This is a guest post by Susan Johnston.
Most freelance writers spend countless hours on Facebook and Twitter. But if you want to connect with decision-makers and build your professional network, then LinkedIn is where it’s at. With over 100 million users in over 200 countries, the networking site offers lots of useful features for freelances. Here are five that you may not know about.
1. Follow the News
With news aggregators, blogs, Twitter, Facebook, and Google +, there are lots of ways to current on the topics you cover, but it’s tough to sift through it all and decide what’s important. LinkedIn Today does the work for you. You can choose which topics or news sources you’d like to follow, and it shows you what articles have been shared most often on LinkedIn. No time to skim the headlines on your computer or smartphone? Listen to headlines on the go with SpeechIn.
2. See Who’s Viewed You
Depending on your privacy settings and the settings of the person who’s viewed your profile, you can sometimes see who’s viewed your profile. I know writers who send InMail (using LinkedIn’s own messaging system) introducing themselves to people who’ve viewed their profile and might be in the market for a freelance writer. It’s so unexpected that it sometimes works! Basic accounts get a small number of InMails but if you send an InMail and the person doesn’t respond within seven days, you get an InMail credit so you can contact someone else.
3. Organize Your Connections
Profile Organizer is only available to LinkedIn Pro account-holders, but there are a few workarounds for organizing your contacts with a free account. LinkedIn’s Profile Organizer lets you set up folders for different types of contacts (ala Google +). For instance, you could create folders for current clients, editors you’d like to work with, or possible interview sources. If you don’t have a paid account, you could save people’s profiles using an external bookmarking tool like Google Bookmarks or diigo.
4. Follow Companies
Now that LinkedIn has a “follow companies” feature, you can follow companies in the industries you cover or that you’d like work with. For instance, if you cover ecommerce and notice that Amazon has just hired a slew of new developers, that could tip you off that they’re planning an expansion or new features that may not have been officially announced yet. Or if you follow companies you’re hoping to write for (say, a hospital or a university) and you notice they’ve hired a new director of communications, you could drop the new person a note congratulating them on their new job and introducing yourself in case they need a copywriter.
5. Show Off Your Work
If you write graphics-heavy pieces like infographics or online slide shows, Behance’s Creative Portfolio Display could help you display your work. It’s one of several applications to jazz up your profile. You can also share what books you’re reading on Amazon, post SlideS
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