How Do You Connect With Groups And Potential Clients On LinkedIn?

Richard: Let’s talk about connecting and getting clients through LinkedIn.

Lynda: Sure. There are a couple of things. First of all, as soon as you join or complete your profile, LinkedIn always presents you with people you may know and suggests people for you.

Every day when you go into your profile, LinkedIn is going to suggest, on the right-hand side, a bunch of people you might know. It is pretty easy to just connect with them, if you want to. Of course, you don’t have to connect with anybody.

As soon as you connect with one person they’re going to say “people also viewed,” and they show you a bunch more people this person knows. If someone you want to connect with knows those people, then maybe it is likely you want to know them as well. This is how you start building connections.

They will also ask you if you want to import your whole contact file; like if you use Microsoft for your email. You can import all your contacts if you want. I don’t know if I want to do that because some of them are quite old for me, and I do not necessarily want to connect with them. You can go through your contact list.

Richard: Can you import from Outlook, for instance?

Lynda: Yes. It is very easy to find people.

Another way that is very easy is you go to the top right-hand corner where there is a search box. You can search by people or by groups. If you know some people you want to connect with, even just by name if you do not know them personally, you can search them. If they are on LinkedIn, which they probably are, then you connect with them. Those are some of the basic ways to get started.

Through groups are some of the best ways. I want to talk a little bit about groups now; and how you can work with groups.

Richard: I am part of a few groups. Are they just forums to chat? What is the real point of groups and the best use of them?

Lynda: The use of groups is very powerful. First of all, you can join 50 groups and I recommend that you join 50 groups. These could be a mixture of your target audience. Let’s say you are a business professional. Let’s say you are a lawyer, an attorney. You might be doing business-to-business, like corporate law.

You might find groups of other people who are likely to be your clients in a certain industry, certain demographic, certain location or whatever. You can find groups by location or by industry; all kinds of groups.

Richard: I am not an attorney, but I work with them. Attorneys probably want to network with bail bondsmen, expert witnesses and obviously other attorneys. Those kinds of people may be able to send or refer clients to them.

Lynda: Absolutely. Also for attorneys, almost anyone may need their services. It might be more local because you are not going to go to an attorney across the country. They might want to join groups that are more local. There are local groups on LinkedIn as well.

I just did a search of attorneys. You have probably done this as well. I don’t know if you know there is an international group of attorneys with over 2,000 people. There is a trial lawyer’s network with 4,000 people. Corporate lawyers have 51,000 people on another network. Can you imagine?

Richard: That is a lot.

Lynda: There are 51,735 people on the corporate lawyer’s network. You can just go through that list of members once you join. You can just look for people you think might be interesting to you.

It is not going to be only lawyers on the network. It will be suppliers. It will be anybody who wants to network there. You can find all kinds of people who might be of interest to you. There is even a fun group called “Happy Lawyers.” It is 8,500 people focused on how to make your law work happier and more enjoyable.

Richard: Wow. I thought that group would be empty.

Lynda: No, there are 8,500 people in that group. You want to look for groups that have big numbers; not a group of 45 people. There are not many people to network with there.

Once you join the group, there are two or three things you can do. In the beginning, you can just lurk and find out what is going on. As a lawyer, maybe find a local chamber of commerce group or someone that might use your services.

This is a place where you can really shine. You can start a discussion about something that might be pertinent to the group. You can mention a newspaper article. You can write an article on something that is useful to the group, and then post it. You can answer people’s questions.

Very often, people have all kinds of questions. Suppose you are the expert and you come in and say, “Here is what you need to know about this problem.” Who are they going to turn to? It is a very soft way of making an introduction without sending a letter saying, “I provide this service.”

Richard: That is true. It is a lot softer if someone says, “Help. I need new practice management software for my practice.” You pipe in and say, “I’ve heard ABC Corp. has one. XYZ has another good one;” versus, “Hi. I sell this. Buy it from me.”

Lynda: Exactly. Being part of a group is really wonderful. After you get used to it, an even more brilliant move is to form your own group. You can invite people to the group. You can direct discussions.

That is something you should think about once you feel more comfortable. Don’t do that as the first thing you do. Think about starting your own group. Anybody can start a group. It just takes, literally, five minutes to start a new group.