When I first joined LinkedIn back in May 2006, the instruction from LinkedIn was to only connect with people you would recommend. Most people had a network of 250 tops. Since then things have relaxed as people realised that a bigger network brings more visibility and more opportunities.
The maximum number of connections you can have is 30,000, there is also a limit on how many invitations you can issue which is around 5,000 - LinkedIn is a little coy about the exact number and there seems to be a little more flexibility than previously. Importantly LinkedIn monitors the ratio of invitations sent to accepted. If only a low percentage is accepted then the algorithm will flag this up as a sign of potential abuse. Too many invitations in a short period will also ring alarm bells for LinkedIn, it could indicate that automated invitations are being sent. My recommendation is don't exceed 60 on a single day.
There are three basic connection strategies:
- Connect to everybody and anybody
- Connect only with people you have met
- Connect broadly but selectively
The last one is the most effective for the average user. Connect with your target audience of course, but also people who might be connected to your target audience, as well as people who could be recommenders or influencers.
So the question is then should you send a personal invitation? Logic suggests that a personal invitation will receive a higher number of acceptances. I decided to test this and employed a virtual assistant to send 100 personal invites and 100 default invitations to people with whom she had a number of common connections so there was an incentive for the person to connect. The results were surprising, 62% accepted the personal invitations but 70% accepted the non-personalised invitations.
Granted the sample was relatively small, however similar results were found by an American colleague who tested several thousand invitations.
What could be the explanation? My hypothesis is that people give more thought to connecting with someone who has sent them a personal invitation, and in effect qualify themselves out if they feel there is insufficient value. On the other hand, especially on mobile, it is very easy to simply click to accept a queue of pending invitations with little or no thought.
So should you still personalise your invitations? My recommendation would still be yes, in most cases. The invitation is the beginning of your LinkedIn relationship with that person, making the effort to send a custom invitation makes you stand out and offers the opportunity for a message dialogue to start. At the end of the day, business is about relationships and relationships are built on conversations.
BIO
Greg Cooper is an independent LinkedIn consultant and trainer based in Bristol, UK. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Direct and Digital Marketing. For over twenty years Greg ran an award-winning direct marketing agency working with leading technology companies like IBM, SAP, and Siemens.
Today he helps SMEs to use LinkedIn more effectively to find, win and keep customers. He runs public and in-house courses including the LinkedIn Essentials Master Class, Sales Navigator, and Social Selling workshops, and Employee Advocacy training.
Greg is also the host for the Bristol LinkedIn Local – a pitch free networking event which focuses on building relationships with other LinkedIn members.
Find Greg on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gregcoopers/
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