LinkedIn PR Campaign? Success or Bust?

Every business has a choice regarding PR campaigns, email marketing, etc.

In today’s great example of “learning in the field” I want to share a communication that fast growing LinkedIn sent to its members earlier this month.

Earlier this month LinkedIn sent messages to their members telling them they were in the top 1%, top 5% or top 10% of viewed profiles in 2012.  They encouraged people to share the message to their social networks.

Why?

LinkedIn wants to get additional people on their service and, by leveraging other people’s social networks and contacts they hope to get the last of those followers onto their service.  I mean, if their friend, relative or colleague is in the top 1%, top 5% or top 10% of viewed profiles why can’t they?  Seems easy enough….

LinkedIn won’t ever be as big as Facebook.

Why?

It is about business, business contacts, networking, connecting with old business relationships, participating in knowledge share with other like minded professionals, etc.  Basically it eliminates a large percentage of people just due to the criteria.

So why would people share this message with their friends, followers, colleagues, etc?

Narcissism, plain and simple…. There isn’t any reward to members for sharing their information, right?  The email is simply “bragging rights” to some, and I find it interesting that LinkedIn would send messages essentially trying to leverage this human emotion.

Did you find out you were part of the LinkedIn elite? If you didn’t, do you feel left out? Let me know in the comments.

To Your Success,

Dan Ross

P.S. Here was the message they sent me and I did a quick screenshot of it and the numbers it represents. With 200 million members being in the top 5% of the top 10,000,000.  Whoop de do!  LOL