Why professional networking on LinkedIn matters

- [Instructor] Today, there are over 500 million LinkedIn users, and this includes the customers and companies with which you want to do business. As a small business owner, you probably rely on networking as part of your marketing strategy to attract new opportunities. LinkedIn is the largest existing professional network, so it's the perfect place for you to fast track in-person networking to build mutually beneficial relationships and grow your business. LinkedIn can make your networking efforts more productive with minimal effort from you. But, why is it important for you to use LinkedIn as a business development system? Well, in order to grow your small business, it's vital for you to keep a full pipeline of leads, build a strong network of referral partners, and stay in touch with your customers.

LinkedIn gives you the tools and resources to do all of this and more. So, in this chapter, we're gonna focus on using LinkedIn to enhance the networking you're already doing offline. You'll learn networking tips and best practices to follow when reaching out to, connecting with, and growing your LinkedIn connections, and we'll start by making sure we have a clear understanding of some key terminology.