I wrote this blog about a year ago, but given LI is at it again it seemed appropriate to report it. 

Okay Okay, I get it. LinkedIn (LI) Changed its agreement, and everyone is in full on panic mode. Heck, some are even saying no more using tools or extensions at all. Well first off slow down, take a breath and relax. What did they really do? They said there are things you can’t do and can do, and tools and extensions that do certain things, certain ways are no-nos.

Okay…So. First off there are what about 500 million people on Linkedin, that’s great. However Facebook is closing in on over 2 billion, Twitter has over 320 million, G+ over 500 million. As you can see there are a lot of social sites nearly as big or even bigger. Now also remember nearly everyone on LI has a social presence on some other site. Also, LI is still indexed by Google, Bing, Yahoo and the other engines.

So what does all this mean? It means LI is making it hard to use them and get any real value, given inmails are a waste of time. However, that does not mean you give up on tools or extensions. You simply only use the ones on LI that are not in violation and use those same ones and others that work on other sites and do other things outside of LI.

Let’s also remember there was recruiting and sourcing long before LI and will be long after LI, and these tools and extensions can help you do things faster and quicker even without LI. Let’s also remember if you were trained the right way you can do almost anything these tools and extensions can do without using them, just not as fast. In the end that is what we are really talking about. Will not being able to use a contact finding tool on LI stop me from finding someone’s contact info that I found on LI? NO, because I know how to do it without the tools, it will just take longer.

I will give you a great example. I decided to do a search for Java developer in Seattle, who also had hadoop, json, pig, and some other things that got me a result of 100 on the dot. I wrote down all 100 names, companies and titles. I then signed out of LI. I then used some tools to do the same search. I again made sure

 I only had 100 and then compared the results. Now let’s remember I was not signed into LI. I then compared the results and there was an 88% redundancy. Meaning I found 88 of the same 100 LI found. I then decided to see if I could find the 12 that LI found without using LI and I did. Now remember I was not signed into LI and I not only found them all but got contact info. Now I am also not saying this will always be true. I am sure there are some that can only be found on LI, I am betting it is less than 10%. That said I also know there are some people you cant find on LI but can in other places. Like I said earlier LI only has 500 Million people or so, Facebook has 3X that. SO there are a lot of people out there not on LI.

Let's also remember one other thing, only 52% of the people using LI do so at least once a week. Compare that to Facebook which is 91%, Twitter which is 59%, Instagram which is 74%, and even Pinterest which is 55%. Heck when it comes to looking for jobs people look on Facebook 67%, Twitter 45%, and LI only 40%.

The point of the exercise was that you can find them without LI. Now I am not saying LI is not a good tool, I mean it found the 100 faster than the method without LI. That said I had contact info with the ones without LI. All I am saying is, just because LI is making it harder to use these tools and extensions that make your life and job easier does not mean you stop using them. You just use them in other ways, that do not violate LIs’ agreement.

Again let me make this clear I am not saying LI is a bad tool, What I am saying is it is not the only tool, and just because LI does not want you to use certain tools to make your job easier does not mean you stop. It just means you only use the tools that does not violate LIs agreement on LI, and the use whatever tools you want or have every place else.  FYI this will include the new toy AI.

Next week we will get back to our Spring Sourcecon share back.