Jordi GiliToday LinkedIn has already changed the way organizations Recruit, Market, Sell and Learn:
1. Recruit. LinkedIn is a must have tool for Recruiters and Talent Specialists today. Organizations that are not looking for active talent (with Job Ads) or passive talent (with Recruiter) on LinkedIn are clearly behind the curve and loosing competitive advantage – nothing new here.
2. Market. We have access now to a variety of solutions to establish a brand (Company Pages …) and generate awareness and leads (Ads, Sponsored Updates, InMails …), especially in Business to Business sectors.
3. Sell. The company has already disrupted the prospecting and lead generation space with its the new Sales Navigator. It will quickly become a must have for business development and key account management professionals. Organizations using it are today ahead of the curve.
4. Learn. Pulse and the most recent acquisition of Lynda.com is a strong declaration of intentions. LinkedIn wants to become the go-to place for Business Information and Training.
So … what’s next? What can we expect from LinkedIn in the coming years? How will they help us be more productive? – This is just an exercise and not based on any company information or guidance-.
1. Manage Relationships. Definitely Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is a space that LinkedIn must have an eye on. We are already experiencing a reduced version of a CRM on the Connections section. The opportunity for the company here is to bet on a full CRM and wipe out the competition, since they are already the leaders in the “Social” part of the CRM. Acquisitions? Own developments? We’ll see how, but it will happen.
2. Productivity. The opportunity for a Corporate Social Network (CSN) is just enormous. I call it “LinkedIn at work” as it would compete with the soon-to-be-ready “Facebook at work” and this move should be anticipated by current actors. The show-stopper for CSN is usually adoption. Well, employees are already on LinkedIn … what else can be said to see the opportunity for LinkedIn. The question is when they will announce it.
3. Performance. We are starting to see LinkedIn ranking individuals at work. The first employee performance indicators are here. For instance, the Social Selling Index (SSI) is a number between 1 and 100 that ranks a Business Development professional’s performance on Linkedin. The number is a result of an algorithm applied to facts: number of connections, activity, shares, likes, messages sent … and the higher the number, the better the performance and the better the professional since studies show that it is correlated with sales results. Now let’s jump ahead a few years and picture a job interview and the recruiter asking: What’s your SSI? … It is happening now. More indicators to come …
What is your opinion? Do you see it coming too? or would you disagree?
Thank you for reading!
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