There are two main reasons why everyone in the business world needs to be on LinkedIn. The first one is to have a web presence and the second one is to stay connected to relevant contacts and to make new connections with people that will create a mutually beneficial relationship (networking).

This post focuses on connecting with people you already know. Konstantinos will follow up with a post on connecting with people you don’t know as he has over 11,000 first contacts and I have 278.

SEARCH FOR PEOPLE YOU KNOW

• Use the Advanced People Search Tool to see if some of your existing contacts are registered as LinkedIn users.

• Connect with Colleagues using your existing LinkedIn profile. This option allows you to search for colleagues from past or present companies that you have worked for. The same option is available to connect with classmates for schools that you have attended.

If you are unable to find existing users that you know, you can always send them an invitation to connect.

INVITE CONTACTS

• Adding Friends or Colleagues – Send existing contacts and invitation (via email) to join LinkedIn and connect with you.

• Outlook ToolBar – This tool allows you to invite connections with one click to build your network faster and gives you recommendations on who to invite based on email frequency.

IMPORT CONTACTS

• Check Your Webmail Contacts (includes Hotmail, Yahoo!, Gmail, and AOL). This will give you a list of your contacts that are already using LinkedIn and with also give you the option to invite contacts that are not yet registered users.

• Upload Your Contacts (if you don’t use webmail). You can export contacts to a file from just about any address book software and simply upload that file to your account.

Once you have made the connection you need to keep active on LinkedIn in order to maintain your relevance as a valued member of someone’s network. I’ll give you some ideas on how to do this in my next post…stay tuned.

In the meantime, how do you increase your connections on LinkedIn?