Accept Every LinkedIn Connection Request – Here's What You Lose if You Don’t
William Arruda
Motivational Speaker and Virtual Keynote Speaker, Bestselling Author, Personal Branding Pioneer, CEO (Chief Encouragement Officer) at Reach. Cofounder of CareerBlast.TV, Helping professionals succeed by being themselves.
I’m LinkedIn’s biggest fan. I think it is the single best personal branding tool there is, and their most recent feature updates have made it your most powerful asset for advancing your career. Despite my love for LinkedIn, I don’t always agree with their suggestions. When it comes to Connection requests, LinkedIn advises that you only connect with people you know well. I recommend you accept virtually any connection request you receive.
Of course, if a connection request smells like spam, it probably is. Email has become a more challenging vehicle for spammers to use to reach their audience, so they are using tools like LinkedIn in hopes of pulling off their scams. Typically, these types of connection requests are easy to spot. Of course you need to ignore or report these requests. For all others, I suggest you accept the connection. Here’s why:
Be found.
When someone searches your name or skill in a LinkedIn keyword box, the results are displayed according to the level of connection that person has with you. The more connections you have, the greater the chance you will show up higher in the search results. And you want to be found when someone is looking for you, don’t you?
See more.
You can see the full profiles of your first- and second-level connections. The more first-level connections you have, the more full profiles you see. This helps when you are looking to learn about prospects, evaluating business partners, and sourcing staff.
Increase your audience.
The more connections you have, the more potential eyeballs you have on the content you post, whether it’s through status updates or long-form content using the LinkedIn Blog. And all these people who see your content can share it with the members of their network – raising your visibility exponentially.
Get to the Magic 500+
Thanks to a weird psychological phenomenon, we think people with 500+ in their profile are a lot more connected than those with 499. The magic 500 is a key number to strive for, and it is a lot harder to get there if you only accept requests from people you know well.
It’s low risk.
I have a few corporate clients whose stress level soars when I give them my “be promiscuous” advice. They have all kinds of reasons this would be a bad idea: What if the person does something bad, then you are associated with them? What if the person annoys you with all kinds of requests to join their group or contribute to their cause? The good news is with a few keystrokes, you can block, report and/or remove a connection. And no, the person you are dissing does not get an email notification that you just removed them!
All of us need to decide for ourselves where we are on the openness scale when it comes to LinkedIn connections. You can be completely open (like LinkedIn LIONS – LinkedIn Open Networkers) or completely closed – only letting in those people you know well. Just know what you’re missing out on if you go with the more conservative approach.
Happy connecting!
Expert in MSME, Arbitration, Civil,Property, Intellectual Property, Commercial Law, Drafting and Conveyancing of Legal Documents.
9 年I completely agree with the author. If any individual having reservations about not accepting any connection requests it is their personal prerogative. But we come to Linkedin to build network, do business, find better jobs, it is purely a professional networking site, unlike Facebook, where you post your personal info. Who knows the unknown request for connect can be your biggest client in future, he may be looking for suppliers, consultants or something to meet his needs. Ofcourse author has given a solution from trouble making networkers and how to overcome in such situations.
Paralegal | Former Broadcaster and Pilot | Lifelong Learner
9 年I absolutely, positively, do not agree with the author that blindly accepting connection requests from unfamiliar people is low risk. To the contrary, there are too many dodgy people who try to connect with others for selfish, ego-gratifying or nefarious reasons. I want to know why requestor wants to connect. If requestor sends me a generic invite and s/he is not familiar to me, I almost always respond with a message asking requestor's interest in connecting. If requestor does not respond within a reasonable period of time, I refuse the request. I do not care to be another profile on a mailing list for someone I will never hear from again or to facilitate someone who is stockpiling connections. I refuse invitations outright from anyone whose profile appears to be the least bit suspicious. By the same token, when I send connection requests I do NOT use LinkedIn's generic verbiage. I explain why I want to connect. I'll reintroduce myself if the person and I have not been in contact for a long time and/or explain our acquaintanceship. Unlike many LinkedIn members, including the author, perhaps, I don't need to prove myself or gratify myself with a vast "network" of people I will never meet personally and never communicate with again. This is not FB, where users "friend" legions of strangers. Any LinkedIn non-connection who wants to communicate with me need only send a private message.
The LinkedIn Mindset guy. "Cambio la testa" alle aziende sul reale potenziale di LinkedIn | Brand Reputation & Advocacy x Top Brand
9 年Why just accept the contact when you can "reply, don't accept" and engage the contact in a meaningful conversation? it's good to have more audience, but do you get more clients/job/opportunities? Not everyone can scale on quantity. (Plus follow button without being connected is a thing, and 3rd degree visibility for free profiles is on the way).
Founder @ Vurbalize | AI Advisor to CMOs & CROs | ex-Alexa AI, ex-World Bank | Wharton
9 年How does this change your perception within your strong network when they approach you to get background information on someone in your network that you don't know? I think there is a difference between "contacts" and meaningful "connections". Given there is no way to delineate the two, at least I tend to focus on quality vs. quantity....