Joel Elad - LinkedIn For Dummies

2 Click the Me icon on the top navigation bar, and then click the Try Premium Free For 1 Month link in the drop-down list that appears, below the Account header.In some cases, you’ll see a Try Premium Free link on the top navigation bar to the right of the work drop-down menu. Click that link to proceed.LinkedIn asks you a series of questions to help recommend a plan.

3 Answer the questions LinkedIn posts and click Next after each question.The Premium Products page appears.

4 Click the Select Plan button to display that premium account’s specific options, as shown in Figure 1-8.LinkedIn accepts PayPal, Visa, MasterCard, American Express, or Discover to pay for your premium account. If paying by credit card, make sure the billing address you provide matches the credit card billing address on file. FIGURE 1-8:Review the options for the premium account you are considering.

5 Click the blue Start My Free Month button for the premium level to which you want to upgrade.

6 When asked to confirm if you want monthly or annual billing, click the type you want.

7 Select the radio button beside the credit card or PayPal option to bring up the specific payment fields. Fill in the appropriate billing information, as shown in Figure 1-9, and then click the Review Order button.

8 Verify the information you’ve provided, and review the terms in the Review Your Order box.If you want, click the links to review LinkedIn’s terms of service, refund policy, and how to cancel.

9 Click the blue Start Your Free Trial button to complete the process.

FIGURE 1-9:Enter your billing information.

That’s it! Expect to get emails from LinkedIn to help explain and demonstrate the new features that you can take advantage of on the website.

If you decide to stop subscribing to a LinkedIn Premium account, you must go to your Settings & Privacy page, click Account Preferences on the left, scroll down to the Subscriptions & Payments section, and then either click Switch Plans to change the level of your premium subscription or click the Cancel Subscription link to cancel your premium account. Follow the on-screen instructions to switch or cancel your Premium subscription. (See “ Looking at the Settings & Privacy page,” earlier in this chapter, for information about how to reach and use this page.)

Chapter 2

IN THIS CHAPTER

Joining LinkedIn with or without an invitation

Registering and setting your preferences

Connecting with people you already know on LinkedIn

When LinkedIn first launched, it grew primarily through invitations — you joined only if someone who was already a member invited you and encouraged you to join. However, membership is now open to anyone 16 years or older (as long as the user hasn’t previously been suspended or removed from LinkedIn, of course). You can have only one active account, but you can attach multiple email addresses, past and present, to your account so that people can more easily find you.

You’ll be presented with some configuration settings during the sign-up process that might confuse you until you’re more familiar with the system. Fortunately, you can customize all those settings later, but for now, I suggest some initial settings. In addition, based on your initial settings, LinkedIn recommends people to invite to your network. This chapter touches on the initial recommendation process; in Chapter 5, I discuss the ways you can grow your network more extensively.

Many people join LinkedIn because a friend or colleague invited them. You can join just as easily without receiving an invitation, though. Everyone joins at the basic level, which is free. (You can opt for different levels of paid membership, as spelled out in Chapter 1.) Being able to start at the basic level makes the sign-up process quite straightforward. Most importantly, the basic level still gives users the ability to take advantage of the most powerful tools that LinkedIn offers.

When a friend or colleague invites you to join, you receive an email invitation. The email clearly identifies the sender and usually has Invitation to connect on LinkedIn as its subject line. (There’s a chance, though, that the sender came up with a custom header, because LinkedIn now has built-in options for the sender to choose a custom reason for the invitation.)

When you open the message, you see an invitation to join LinkedIn, such as the message shown in Figure 2-1. There might be some extra text if the person inviting you personalized the message. You also see a button or link that takes you back to LinkedIn to create your account, such as the Join to View Invitation button shown in Figure 2-1.

FIGURE 2-1:An invitation to connect on LinkedIn.

When you’re ready to join LinkedIn with an invitation, you’ll start with these two steps:

1 Click the button or link from your invitation email.A new window appears that goes to the LinkedIn website, as shown in Figure 2-2. FIGURE 2-2:Provide your name and create a password.

2 Enter your email address, and create a new password for your account. If you want to use a different email address from the one used for your invitation, you can change the details by clicking the Not You? link below the Email field.

3 Click the Agree & Join button.You are taken to the next part of the sign-up process, where you provide basic information that LinkedIn will use to create your account. I cover the remainder of the sign-up process in “ Completing the sign-up process,” later in this chapter.

Try to choose a password that no one else can guess. You should use a combination of letters and numbers, and avoid commonly used passwords such as your name, the word password, a string of letters or numbers that are next to each other on the keyboard (for example, qwerty ), or a password that you use on many other sites.

If you haven’t received an invitation to join LinkedIn, don’t let that turn you into a wallflower. You can join LinkedIn directly, without an invitation from an existing user. Open your web browser and go to https://www.linkedin.com . When you’re ready to join LinkedIn, click the Join Now link in the top-right corner to display the page shown in Figure 2-3. Simply provide your email address and enter a password, and then click the Agree & Join button.

FIGURE 2-3:Join LinkedIn from its home page.