Gill South: Linking up online - now it's about business, not just pleasure

Social networking sites such as LinkedIn offer a way to build professional relationships and boost your brand.

When you returned to your desk in the New Year, your email probably included a few invitations to accept new "connections" to the business social networking site, LinkedIn.

So far, LinkedIn may be something you have done the bare minimum with. Your name and photo is up there, a few career details, but that's it. As for Twitter, you are yet to get to that. Facebook, you worry, is a bit personal, while TweetDeck or Twickertape are things you've probably never heard of.

Well, the chances are you will this year. And now is a good time to get a better handle on these forms of social networking which, if managed right, should bring you and your company interesting opportunities.

Be reassured it is still the Wild West - no one's perfected it. Richard Westney, senior resources manager at KPMG, who has his own Twitter account and is on LinkedIn, says: "I'm not sure business owners have got to grips with social media as yet. My impression is that it is largely down to a few savvy people in each organisation who are aware of it and starting to drive this. Most senior management teams don't have a clue.

"From my perspective, I would say 12-18 months ago we would have been putting a business case together, saying why we need to do it. Now the case is all about how we can't afford to not be doing it."

While Westney admits he does not have all the answers, "we are intending to have a big social media presence in 2010. We really do see these tools as the way of the future and the best way of getting our name and brand out there".

Fiona Michel, executive general manager of human resources at insurance group IAG, has returned to work this year determined to get a better handle on LinkedIn. She has worked on her profile and sent out invitations to connections over New Year's.

"LinkedIn is something that I think has a much stronger level of credibility than earlier," says Michel.

With 2000 employees, LinkedIn makes sense for IAG. Late last year Michel was recruiting for some senior roles. "A lot of candidates talked about looking me up on LinkedIn to get a flavour of what I was about before taking the next step. Good candidates need to be convinced to take a step further, just as much as I do."

Michel has another agenda: "With LinkedIn, a number of large companies have started alumni groups."

She is also joining LinkedIn groups overseas to discuss global human resources issues and finds useful references to books, reading lists and websites.

As for Twitter, Michel is not clear about why she would use it. Facebook, meanwhile, she sees as "fluffy".

There is plenty of confusion about how to use social networking websites for business. Linda Coles founded Blue Banana (bluebanana.co.nz) to train other professionals in social media tools to help grow their brand or company online. She has worked with Richard Westney from KPMG, Air New Zealand and Bayleys Real Estate among others.

"Everybody in business, from a manager owner to a CEO, everyone should have a LinkedIn profile.

"There are different ways of using it. Some people think it is like Facebook and use it to keep in touch with just colleagues," she says. "But it is a great place to do business - and to start building relationships longer term."

She advises going into LinkedIn before checking email for the day, and says managers have to get over the idea that online networking is "mucking about".

In your profile you should say who you are, what you do, what your point of difference is and why should we use you, she says. Coles says recommendations are a big part of LinkedIn and can be an effective way of winning business.

Coles suggests setting up a group to show leadership. She launched her own brainstorming LinkedIn group in November and it now has around 200 members. These forums are mainly for discussion, job postings and anything newsworthy.

"You can use [a group] as a newsletter to clients and prospective clients."

For example, Coles recommends Trish McLean's group to senior retail executives. McLean, the head of recruitment consultancy Retailworld Resourcing, set up the group for professional women in retailing.

"To engage with your customers and be the connection adds value to my business and brand credibility," says McLean.

"Retailworld does use other online networking - but nothing is as professionally credible or targets the executive market quite like LinkedIn."

Coles also recommends Twitter as a useful marketing tool: "You need to make it to do with your industry, to make it interesting to a lot of people." She advises chief executives to "keep it human".

The Blue Banana consultant is not as impressed with Facebook, although she believes it has its purpose.

"You have just got to be careful what your mates are doing," she warns. If they tag you in a photo and it comes up on your page, it can taint your profile, she says.

The consultant has worked with Ben Ridler, head of the business strategy company Results.com, who in the past 18 months has spent 40 or 50 days at seminars on social media "just to get my head around it". In his experience Facebook has been the most used over the past five years but now it's all about LinkedIn and Twitter.

LinkedIn has been a good source for finding key staff, said Ridler.

"Not only we have found them, but they have found us through LinkedIn."

As well as LinkedIn, Results.com is using Facebook, sends out weekly business tips online and has a Twitter profile as well as a blog.

"Our weekly blogs that we do as a company are a huge part of our marketing. It's dynamic, there's not one set of rules."

Ridler is a fan of TweetDeck, the desktop application which helps you keep in touch with your social media. He has Tweetdeck programs running to monitor his LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter activity.

"It's very easy for me to look across all three."

For business leaders this might seem like a lot of time wasting, but he says: "We have come to realise, those who have got good at interacting with people online are going to do a lot of good for their business."

Ridler has noticed that some of his executives, who are not particularly adept at offline networking, excel online. "They may not be the life of the party but they are the most active, they are doing the most research. It's a brave new world."

LinkedIn

* Social networking site aimed primarily at business users.
* Launched 2003.
* Allows members to keep contact details of people they know - called "connections". Resulting contact networks can then be be used to find jobs or business opportunities, among other things.
* Now has about 55 million members, including 160,000 in New Zealand.

* Gill South is an Auckland freelance writer