This is real, and not much of a surprise considering Steven Burda is one of the most connected people on LinkedIn. I think this qualifies as the coolest LinkedIn Profile of 2008:
No, this isn’t the much-anticipated post announcing a link between LinkedIn and Twitter (like there is on Facebook), but I do want to talk briefly about Twitter. I’m assuming that you (readers of this blog) are interested in social networking, marketing, etc. for business, personal or job search reasons.
Actually, I won’t do much talking at all… I do want to point you to an excellent, awesome article on Twitter written by a JibberJobber partner, Deb Dib. Deb Dib is a well-respected executive coach, helping high-level execs who are in career transition (yes, they are all over the place, and Deb gets to peak inside their brains, see what makes them tick, and even help them adjust to be better - what a very cool opportunity!), and pontificating about various tools, tactics and techniques in executive job search and career management.
Okay, here’s my first problem with the LinkedIn book and the two editions:
I *just* bought your book (”I’m On Linked In, Now What?“) from Amazon and received it a few days ago. However, I found out that there is a 2nd edition, but Amazon sent me the 1st edition.
Darnit!
My publisher responds:
I’m wondering if he purchased a “used” copy or a “new” copy offered by an Amazon reseller. Only new copies purchased directly from Amazon, vs. an Amazon reseller selling a “used” or “new” version, will be the proper second edition. Unfortunately, Amazon makes purchasing “new” and “used” copies from Amazon resellers seemless and transparent from their inventory.
Darnit! If this happens to you not sure what you choose to do, but remember, if you get the first edition of the LinkedIn book you can simply contact me to get the second edition in ebook.
There is a really, really interesting story from Gayle Howard, a resume writer in Australia, about a client of hers who had very different results with his LinkedIn status.
Here’s the story - you gotta read it, although I’ll paraphrase what happened.
Her client put the status on LinkedIn to something like “I’m a consultant.” He started to get some congratulatory emails since he had just transitioned out of his last role as a CIO.
This was frustrating because the message he was sending was “I’ve landed!” and his network stopped thinking about him as someone who they could help land.
Oops.
So, they changed the status (click here to see what they changed it to) and within hours he got another email from a colleague who was interested in talking with him about a job opportunity.
It’s probably too early to know if he landed or not, but this is a terrific example of how powerful just a few words can be on your LinkedIn Profile.
Are YOU sending the right message to your contacts?
Paul B. Allen (aka, Paul Allen the lesser (since the other Paul Allen is a Microsoft founder and multi-gabazillionaire)) is well-known in the Utah startup space. He has a very thoughtful blog… I found this awesome blog post about how he is using LinkedIn:
The Speed of Trust is a book written by Steven Covey’s son… and Paul calls LinkedIn “… without a doubt the most powerful “Speed of Trust” tool ever invented in the history of the world,” and goes on to say “I think modern entrepreneurs and business people who learn how to fully utilize its capabilities and help others in their network to benefit from it in appropriate ways, will find like I have that it it creates a wrinkle in time where all of a sudden you find yourself through some kind of invisible transference of good-will doing business with people you’ve never met before but that you feel that you have, because you’re friends of the same friend.”
Yeah, that’s all one sentence :p Bloggers do that (and we make up our own words, too).
Is LinkedIn useful? Take it from Paul - this is a powerful testimonial on how useful it can be (there are a number of tactics hidden in his post - which are you incorporating?).
I’ve gotten to know Sophie Lagacé over the last year or so and have always appreciated her value-add comments on my blog - she’s a good thinker, and freely shares her knowledge. My kind of person
Here’s something I discovered on LinkedIn Group Discussions… when you leave a discussion comment, you can put your URL in and have it converted to a hyperlink. So, if you put your email signature in, like this:
Jason Alba
CEO - http://www.JibberJobber.com
then it will make that a clickable link. This is one of those “little huge” things, as just having the link to click might get a few more people over to your website to learn about what you do.
I don’t think it works if you leave the http:// out… I haven’t tried that yet. Check out a discussion response I submitted this morning… notice the hyperlinks:
Last week I heard that Amazon is now shipping the second edition of my LinkedIn book, I’m on LinkedIn Now What???, and just barely noticed (at 6:04am MST this morning) that the image on the LinkedIn book page now has the “second edition” image… HOW COOL)! Happy About has been shipping the second edition a little before that… that’s always the best place to purchase from unless you get some extra-cool Amazon perks (free shipping, etc.).
Going through this second edition process was enough for me to think:
Oh my gosh! I have to do this every year??? That’s a lot of work (but I don’t like the idea of my work being outdated, so I know I will), and
If I ever write another book again, I’d like to write about something I can update once every three years… at the most
That’s okay though… it was a great experience and I do look forward to writing the third edition to see how far they progress between now and then.
Here’s something very, very cool: If you purchased the first edition of my LinkedIn book, whether it was paperback or ebook, you can get the second edition ebook for free. Complementary. On us. Here’s how it works:
If you purchased from Happy About, you should have (or will) get the ebook automatically (when you purchase from them you should have put your email address in the order form (I think)).
If you purchased from Amazon, simply let us know (use the JibberJobber Contact Us form) and we’ll get you a link where you can fill out a small, quick form on Happy About’s site and then get the ebook.
We expect to send out thousands of ebooks under this program, so please be patient (I don’t think they have ever done this before, and we’ll be taxing their internal systems :p). How many authors and publishers would offer something like this? I don’t know, but I thought it was pretty cool!
Enjoy the second edition of this LinkedIn book, and if you have a few minutes leave a review on Amazon.com
