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I get lots of people saying they don’t know how to use LinkedIn but know I’m a member so they ask to connect with me, or agree to join but don’t know how to proceed. I wrote the message below and sent it by email to many to help them on their way, but thought I should really share it here for all.

Granted, LinkedIn has changed how the home page looks now but the components are still the same, so the information below should help you move in the right direction and get some value out of your membership.

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There are many components to LinkedIn and I’m not going to try and cover it all in one email but just want to give you an outline this time round.

When you log into LinkedIn you will see the above on your login page.

First of all Account & Settings is where you can set various items for your account - if you use more than one email address during your workday, then I suggest you list all your email addresses so that if someone sends you an invite via any of them, you will receive it into this account and not accidentally set up a second account - something I see a number of people doing and having challenges with.

There are 4 areas here you will probably use more than the others and they are:

1. Home (to view your updates and inbox and total number of connections),
2. My Profile (which you should get set up as soon as possible if you haven’t already),
3. My Contacts (where you will see an alphabetical list of all your first level contacts)
4. and the one that I’ve found most beneficial for networking - Answers.

Answers is worth checking out. You can read through Questions that people have placed and read the answers of others. Here you get to learn who has experience and knowledge in various areas and go and view their profiles. As you do so you’ll probably get more ideas for adding to your profile. If you know the answer to a question asked, don’t be shy - go ahead and give an answer. If your answer is listed as ‘good’ or ‘best’ you will start to see that in your Answers stats (My Q&A). Once you’ve gotten a ‘best’ answer you will then go on the Experts list - these are also worth checking out.

You are allowed to ask 10 questions a month and can ask questions about almost anything. But do have a look at the others first because sometimes the same questions are asked over and over again, mainly about how LinkedIn works. But that is only one category and there are many others relating to all sorts of things such as Technology, Staffing, Administration and so on.

Do be careful not to place something in Answers that comes across as blatant advertising. I did post something that was intended to be informative and to give others an opportunity in relation to a competition and it was flagged as an advertisement and closed. I wasn’t aware of this till I was checking my stats and wondered what had happened to that question. So I’m learning to be careful how I word things so that I’m not viewed as blatantly advertising something. Too many of these and you get your Q&A privileges suspended by Customer Service.

Be aware too, when you are sending invitations to people to connect with them, it is important you introduce yourself and explain why you want to connect - particularly with people who might not know you very well (but are on your database) or people you’ve seen at LinkedIn and want to get to know better. If they say they don’t know you and you get 5 of these, then your invitations are suspended for a period of time, so it is taken seriously.

Finally, if you want to get true networking value out of LinkedIn, then make sure you join some of the chat forums associated with members there. LinkedIn does not have an actual chat forum, nor the facility for sending emails to members so many members host forums via Yahoogroups and Google groups, amongst other mediums. You can check some of them out at my profile at http://www.linkedin.com/in/kathiethomas or simply shoot me an email and I’ll send you addresses to those I find most particularly beneficial.

Tags: LinkedIn, Productivity Tips by Kathie Thomas
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The ‘paperless’ office is pretty much a joke these days. Email seems to generate much more of it, but even if we don’t print it off, we still have lots to read and catch up on - if we want to keep up to date with the world. The world has grown ’smaller’ but with it the amount of stuff we want to know and read has increased considerably. This leads us to being on lots and lots of lists and it’s easy to lose control of what we’ve subscribed to and where those things are on the web.

I started subscribing to lists back in 1997 or perhaps even earlier, definitely before spam became a problem and so every man and his dog seemed to end up with my address as it got passed or sold from one person to another. Of course spam legislations and other rulings now make that a ‘no no’ but it doesn’t change what has taken place in the past. The end result is that people tend to get an email address that they use for subscriptions only and then change it if the spam gets too much. And that’s where a new challenge comes - to the owners of the lists you want to stay on.

I frequently get emails from people asking me to change their details on my, or my clients’ broadcast lists. Or autoresponders that say ‘Johnnie doesn’t use this address anymore, please update your file to xxxx’. I guess that seems fair enough to the owner of that address but what about the list owner when they get this multiple times? Suddenly they’re faced with having to set aside time to update addresses on their lists.  Not to mention all the old addresses that need culling.

Many lists I belong to (and those I use) allow you to click on a link and update the listing yourself and I encourage you to do so.  Or if you want to get off a list, use the Cancel link rather than emailing the people who own the list to ask them to remove you - much less time and keystrokes involved for all.  And it’s easier.

And if you’re sick of changing addresses constantly, consider using a good spam filter online and then add the addresses of the lists you want to stay on, to the safe list so they can get through.  I use spamarrest and this has worked well for me for several years now.  KMT

Tags: Productivity Tips, Technology by Kathie Thomas
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For many months now I’ve been writing a book. I’ve written other books which are sold as e-books online and are business ‘how to’ books, but this one is different and is being published by a company in W.A.

I began a blog (yes another one - I own several) in January 2006 which has proven very popular and when I mentioned it to my business coach late last year he said I should really do something with it and turn it into a book. I thought about that but didn’t do anything about it, and at the following session I saw my coach I mentioned I’d been booked to speak at a Christian Business Women’s Conference in Brisbane for September 2007. ‘Great!’ he said ‘you can launch your book there!’

Up till that point it was just an idea but suddenly it began to take hold and thereafter at each session he would ask me how many words I’d written? I took the idea of the blog and the content and built on it, and wove my story into it, and now it’s soon to be a full-sized paperback - probably to be listed in the ’self-help’ or ‘Christian living’ genres.

If you don’t have a business coach it is worth exploring.  I provide VA services to a few coaches and decided I need to get a coach I didn’t do work for - for a couple of reasons.  I didn’t want to have to choose one from the other, but also I felt they would already have a perception of who I am and what I do (based on what I do for them) and I wanted to have someone work with me from a separate viewpoint.  And then I went to a networking meeting about a year ago and saw a man from my church who is a business coach. We began talking and things just clicked.  Stuart really has been excellent for me.  Whilst my business had been moving forward, he’s had me dreaming, planning and pulling out things I had put aside because I was so busy concentrating on running my business.  Now I’m looking up and ahead again and the book has become one of those things that used to be in the distant future.

Going this road is new, exciting, scary and full-on.  I had to commit myself to write a few thousand words every weekend for months and had it set in my Outlook calendar to nag me into getting the work done. But now it’s done I’m filled with excitement and can’t wait to see the finished product.   Stay tuned!

Tags: Productivity Tips, Blogging by Kathie Thomas
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Ben over at Instigator Blog has instigated an activity that could prove not only catching, but also productive, pardon the puns!

He’s encouraging people to post Productivity Tips on their blogs, basically as a meme and to tag others to follow suit. He’s even got a banner image to go with the theme. I’ve included it here and am tagging the following people to join in!

Lorraine Pirihi, Sharon Williams, Darren Rowse

For me, I have a post on Google Alert which is one of my favourite tips and I’ve gone back through previous posts to tag them accordingly. KMT

productivity tip, ultimate guide to productivity, instigator blog, Kathie Thomas

Tags: Productivity Tips by Kathie Thomas
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I received an email with the title ‘Question About Your Service’ and then the lady proceeded to tell me all about her services and how she would like me to meet one of her team to discuss my interest in their services. All seemed above board but when I got to the bottom of the email she signed off with her name and a hotmail address.

I emailed her back with the following:

Is there a reason why you’re using a hotmail address and not a domain address? Your signature block does not have a phone number, website or anything at all that makes me think you are a genuine business.

Sorry but that’s how it seems - too many scammers and spammers around these days.

With respect to the list below, you haven’t even indicated what country you are in so even if I were interested in any of these chances are I’m not even in the same country as you.

Seriously, I would think if she’s going to offer savings for healthcare and worker’s compensation, shipping rates, office equipment and travel expenses, etc that she would at least have a business name, domain name for a website (or at least for her email) and some other form of contact information such as a phone number, fax number, etc. What do you think? KMT

The email above was received over a week ago - to date she’s not answered my query.

professionalism, email etiquette, global business, business, advertising

Tags: Productivity Tips, Business Operations by Kathie Thomas
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