An introduction to LinkedIn

It's not just the Social Networking Sites such as Facebook, MySpace, Orkut making waves across the globe and among various demographics, it's also the PNS or the Professional Networking Site - LinkedIn. Launched in 2003, LinkedIn is a business-oriented platform that helps individuals and organizations network with people across the globe.

Its growth has been amazing with more than 70 million registered users, spanning more than 200 countries and territories worldwide as of June 2010. The features of LinkedIn give you plenty of opportunities to expand and grow your network. LinkedIn helps businesses and organizations acquire new customers, buy & sell various products, recruit suitable hires, and make you sell yourself and your company for better prospects.

The advantages of LinkedIn cannot be ignored... One can know and learn more about one's own organization and other organizations receive updates on company information, get news and announcements and many more. Adding connections not only expands your network but makes your profile credible. Following people and companies is another way to keep-up-to-date with the discussions and news around.

Joining various groups depending on your industry and area of interest is a great way to share knowledge. Participating in polls, discussions, answering and posting questions make you gain visibility and more importantly gives you a whole lot of information needed to make your job easy.

Various applications like incorporating the Twitter account to LinkedIn, adding in SlideShare, polls, blogs etc makes your profile look interesting. If you do not have a LinkedIn profile yet, do create one right away and get the most of it!

Importance of Social Media Marketing

Many people want to promote their business via social media? Why? It has various benefits to begin with. Thanks to the number of channels, social media helps reach out to lot of people at once, leads to better search engine rankings, everybody can use social media...there are no barriers, helps one get closer to customers and respond to their needs, increases brand awareness, influences brand reputation, generates leads, and increases sales online among others. Here's a look at some of the social media tools:

Blogs provide an excellent platform to voice one's thoughts and opinions on everything under the sun. Great that people can now listen to what you say, counter it and also give feedback and suggestions. Many bloggers today post just a blog post or two and then promote it actively on other social media channels. Posting a link of your blog post on Twitter and Facebook lets many people read it who otherwise wouldn't have. This is because, most of us like to spend time on Facebook rather than look for content elsewhere. It also helps to get the much needed traffic for your blog.

Social media helps your content to be published in various channels. Bookmarking content, videos, and images on Stumbleupon, Digg, Delicious, and Diigo gets you the desired traffic. The more people bookmark the particular link, the more it is read and trusted. Having a presence in social networking sites such as Facebook help to engage with customers directly (which can be debated) - Giving announcements of product offerings, upcoming deals, and having a fan base that signifies the strength and value of the brand. Microblogging sites such as Twitter lets one 'tweet' their thoughts in 140 characters or less. It lets one articulate content in fewer words thus reaching the goal of people reading or viewing your tweet.

Video and photo sharing sites such as Youtube, Flickr, Photbucket are an audio-visual medium, making the content more interesting and enjoyable. But it is more of a one-way conversation. This depends on the strength of the video or image. For instance, a Michael Jackson video has great chances of having comments that lead to a conversation. Professional networking sites such as LinkedIn help to reach a network of professionals in your domain leading to valuable discussions and exchange of information. Also your queries are answered with genuine people from the field, leading to knowledge sharing.

There are many more like forums, QnA sites, document sharing sites etc. In short, social media marketing is the new age marketing. It helps small businesses see the light of the day and lets the already established ones have a stronger foothold. It's not as easy as it sounds. It is a gradual process and needs expertise and patience if you want to see the fruits of your results.