You need to know these action buttons on profiles and how they work

Note: Please see the "new look" these buttons have in the series of short updates I've been publishing from July 20, 2020. Start on the link below.

Now for the old version, prior to the late 2016 redesign

Read this for basic principles and ignore the outdated graphics.

While surfing through LinkedIn members' profiles on your web browser, did you ever notice that each one contained a Big Blue Button near the top? And did you wonder why the text on the button varies from person to person? Why there is a gray button now and then? And sometimes clickable text? And that there are dropdown menus sometimes under a white arrowhead and other times black?

Let's explore these burning questions and learn how to find our way through the maze of action elements on profiles.

What controls the buttons, their texts, and the dropdown items

The text on the buttons and rows of the dropdown menu, indicating the actions that will happen if you click, will vary depending on ...

• The degree of connection between you and the profile owner you're viewing.
• Whether you have a Basic or a Premium membership, and if Premium, whether you have any InMail credits to spend.
• Whether the person you're viewing has a Basic or Premium membership, and, if Premium, has elected to offer Open Profile messaging.
• Whether there is an invitation pending from one of you to the other.
• Whether the profile owner is somebody really famous.

Example screen clips show variation in text and layout of controls

Notice in these three example clips from profiles how the button texts and the layouts vary, some with an extra button or clickable text.

One typical layout has the blue action button with white text and a dropdown arrowhead in white-on-blue butted up against it such that some people hardly see it.

Another has the blue button plus another gray one with black text, and the dropdown is under a black arrowhead with no border.

Lastly, some well-known people have a blue button, a white dropdown arrow, and a piece of blue action text.

LinkedIn has actions it wants you to take in preference to others

From profile to profile, LinkedIn will "guide" you toward selecting its preferred actions by making the choices more visible. Blue stands out, drawing your attention. So the blue button's text will be Send a Message for your 1st-degree connections, and Connect for your 2nd-degrees and some of your 3rds. As you get into other 3rd-degrees and all of those beyond the 3rd degree, the choices on the blue button become either Send InMail, Send a Free Message or Follow. In some cases, there is a gray button as well as the blue Connect, and it will offer a choice to Send InMail with varied wordings.

Some of this logic aids usability--if you and another person are 1st-degree connections, you most likely would want to Send a message rather than any other action; in fact, Connect is not offered because you already have done that. No point in offering a choice only to raise an "action not available" error if you clicked it!

In other cases, though, you'll see the hand of LinkedIn tilting the scales, hiding the Connect button in favor of offering to send the person a message (which often requires you to pay to get a Premium membership, so they tease you to upgrade).

Dropdown menu items vary according to context

The contents of the dropdown menus are a mix of constant and variable action items. For example, every menu contains View Recent Activity, Share Profile, Save to PDF, and Block or Report.

Other actions which vary from profile to profile include Connect andFollow.

Reserved for 1st-levels only are Recommend, Endorse, and Remove Connection.

If you have invited the other party to connect and are awaiting acceptance, the dropdown menu will include Invitation pending.

[Please note, these are not all of the possible configurations of dropdown menus.]

Policy: Always "upsell" the LinkedIn member

A primary factor in what action LinkedIn offers on the Big Blue Button is what they want you to do, not what you want to do. For example, you might want to connect with an individual, but instead of Connect, you're offered Send [the person] InMail. What if you click Send ... InMail but you don't have a Premium membership or any InMail credits to spend? And the other party does not accept Open Profile messages? That's no problem to LinkedIn--it will gladly accept the click of the button, tell you that messaging is not available, and offer you an upgrade to a paid account level that will let you send messages.

Sometimes you will want to Connect with a person but the action button is not showing on the profile. LinkedIn, in its paternalistic way, makes it difficult to connect with people who do not have 2nd-degree relationships to you. To Connect with a person whose profile does not put that choice on a button, you need to use the dropdown menu to reveal the option. [Please note that inviting from the profile on the browser is the one sure way to get a chance to personalize the invitation, which I highly recommend you do for every invitation.]

As far as I've been able to see, there is a Connect option on every profile that is not already your 1st-level connection. If it's not obvious on a blue button, it might be hiding as in this dropdown menu:

Sometimes actions are conveniently laid out

LinkedIn is not always pandering for you to upgrade your membership. When you and another party are 1st-level connections, you each have the right to send each other unlimited free messages through LinkedIn. Therefore, the blue button reading Send a message and the dropdown actions are totally appropriate to that degree of connection.

Messages are free to send if the other party pays

Turning to members who are not your 1st-degree connections, you'll sometimes see Send a Free Message on either the blue button or an added gray button (where the blue one already reads Connect). This text conveniently indicates that you will not be paying for the message, because the other party has a Premium membership with Open Profile messaging turned on.

However, some cases use ambiguous labeling. The blue or the gray button can read Send [the person] InMail but you won't be sure who pays until you see an edit window with a message below it stating how many InMail credits it will cost you. Compare the two advisories pictured:

Invitations to connect can be accepted from the person's profile

When someone has invited you to connect and you've not yet responded with either Accept or Ignore (on the Pending Invitations page), the blue button's text becomes Accept Invitation and a gray button appears, typically Send [the person] InMail.

A pending invitation will show in the other person's profile

When you have an invitation out to someone to which they've not responded, you might be surprised to see that fact noted in the dropdown menu on the person's profile.

This is the only row label that I can recall seeing in a dropdown menu where clicking it does nothing!

Famous people get special treatment

Some profiles belonging to highly connected people, for example the CEO of LinkedIn or the US President, have special features that shield them from the "easy" connection requests. Their blue buttons read Follow, and extra text hints that only if you know the person should you click Connect, which is in smaller blue text on a buttonless background.

President Obama's Connect logic requires you to give his email address.

Jeff Weiner's Connect logic presents the standard panel where you indicate how you know him.

Interestingly, Jeff Weiner's dropdown menu offers a choice to Send Jeff a Message or Send a Free Message (depending on whether the sender's account is non-Premium or Premium). So it would seem that Jeff Weiner has Open Profile messaging "on" whereas the President does not. (I wonder who answers all his InMail?) Kind of neat to see that Jeff Weiner's followers outnumber the President's by about 38 to 1!

Takeaways and call to action

I hope you've enjoyed a little exploration of the various actions you can take by clicking a control at the top of someone's profile in the web browser. Please explore on your own and become more aware of the way those controls work.

I've published a modest number of "techie" pieces about LinkedIn; their catalog is here at https://www.dhirubhai.net/today/author/sidclark .

If you could, please like, comment on, or share this article or any in my catalog. Do keep in mind that the "new" (late 2016) version of the browser interface hasn't hit me yet, so this article may have a short shelf life. As well, there may be parts of my previous articles that are already overtaken by changes in the user interface; please let me know if you find anything grossly wrong--and it's LinkedIn's fault since they change things all the time with no announcement!