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Recently LinkedIn made significant changes to the look and feel of the account settings that are available to you, the user. The result is a much easier way to customize your LinkedIn experience. I recommend you spend some time reviewing these to make sure that the default settings match your approach and strategy.
You can access your account settings by going to the top of the toolbar where your name appears, placing your cursor over your name, and selecting “Settings.”
Today’s help is not going to be a complete review of all the settings available. That would take too much time and be awfully boring to boot. But instead I am going to address what I think are the most important settings. This short list is based not only on my experience but the most popular questions I get at my classes and through my emails each week.
The Strategy Behind The Five Most Critical LinkedIn Account Settings
1. The “I don’t want to be bothered with all those group emails” setting
Yes, you have full control over which groups you receive email notifications from and the frequency with which you receive them. My recommendation is to turn off the notifications for the groups that are not of highest importance to you. The question you should ask yourself is: If I miss something from this group, would I be mad? I would suggest keeping track of a handful of groups, and then turn the others off.
How: (Settings/Email Preferences/Set the frequency of group digest emails)
2. The “This guy is driving me nuts with his silly Status Updates” setting
We all have some people in our network who are essentially using their Status Updates like a Twitter account or they don’t understand that on LinkedIn we don’t want to be sold to on a daily basis. This setting allows you to say “bye-bye” to their Status Updates.
How: (When you view one of their Status Updates on your home page, move the cursor to the top right of the update, where the word “Hide” will appear. Just click this.)
3. The “I don’t want to tell my network every time I change my profile this weekend” setting
This is especially helpful if you are working on your profile in a condensed period of time and don’t want to report every change immediately. Be sure to turn this back on when you have completed your final change. Having your network see your profile changes is a good thing. So be sure you leave this on as your default setting.
4. The “I don’t want people to see my connections” setting
The default on LinkedIn is that your first-degree connections can see who your other first-degree connections are.
That being said, I do understand certain people and professions may not want this list to be viewable by others. So in those cases I am thankful this control exists. I know plenty of people who would not play the LinkedIn game at all if this control did not exist.
Many people would like this setting to be person by person and not all or nothing. I am sorry to say that option is not yet available on LinkedIn.
How: (Settings/Profile/Select who can see your connections)
5. The “How do other people get their picture, name, and company name on Who’s Viewed Your Profile” setting
The default is that you won’t see this detail, but I would think most of us who are into growing our brands in the marketplace would want this detailed information to show up when we appear on the Who’s Viewed Your Profile list.
How: (Settings/Profile/Select what others see when you’ve viewed their profile)
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The Five Most Critical LinkedIn Account Settings
April 17, 2011
Allowing your friends to know who your other friends are has always been an important step in the networking process. It is especially cool how LinkedIn has taken that to a new level.Categories: Uncategorized
I thought this was pretty informative–I do have to say I feel bombarded somedays with group e-mails and I will have to look at the first step mentioned.
Got your name from the Spring issue of Marquette (I am Dent ’60). I think I am going to learn a lot from you and fully intend to buy your book after I finish one or two in line ahead of you.
Thanks for the tips.
Great list – you hit a lot of the biggies (although you are missing the “how” on #3). Two of my other favorites are:
1) “Customize your public profile URL” so you can have http://www.linkedin.com/in/yourname instead of a line of gobbledygook, and
2) “Edit Websites” – if you set the category to “Other” you can put a custom name instead of just “Company website” or whatever.
My feeling is that your setting’s
recommendations are at least partially
in conflict with the true nature of
LinkedIn — which is really a marketing
channel disguised as a networking site.
If you are limiting viewership of your
connections in any way then you aren’t
providing value to your network or those
that might join.
The most important settings on LinkedIn
are those that make you the most accessible
and visible to others.
And though it may be a nice courtesy to
turn off your updates while re doing your
profile — I don’t see it as critical and
especially if you’re doing it on the
weekend when activity is significantly
reduced.
I admit that even just the weekly
notifications from the groups can be a bit
of a distraction, but there is a very
important reason NOT to turn them off.
By going through the exercise of doing
so you can see some of the discussions
being posted and you will likely find
some that you should respond to that you
wouldn’t have seen in the normal course
of things.
Again this is something that increases
your visibility to others and in a
marketing channel that is KEY!
You may exclude recruiters from most of
my comments as that have no interest in
networking for the most part and they
don’t want their competitors trolling
there connections.