By James Thomas Mobile has been flavor of the month for what seems like an eternity now. Recently I wrote about Facebook’s recent developments in the mobile space, and how their mobile business model is moving closer towards ‘fruition’. LinkedIn it seems is the latest social network to shower their users with some mobile love.
Over the past couple of months, LinkedIn has made some small, but significant moves towards increasing the stickiness and usage of its mobile app. The most significant of these recently has been the ability to endorse a LinkedIn connection via mobile.
What do these developments mean for us as social marketers?
The Guided Tour
This is a nifty bit of functionality for social agencies and SEO Agencies alike to take advantage of for their client base. I see this as a move towards activating and monetizing the more traditional, old school segment of the social market who are still resistant to fully embracing social media. This could also be a strong hint that large areas of LinkedIn functionality aren’t being utilized properly, or perhaps completely neglected by large chunks of the user-base.
As a provider of Social Sales Training, one thing I see an abundance of is poorly completed, or incomplete LinkedIn profiles. Achieving that All Star profile status isn’t just for bragging rights, though it does hold power and social proof in this respect, but it actually helps LinkedIn index your profile more efficiently and will increase your chances of showing up in LinkedIn searches that pull relevant key-phrases or topics from your profile.
For instance, if a Chief Exec decides to run a LinkedIn search for ‘SEO’ or ‘SEO Agency’, and he’s a 2nd connection of mine, there’s a better chance my profile might top his list, after his 1st connections.
This is a clever move in my opinion and by baby feeding executives and those who may not be as socially savvy, LinkedIn is not only embracing and growing its mobile platform, but essentially beginning to monetize what was previously a dormant or non-existent user base.
It might seem trivial, it’s just a guided tour right? Sure to social marketers it might seem like no big deal, but for those social marketers out there who offer social media training, you’ll appreciate how much we sometimes take stuff like this for granted.
The Mobile Seal of Approval – Endorsements
Mobile social behaviour is different to that of desktop social behaviour; we’ve known this for some time. The mobile experience, in those cases where it’s done well, is minimal, cleaner and trimmed down. Arguably in many instances this is a bad thing as it’s stripping away the true functionality and power of many browser based applications, however, for social networks where users tend only to use a small chunk of the features (after initial set up and optimisation) the mobile experience is, in many instances, superior. Less is more. Which is why optimising the Endorsement feature for mobile is a smart move.
What’s the significance of this feature in particular? The endorsement is a powerful piece of LinkedIn functionality. In terms of stickiness, it’s great. Think about it. You’re browsing LinkedIn on a mobile and a notification pops up to inform you that your profile has been viewed by John Smith, Director at an SEO Agency and Peter Jones the Sales Director of a big fortune 500 company. The natural reaction is to then, out of curiosity, see what these individuals have been up to.
The mobile experience of LinkedIn is so slimmed down and clean that after a quick scroll down you’re presented with a one click endorsement process. The endorsement, it seems, is akin to a ‘like’ on Facebook, even though LinkedIn also boasts this feature. Not only is the recipient notified of this process, but it’s then displayed in the LinkedIn newsfeed for your shared connections to witness.
This action not only further connects two LinkedIn users, but generally will then spark more endorsements amongst the shared connections of the users. So a one click action on LinkedIn’s mobile app is now generating a huge spike in engagement, bringing two users back to the app, and potentially creating reactive engagement amongst those who witnessed the endorsement then followed suit. Very clever. Not only this, but it’s arguably more powerful than Facebook’s like, which LinkedIn also boasts, as the action holds more social sway and requires more work on the user’s end to deliver.
How to take advantage of this? Get out there and start endorsing your professional colleagues in the evening on your mobile! Just don’t abuse the functionality and endorse people you don’t know, nobody likes that person!
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