Linked IN

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DennisB

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(Once again, I'm not sure where this should go, but I'm confident a moderator will put it in its place.)

Anybody on Linked-In? If you're not, that's a business-related SN site that allows professionals or wannabes to trade info and solicit deals. It runs a gamut, from teachers to engineers to writers & editors.

They also have discussions. Which they keep closely monitored for any seditious posts. Right now, they're promoting self-publishing. Which means posts that actually point out the reality of self-pub get sidelined--held up in "review."

So, I'm thankful for AW. For the most part, it's a free-for-all.
 

Xelebes

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I'm on Linked-in. I mostly use it for the accounting and finance groups. Don't know what the writer groups are like.
 

Torgo

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I'm on LinkedIN. No idea why. I use it for nothing and people who contact me through it are invariably crashing bores.
 

Rachel77

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I'm on it, though I don't use it for much. I did get contacted by a long-lost relative who'd found me through LinkedIn, and I can see the "open positions you might be interested in" part being useful at some point in the future. But at the moment I just accept "join my network" requests when it makes sense to do so, and that's about it.
 

Deleted member 42

I'm on LinkedIN. No idea why. I use it for nothing and people who contact me through it are invariably crashing bores.

It begin primarily as a way for geeks trying to hire other geeks.

It used to be pretty useful; not so much now. The blogs for instance are obnoxious chit-chat for the most part.
 

Deepthought

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I go on it, but only because I needed a web designer for my start up idea. I haven't gotten one. Not from there. But if I win the innovation challenge at school, I can just hire someone from the prize money.
 

direndria2

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I never even thought about signing my wife up for LinkedIN... what a great idea. I know it was more useful before, but it can't hurt being set up with a profile, right?
 

Jess Haines

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I signed up just so I could turn off all the notifications. Despite unsubscribing, they kept sending me emails. Hate it. Spammy, annoying, not useful to me.
 

frimble3

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I never joined LinkedIn, have no interest in LinkedIn, I think I may have gone there once looking for someone, a year ago, but recently I seem to have been 'found', and for a while I was getting 4-5 pieces of spam from Linkedin members daily. None of the usual 'click here to unsubscribe', and I'm certainly not going there. So I've been reporting it all as 'phishing' and hoping that that does something bad to them.
Any of them, all of them. I wouldn't go there looking for 'professionals' unless I wanted a spammer for some reason.
 

Debbie V

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I participate in two discussion groups - SCBWI and Children's Writers. The children's writers group is now moderated by Harold Underdown. He is one of the most knowledgable people in the industry. We've had some very interesting discussions including why it is so hard to find someone who will publish a book of children's poetry and the greater difficulty of writing publishable verse for children than adults.
The moderators do their best to keep the spammers out. The newbie questions are about the same as you find in children's here.
 

WriterBN

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I find LinkedIn fairly useful for professional networking. I used to be more active in groups, but most of them these days, especially writing ones, are overrun with soft spam.
 

Brn2bwild

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I joined Linked In to try and "sell myself" during law school. Then after it made me connect with dozens of people I did not want to connect with, I tried to cancel it. It would not let me cancel. To this day, I have a Linked In account, albeit a shadow of itself. I don't want people knowing every little thing that I'm doing.
 

desinty

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I have a linked in....I hate it. I don't see how useful it can be. It tells you not to add people you don't know....well, if I only add people I know, they would already be sending jobs my way. It would be more useful if I could link up with editors and agents that might be interested in what I have to offer. Not my current friends or someone I knew from my undergrad years. I don't believe I ever cancelled it, but it's definitely not actively used.
 

Melina

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You've got to look at your LinkedIn profile as Inbound marketing...fill out your profile completely, post your best clips.

There are editors and marketing directors who reach out to writers on LinkedIn when they're looking for a freelancer--having a killer profile will be what makes them contact you over someone else.

I've been contacted twice by editors on LinkedIn, and I've only had my profile up for 6 months. I have other freelance writing friends who have been contacted by Fortune 500 companies who needed freelance business writing work done.
 

roundtable

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One thing to be careful of on LinkedIn are the people who go through your list of clients and then try to take those clients away. I don't know how often it happens, but it happens.

I had a lot of people asking to connect and, at the time, felt making connections was a good way to get my name out there. Then one of my regular clients emailed me one day and asked if I'd recommended a woman contacting him. A second client called me up a few hours later asking the same thing. This woman went through all my current employers, contacted them all saying she was willing to beat my rates if they gave her a week's trial. Thankfully, these clients had no interest in hiring anyone else.

But, it's made me very leery of connecting with anyone I don't really know now.
 
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desinty

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There are editors and marketing directors who reach out to writers on LinkedIn when they're looking for a freelancer--having a killer profile will be what makes them contact you over someone else.

Okay. That sounds good. How do they "contact" you though? Do they connect with you by adding you? I guess that's where I'm confused. If I am not connected to any editors, how would they find me?

Thanks for sharing your wisdom!
 

robjvargas

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Okay. That sounds good. How do they "contact" you though? Do they connect with you by adding you? I guess that's where I'm confused. If I am not connected to any editors, how would they find me?

Thanks for sharing your wisdom!

LinkedIN has a skills section to your profile. So you could add your area of expertise, copyediting, proofreading, and so on. Then editors (or anyone there seeking a writer) would search for those skill sets.

In my field, Information Technology and Security, endorsements from others have value. Having a lot of endorsements helps solidify the claims I have about my skills. I can't speak to other fields.
 

Debbie V

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It is possible to contact people you aren't connected with you if you have a group in common. Also, those who pay can use Inmail to contact folks. I'm not sure what the parameters are for that.
 
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