LinkedIn Basic Vs LinkedIn Premium – When is the best time to to upgrade?

by | Jan 27, 2016 | Uncategorized

Now that the new year is here and fulfilling your 2016 business resolutions is on your mind, you may be thinking about upgrading to LinkedIn Premium. After all, there are many benefits to doing so and you want to invest in your business.

As you decide whether to make that investment, it is important to consider what is best for your business’s specific needs. To start, here’s a quick breakdown of LinkedIn Basic compared to LinkedIn Premium:

LinkedIn Basic:

•   Craft your profile, connect with professionals, and build your network.
•   Give and receive recommendations.
•   Request up to 5 introductions at a time.
•   Receive (but not send) unlimited InMail messages.
•   Save up to 3 searches and receive weekly search alerts.
•   See the last 5 people who viewed your profile.

See the top 10 most viewed people among your connections, and the five people above and below you.

LinkedIn Premium:

There are actually four versions of LinkedIn Premium accounts tailored for different purposes: Job Seeker, Sales Navigator, Recruiter Lite, and Business Plus. Many of the benefits overlap:

•   Unlimited Profile Search.
•   Send direct messages to anyone with InMail.
•   See who’s viewed your profile over the last 90 days, plus what keywords got them there.
•   See the top 100 most viewed people in your network, and how you rank against other professionals in your industry.
•   Expanded Search Listings show more information from your profile when someone searches your name.
•   Keyword Suggestions that can be applied to write a more search-friendly Profile summary.
•   Open Profile allows any LinkedIn member to send you InMail, even if they don’t have Premium themselves.
•   Up to 8 Additional Search Filters: Groups, Years of Experience, Function, Seniority Level, Interested In, Company Size, Fortune, When Joined.

If you are just beginning to promote your business on LinkedIn, you can create a company page with LinkedIn Basic. If your profile and company page are doing well and you are looking to use LinkedIn to build your lead pipeline, that’s when Premium features such as Unlimited Profile Search and InMail can be helpful. For example, InMail allows you to message executives who may have otherwise restricted their settings to limit who can request to connect with them.

So when should you use LinkedIn Basic and when should you spring for LinkedIn Premium?

As with anything, the answer will vary depending on your business and what your goals are for using LinkedIn. Ask yourself the following questions:

•   Am I looking to hire a lot of new staff members?
•   Do I want to use LinkedIn to find more leads?
•   Is my goal to use LinkedIn as my primary sales platform?
•   Will using LinkedIn allow me to better reach the target audience for my business?

If you’ve answered yes to any of the above, maybe it’s time to consider LinkedIn Premium. And if you’re still on the fence, you can always try LinkedIn Premium for free.

Just remember: LinkedIn Premium is designed to help with business development, sales, recruiting, marketing and so on, but that’s all it does – help. So the most important question you should ask yourself when choosing between LinkedIn Basic and LinkedIn Premium is: Am I willing to put in the time and effort to make effective use of these premium features?

For any questions about LinkedIn Premium, you are welcome to connect with me on LinkedIn or email me at: [email protected] 

This post was originally published on LinkedIn Pulse.

By Julbert Abraham & Marie Yatsyk

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