Today’s question is “What the heck happened to Introductions on LinkedIn?!?”
It seems that in the redesign of its messages functionality, LinkedIn broke introductions. Let me show you a manual process that will be a good workaround until the folks at LinkedIn get this fixed.
I’m going to start with a search results page that shows 2nd level connections. From this list, control+click the person’s name to open a new tab. From the person’s tab, you will see a “How you’re connected” section. Look through the people here, and decide who you are going to ask. Now, click on the triangle next to the “Send Person InMail” button, and then select “Share Profile.” This will open the messages section with some content pre-populated. You’ll be changing this, but it gets you an important start to the message. Now, in the messages section, type in the name of the existing contact you are going to ask for an introduction. Then change the content of the message to read something like this:
Name – I could use your help with an introduction to this Person. Here’s a link to his profile: URL.
Could you send a message to let him know that I’d like to have a chat. Alternatively, could you send me his email address or phone number and I’ll reach out to him directly?
Seriously, this method stinks. It forces the person your are asking to do extra work on your behalf. You could do just as well simply sending an email to your connection asking for help with the introduction, and that might actually work better. But until Introductions gets fixed, this is a reasonable workaround inside of LinkedIn.
And that is another “Ask Howard” Quick Tip.