update your email signature line
You’ll want to start building awareness of your LinkedIn Profile. Since many professionals rely on email as their primary digital communication stream, your usual email signature is often a great starting point to connect with others.

The Email Signature tool provides a series of options to input and style your signature line. Make sure to select under Options the “Professional Profile” link and “See who we know in common” link.

11. Explore the rest of the tool kit
The LinkedIn Developer site has a rich number of easy-to-use tools to enhance your site.

For example, beef up your online Bio or About page with a quick link back to LinkedIn by using the Member Profile plugin.

If you have a business blog, the Share on LinkedIn plugin is the perfect complement to your Tweet Share button.

Don’t forget to also include the Recommend with LinkedIn button. This feature gives your business social proof through recommendations of LinkedIn Users that are visible on your site.

As a side note for those of you who are more SEO-savvy, it is very feasible that LinkedIn Recommendations will be a factor in search rankings — similar to Facebook Likes or Twitter sharing today.

12. Dominate the All Updates area
By default, LinkedIn presents a list of Network Updates when a user logs in. This is a gold mine for the smart content marketing professional.

Start building authority and awareness through an ever-present stream of relevant information that appears directly on the LinkedIn home page of your connections.

13. Create your own LinkedIn group
LinkedIn contains a vast collection of online groups. For many, joining and participating in a LinkedIn group is an easy way to build authority through comments and discussion postings.

But for the savvy professional who is willing to commit the time, creating and nurturing your own online group can pay huge dividends — if you build it right.

The real secret of having your own group is the free email broadcast tool included with it.

Under the Manage options, you will see a feature to Send An Announcement. While restricted to once every seven days, LinkedIn provides you with a free and easy method to send email broadcasts to your group members.

14. And speaking of email …
Did you know you can send out email newsletters to your contacts?

The Compose Message feature in your inbox has a unique way to tailor your emails to your LinkedIn Contacts by geography and/or by industry, for up to 50 people at a time.

So if you want to share an interesting story or idea with your contacts in the accounting industry, a simple point and click is all it takes.

Obviously you’re not going to use this feature to spam or annoy your contacts (that will take you in the exact opposite direction of where you want to go). Keep these messages informative and highly relevant.

15. Work your company page
Recently, LinkedIn introduced company pages — an easy way to provide additional details about your business.

As you update your Products & Services page, consider including appealing special offers for people who visit and recommend your LinkedIn company page.

And of course, don’t forget to promote your company page by LinkedIn email, group discussions, group announcements, and updating your status.

16. Manage and mine your data stream
With so much activity conducted within LinkedIn, it’s easy to get overwhelmed. This is where RSS can become your friend.

On the Account Settings page, you will see a tab called Account. Within the Account features is an option to Get LinkedIn content in an RSS feed. Make sure this feature is enabled and add the link to your favorite RSS reader to receive daily updates from your connections.

Once you have everything where you can review it easily, mine the data stream by taking advantage of the built in search features of your newsreader. Alternatively, your reader may have additional options to flag certain items that contain terms you designate.

With a little bit of effort, your RSS reader can become a daily source of business opportunities.

The value of LinkedIn is you

LinkedIn gives you plenty of powerful toys to play with that can make your business-to-business marketing more effective. This guide represents just a few of the many things you can do.

The tools are there, your customers are there … the only thing that’s missing is you. So while the rest of the world sits in awe of LinkedIn’s stock price, start creating your own return on investment for your business.

About the Author: Sean Jackson is a partner in Copyblogger Media and the company CFO. Check out how he uses LinkedIn here.

Linking It

Some of my friends use LinkedIn as their primary Social Media Platform.

If you are going to use it, or just establish a presence on LinkedIn, here's a few tips from MarketingProfs.com:

Three LinkedIn No-Nos

"People use LinkedIn to connect with coworkers and industry peers, get business advice, and even find new jobs," writes Diana Freedman at HubSpot. "It's a great place for businesses to make relevant LinkedIn users aware of their brand." But, she cautions, those positive outcomes won't happen if you make mistakes like these:

Failing to answer questions. When you respond to business-related questions at LinkedIn's "Answer" section, you establish yourself as an expert—and it might even generate new customers. "Take a few minutes each day to look at the new questions in your industry," she suggests, "and see if there's one you can provide a helpful answer to." Be careful, though, to reply without blatant promotion of your product or service. "If you were in a bind and reached out to a community of peers for help," she explains, "would you want the only response to be 'Give me your money'?"

Failing to complete your personal profile. If you want to build trust, you have to let others know who you are. "Describe your role at your current and previous companies," she advises, "and provide links to your website and any relevant profiles," such as Twitter.

Failing to post status updates. Don't worry about the apparent redundancy of posting updates at LinkedIn when you're already active on Twitter and Facebook. There's a good chance your LinkedIn network has business connections who wouldn't see your updates in other venues. "It's ok to re-purpose content across all of the social channels, as long as you're not duplicating the content," she notes.

The Po!nt: Active, transparent participation at LinkedIn will deliver the best networking results.

Keeping track of the important

and ignoring the rest....

Last month I was one of four panelists on the Social Media Breakfast Fort Wayne event.

The general topic was Managing It All.

And I noticed each of the four of us, do it a little differently, which is great.

But I'm not sure if I clearly stated how I do it.

My Twitter followers is in the 1700+ range. Over 95% of Twitter users have less than 500. I follow back about 2/3 of them.

Facebook and LinkedIn I use too but my connections there are under 1000.

I rely on two tools to filter out the noise and stay on top of what needs my attention.

Email and a setting on my smart phone.

Good old fashioned email. I get email alerts for Facebook, LinkedIn and Direct Messages from Twitter.

I also use a Twitter application on my droid that chirps when I get a mention or Direct Message, which alerts me to something that I should respond to.

It's that simple.

What do you do?

Multiple Personalities in Social Media?

Last week I was asked about creating separate Twitter accounts based on the subject matter being discussed.

Here's the question:


@lifeasclouds: @ScLoHo should I use different twitter handles if I want to tweet about more than one topic (i.e. Personal stuff, Govt mngmnt and religion)?

I answered back in a couple of tweets, but want to explain my answer in more than 140 characters.

My opinion:

Social Media Identities should be Brands.

This applies to Facebook, Blogs, Twitter, and other Social Media platforms.

I am on Social Media as ScLoHo which is a personal brand. I do not speak on behalf of the radio stations I work for, however I will update my Facebook Wall, Tweet, and write on blogs about them on occasion.

In other words, I am me, not my employer when I write as ScLoHo.

I do have administrator privileges with a couple of Facebook accounts that represent other organizations. Anything that I post on those accounts are appropriate for that organization.

I pulled a couple others into the conversation I was having with Chris @LifeAsClouds.

Amber:


@arecker1704: @scloho @lifeasclouds- good question. I have 4 twitter accts- 1 for me, @fwderbygirls @fiveonfivemag @cancersvcsni. But those are all orgs.


and...


@arecker1704: @scloho @lifeasclouds if it's just various aspects of u, I'd say let them shine through as u :) But if you rep a company, set up a sep acct.


Heather:


@HSchoegler: @arecker1704 @ScLoHo @lifeasclouds Just be you & talk about all that's important to you. Add disclaimer on your bio that they're your words.


And then Andy asked:


@awelfle: @hschoegler @arecker1704 @ScLoHo @lifeasclouds Is a disclaimer rly necessary? It seems superfluous & jst clogs up ur profile. Y do u use it?


I believe I know the answer to that one. Heather is a public figure who is the communication director for a local non-profit, and she has been the president of a local leadership organization, plus her husband is a television sportscaster. She does it to cover her butt.

My Social Media activities are all branded ScLoHo. I started doing this after a couple of years and a couple of blogs. I added ScLoHo to the name of all my blogs along with Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, and nearly everything I do online that is mine.

I do have separate blogs because each has a different theme. That is to create consistency for the readers of each blogsite so they know what to expect when they visit.

But this is different from what Chris asked regarding Twitter.

Here are the links to many of the places that you will find me online:

My home page is ScLoHo.net. Click Here.

My personal blog is ScLoHo's Really? Click Here.

One of my Advertising, Marketing, Media & Sales blogs is ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom. Collective Wisdom because it features wisdom I've collected from others. Click Here.

The other Advertising, Marketing, Media & Sales blog only features stuff that I write. The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo. Click Here.

You are reading my newest blog, ScLoHo's Social Media Adventure. Click Here to go to the home page.

I mentioned LinkedIn. Click here.

My Facebook page. Click here.

And besides the blogs, I am most active on Twitter. Click here.

What are your thoughts on all of this?

The Complete Picture

This week we're going to look at filling some holes, starting with this advice from Anthony Juliano and his site Content: Making sense of our changing communication environment

Why a photo on your LinkedIn profile is a must

by ajjuliano

Don't let this be your image on LinkedIn

If you drive by a house with an unkempt lawn, what’s your immediate thought? If you’re like most people, you probably make a snap judgment that the owner is lazy or inept. “Everyone else got in done,” we think. “Why didn’t they?”

As social media use becomes more common, the same kinds of small negative impressions are being registered when others visit your social media profiles. One example: what a LinkedIn page without a photo might signal to a visitor:

• That you don’t know how to upload a photo (and are therefore incompetent)
• That you haven’t taken the time to do it (and are therefore lazy)
• That you don’t have a photo of yourself that you like (and are therefore either unattractive or lacking in confidence)

This may seem unfair. You may think “I’ve been working on more important things” or “All my good photos are on my work computer and I only access LinkedIn from home.” Unfortunately, the audience isn’t going to give you the benefit of the doubt. After all, when we see a lawn that needs mowing, we usually don’t cut the owner any slack. Regardless of whether there’s more to the story–a broken mower or a broken arm, perhaps–we go with the information we have, and it registers as a negative impression.

So before any more time goes by, take the time to add a photo to your LinkedIn profile. Here’s how you do it:

1. Ensure you have a photo loaded on to your computer and that know where to find it. Make sure it’s a vertically-oriented, professional photo (NOT one of you at play, with a spouse, with a dog, etc., unless that’s somehow related to your work) smaller than 4 MB. Even if you prefer how you looked five years ago, use something that looks like the present-day you.
2. Log in to LinkedIn
3. On the home page, click on Profile, then Edit Profile. You’ll see something that looks like this (absent the photo, of course):
4. Click on the “Edit” link under the photo box
5. Click on “Choose file”; select it from the correct folder on your hard drive
6. Click on “Upload photo”
7. Click on “Save settings” and you’re done
8. If you still have problems, contact me and I’ll walk you through it

One more thing: many people think you should change our your LinkedIn photo often to mix things up and get the audience’s attention. I think the opposite is true: our eyes are drawn to familiar images, so your profile photo will stand out only if it’s recognizable. Change it out once or twice a year if you want, but it’s not necessary to do it more often (unless your appearance changes dramatically, of course).

Now get out your camera, smile and get it done.

The Social Side of LinkedIN

Last week, I was watching a video created by a friend of my Chris Sanderson who explains in very simple terms how to grow your relationships on LinkedIn.

Deliver Daily

Yesterday I touched on the Magic Secret of Success in Social Media.

Today I'm laying in on the line.

Do you want to be a player or an also-ran?

Most bloggers quit after a few months.

Same with Twitters.

Why?

Impatience, unrealistic expectations, and a lack of commitment are the top 3 reasons.

So to overcome those three reasons, you need to understand that there is a direct correlation between your level of activity with social media and the growth of your brand.

There is also a "natural timeline" where you can't rush things.

Face it, everyone of us filled our 24 hours a day before social media was around. And each of us have limited time to spend with social media every day and every week.

So, if you write and post 7 new blog posts on one day and do that once a week, odds are the results will be less than if you were to post one time each day, 7 days a week.

The 4 blogs that I own and update regularly are a living example of this.

Collective Wisdom is updated 3 to 4 times a day and last month received over 7,200 visits.

Really? is updated twice a day and last month received over 3,400 visits.

The site you are reading now, ScLoHo's Social Media Adventure is updated at noon, 5 days a week. 574 visits in the first 4 weeks.

The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo is updated every Tuesday and last month had 272 views.

This is why I recommend you post every day, at least 5 days a week.

By the way, I am also updating my Facebook and LinkedIn status at least once a day too, with a link to one of the blog posts.

Want some hints on how to manage this and still have a life? There are still a few openings for the Social Media Breakfast Fort Wayne gathering on February 22nd. Click here for details and to reserve your spot.

Does LinkedIN Matter?

Guest Post today from the Inside View Blog:

10 Reasons You Need a LinkedIn Profile

by koka sexton

LinkedIn is the go to place for sales people doing discovery on their prospects. It is also the place customer 2.0 prospects go to do some discovery on the sales people they do business with. With over 85 million people on LinkedIn, it always surprises me when I talk to a sales team (especially in the high-tech industry) and find even one without a LinkedIn profile.

Every sales person needs a LinkedIn profile. It is your single most important online asset besides your email address. You are doing yourself a huge disservice professionally if you do not have one.

• Find past coworkers: You may be new in your career as a sales professional or maybe a veteran, either way, LinkedIn will help you keep the connections and friends you make at work only a mouse click away. Sure you have their contact information already but you can lose your computer or delete the record on accident. LinkedIn lets you keep people in a digital address book that makes sure you dont lose contact. Your address book wont keep you up to date on the latest happenings with your coworkers either.

• Build your online identity: Your professional sales 2.0 career is more dependent on your online identity than ever before. If you are serious about becoming a sales leader or expert, without your personal brand being stamped in cement you will be facing an uphill battle. There are many things you should do to make sure your personal brand is front and center but having an well crafted and interactive LinkedIn profile is the best place to start.

• Get new opportunities: People use LinkedIn to find recommendations on products/services. From the LinkedIn Groups to the Answers page, thousands of people a day are looking for help making decisions. As a sales person you should be in these groups or at least setting up email alerts so you can scan the groups to see if you can offer some help and create a new opportunity.

• Learn something new: As a professional you should spend a portion of your day getting better educated on your industry or the latest sales trends. LinkedIn is a focal point for these types of discussions and you have the ability to tap into a network of experts that can help guide you through some of the obstacles you face in your sales efforts.

• Get some credibility: This goes along with #2 but in more detail. As you get more experience, you should be helping other professionals by answering questions. As you help people even if its only a couple times a week you will see your profile being looked at by more and more people. Your prospects are looking at your LinkedIn profile. Make sure you update your LinkedIn profile and give your prospects an excellent representation of who you are.

• Become an expert: The quickest way to get and grow your credibility is to become a social selling expert. The ability to be seen by millions of LinkedIn users trying to make decisions will help build your credibility to the point you are the go to person when it comes to getting help. This could be one of the most influential moves you could make to build your career into exactly what you want it to be.

• Grow your pipeline: Speaking from experience, LinkedIn is a great way for you to take your sales career to another level. As you build your network, become an expert in your space and build your personal brand, you will find more people coming to you for help related to your product or service. This will create a snow ball effect and eventually people from all over LinkedIn will be singing your praises and driving more leads to you.

• Help out a friend: Let’s face it, these are some tough times when it comes to finding a job. Being on LinkedIn will let you connect people you know with others in your network that may be looking for some new talent. You can be the connector that brings someone out of unemployment or maybe you will need to tap into your network when you are looking for a job. Either way, LinkedIn helps facilitate this process easily.

• Find a new job: The job board on LinkedIn is more likely to land you a new position than Monster.com. Because your job inquiry will be directly linked to your LinkedIn profile, employers and hiring managers will be able to quickly decide if you are the right person to talk to. The search features in LinkedIn jobs is one of the best I’ve seen and should be used if you are looking for a new place to work.

• Get found by a new job: Recruiters make up for a decent chunk of people on LinkedIn along with hiring managers. Even if you are not actively looking for a new gig, here may be companies out there looking for someone with your exact talents. They run searches based on expertise, interests, past company and other identifiers that all lead them to your LinkedIn profile. This is more of a reason to make sure your LinkedIn profile is up to date and that you are seen is the most positive light possible.

The Quiet Social Network

Last week I was doing a presentation to a college class at Huntington University.

I was invited to talk about Personal Branding, the @ScLoHo way.

Part of the demonstration was a Google search for my name, Scott Howard.

There were over 6 million results. But on page 2, there I was.



It was my LinkedIn Profile, followed by my Twitter profile.

I call it the Quiet Social Network because it is not as well known as Facebook or Twitter but as of last November "...LinkedIn, which now has 85 million users and is adding a member every second...", according to TechCrunch.

If you have not yet set up your LinkedIn Profile, Go here and start.

And for more info on LinkedIn, check this video:

Twitter? Get Real! (Part 5)

Wrapping up this week of Twitter indoctrination with some of my tips and tricks.

When I was writing this post Monday evening, I had 1332 followers and was following 856 people.

I find following 856 people impossible.

So here's what I do:

Most of my social media activity is done on my computer, a 3 year old laptop. At home we also have a desktop computer, but my wife is the only person who uses it.

Last summer I upgraded my old cell phone to a Droid, but if my laptop is available, it is still my computer of choice.

Twitter has a way for you to organize the people you follow that I started using once I started following a couple hundred folks. They call it Lists.

Everyone I decided to follow, I put on a list. Currently I have 4 main lists:

1. Newsmakers
2. Marketing-Advertising
3. Fort Wayne Area
4. On The Edge

I also have a temporary list: JTerm11 which includes the students I spoke to yesterday at Huntington University. JTerm11 is the HashTag they are using to identify themselves as they are just starting out using Twitter since it is a class requirement. I'll keep tabs on the students to see if they continue using Twitter, or quit.

There is one more list that I created that I usually don't tell people about. It is the RF list.

RF is my own shorthand for Really Follow. I'll get back to this in a moment.

Like I said, everyone I follow goes on one of the 4 lists. Some folks are on a 2 of the 4 lists. Twitter limits a List to 500 people. So as I increase the number of followers, I may need to add some more lists.

Instead of using the Twitter.com website (Twitter.com) I use one of the various Twitter applications on my laptop. There are several available, free of course and the two that I have used most are Tweetdeck and Seesmic.

I currently prefer Tweetdeck but both are fine depending on what your own personal preferences. Another Twitter application that is popular is Hootsuite. I tried it, it doesn't have all the features I want.

So, I'm going to help you set up Tweetdeck. Here's what you see when you go to Tweetdeck.com.

(Click on the pictures to make them bigger, if you want).




Click on the Desktop button at the top and you'll see this:





In the lower right side of your screen is the download button. Click on it and install on your computer.

As you go through the installation and set up of Tweetdeck, you'll see all kinds of options.

One of my favorite is the ability to update my Twitter account, my Facebook account and my LinkedIn account all from Tweetdeck. Play around with the options and in the weeks ahead I'll point out some of my favorites.

But for now, I have one more Tweetdeck tip and it involves columns and lists.

Tweetdeck allows you to set up multiple columns and you can decide what each column will contain. Take a look at mine:



4 Columns fit the screen on my laptop. My usual 4 columns:

1. My RF list
2. Mentions
3. Direct Messages
4. Facebook Status Updates

Remember Twitter lists are limited to 500 people. My RF list currently has 450 people on it of the 850+ that I am following.

My RF list is fluid. I'll put people on this list for awhile and then if I'm not really interested in keeping up with their tweets all the time, I may drop them from my RF list. Some people come and go on my RF list and come back again.

About once a week, I'll look at some of the tweets from folks who are not on my RF list and decide to add them to the RF list. If you are not currently on that list, don't worry about it, you probably will be in the future.

The Mention column shows tweets that include @ScLoHo.
The Direct Message column shows private messages sent to or from me.

I have the Facebook status update column so I can be aware of what my Facebook Friends are up to.

(By the way, I am currently using Tweetcaster on my Droid.)

Starting next week, Fridays will be a guest post day. I have a few lined up, but if you want to write something for me to consider as a guest post, let me know.

Next week, I'll introduce you to LinkedIn and we'll see where else this Social Media Adventure takes us.

Your comments, questions and suggestions are always welcome.

Beyond Facebook

Facebook has its place, but don't believe that Facebook is everything you need to be involved with Social Media.

There are two additional Social Media sites I believe you should be on:

Twitter

and

LinkedIn.

In the days ahead, I'll give you some tips and pointers on these two social media platforms, but first here's why I believe you should be involved with these two platforms.

They are not Facebook.

For the opposite reason that I am on Facebook, I am also on Twitter and LinkedIn.

Why am I on Facebook? Because "everyone" else it on Facebook.

It's where the masses of people are. I can find nearly anyone, from my 80 year old Uncle Bill to my wife's 12 year old grandson.

Facebook is not exclusive, it is inclusive. I use Facebook to find others and to be found.

Twitter and LinkedIn, are much more exclusive. Not because they have certain requirements that keeps people from joining. They have different purposes which people don't always understand.

But like I said, I'll dig into those more in the future.

My primary online presence, my first venture into the social media world, was none of these.

In 2004, I started my first Blog. And it was my blogging that gathered attention. Google loves Blogs. Start a blog and do it right, and you can turn up in search results with Google, Yahoo and Bing.

So, Blogging is another path I'll take you on with this adventure.

And I encourage you to ask questions, make comments, agree, disagree, it's up to you. All I request is that you keep it clean and if you spam, you will be blocked.

Also depending on the time of day, it may be a few hours before I can respond.

The Introduction

This past weekend, I kicked off ScLoHo's Media Adventure by writing several blog posts, including this one.

With this one, I'm going to give you the background and then in the days and weeks ahead, I'll be sharing tips and tricks that I have learned along the way, along with posts from others that will add to our experience.

1st. What's a ScLoHo?

ScLoHo began as a mash up of my first, middle and last names, using the first 2 letters of each to create a unique email address back in the 1990's. Today, I've expanded ScLoHo as a personal brand to distinguish myself from the hundreds of other Scott Howard's in this world.

2nd. What makes you an expert?

Expertise in Social Media is difficult to quantify. It is a growing and expanding world, and I usually do not refer to myself as an expert. However, I've had a lot of success, more than most of the people I know and with my other backgrounds, have been asked to share, teach, and write about this subject.

3rd. Do you do this as a full time occupation?

At this time, no. Although my family sometimes thinks I do. I earn the majority of my income from "Traditional Media". Since 2003, I have worked for a group of radio stations based in Fort Wayne, Indiana; creating advertising and marketing programs and campaigns. I have worked for radio stations for 25 years, along with positions outside of the media world. I also do media and marketing consulting for other businesses and media.

4th. So how do you measure success?

For each of us success has its own personal definition. My online goals have evolved over the years without a grand master plan. The platforms have changed since the days I began developing an online presence and personal brand.

I define my success in how much I can help others and build relationships. That has been my passion before Social Media, and Social Media is simply another arena, another set of tools to accomplish this.

As I mentioned, my background is in advertising and marketing. There are timeless principles to communication that are basic to how we as people build relationships that should be used and those are my guide.

And if you want some numbers, here's some that were current as of 11am on Sunday 1/2/11:

Number of Facebook Friends: 611
Number of LinkedIn 1st person contacts: 573
Number of Twitter Followers: 1302
Number of Blog Pageviews: 9987 in the past month.


5th. I thought Social Media was about making money?

Well, my friend, there are plenty of people who will try and sell you on using Social Media as a way to wealth. But the number of people who become financially independent is similar to the number of people who play basketball who become Michael Jordon.

If your main goal and focus on using Social Media is to become wealthy, then this blog is not for you.

6th. So why get involved with Social Media?

Social Media, is another tool to communicate, build and maintain relationships. You can find others with similar interests, you can connect with friends and family, you can promote your business, you can use the internet as a two way communication device.

If you have a business, then there are consumers and customers who are already looking for a business like yours, and by using Social Media, you can connect with them and convert them into paying customers.

And finally, your business is already being talked about on Social Media by others. Perhaps it is time to join the conversation.

7th. What is this blog, ScLoHo's Social Media Adventure, going to be about?

My adventure began in 2004, so I have some catching up to do:

1. I will bring you up to speed on what I have done, right and wrong, to achieve what I am doing now.
2. I will give my opinion which is based on my own experiences and the data and studies I see on a regular basis.
3. I will update daily at 12 noon Eastern time, Monday thru Friday.
   
4. I will share with you lots of wisdom from others, including those who do this as a full time profession.
5. I will tell you how I use Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, SlideShare and a few other sites.
6. I will show you how I post between 40 and 50 blog posts a week, on a part-time basis, and why you don't have to unless you really want to.
7. I encourage and welcome your comments and feedback.