Another tool every business professional should definitely be using is LinkedIn. I’m know I’m stating the obvious since LinkedIn has already been included amongst the ranks of high profile social media platform such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube but more recently I’ve been taking advantage of LinkedIn as a social network.
It can really be quite interesting to follow people’s career path who either you’ve worked with or are friends with. 
This also helps nicely with reconnecting with others who you may never know can help you out with a future business endeavor.
What’s also great is that LinkedIn has been adopting more social platform qualities that haven’t been present in the past. Previously, LinkedIn was mainly an awesome resume platform, used mainly to showcase your experiences and skill sets. Now one can see more social media qualities developing to include the following:
- Network Activity: Basically think of this a Facebook newsfeed where you can see which of your connections has updated what. Of course, there are the well-known features such as “Like,” “Comment,” “Send a Message” and “Share.”
- Groups: LinkedIn has recently also created “Open Groups” so you don’t necessarily have to be a member of a group in order to comment and access information of a group. However, this is at the discretion of the Group Moderator to make their group an “Open Group.” I have joined “Marketing Future” which is a great group to look into for anyone in the Marketing or Advertising industries.
- Share Button: LinkedIn has finally developed its own Share Button you can place on your website, blog, what have you. It’s the same as the Twitter or Facebook button and pretty straight forward to include. Here is the link to their Publishers Page should you want to add a Share Button.
- Applications: I recently stumbled upon this feature which allows you to add cool apps to your profile such as Google Presentations, Polls, Tweets. I just added an app for my WordPress blog, so connections can see my latest posts whenever they look at my profile. See below:
I think LinkedIn will continue to gain traction as an influential social media platform in the years to come. Since it has such a niche market of business professionals, it has a lot to leverage in this area. Take a look at my public profile if you haven’t done so.
