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LinkedIn changes Terms of Service, what does it mean for you?

LinkedIn, the tech giant used by 467 million people worldwide has announced that they have changed their terms of service, with both the User Agreement and the Privacy Policy due to be updated on the 7th June.

What does this mean for you?

The company says they were driven by a ‘members first’ philosophy and wanted to improve the experience for the users of the site. LinkedIn’s blog said that they haven’t updated their terms for quite some time and that they are still committed to giving users control over their personal information, but there will be increased visibility of your information through the search engines.

LINKEDIN AS A RESUME

The major drawcard of LinkedIn is that it’s similar to your resume. It’s another way you can reach people. It’s important that you share your achievements and proudest moments. It will now easier to share your accomplishments, such as awards or industry recognitions with those in your network; so if you are trying to make a name for yourself, you’ll more easily be able to.


THE ‘MICROSOFT’ EFFECT

If you want to use LinkedIn as a marketing tool and connect with other users, for example, prospective clients, business partners or colleagues, then you’ll love the increased visibility. Third party services such as search engines (ie Google) will have greater access to your profile. But LinkedIn, now owned by Microsoft, are now saying their goal is to help members be found for opportunities and facilitate better informed professional communications both on and off the site. In addition, users of certain mail services (such as outlook) will see mini public profiles of the person that is emailing them. Some examples include Outlook and Yahoo Mail, Calendar or Contacts, Apple and Samsung native mail, contacts and calendar phone apps, Cortana, Evernote, social media aggregators (e.g. tools for company brand administrators to consolidate interactions with followers across social media), talent and lead managers.

Anyone can see your public profile in search engines, as well as in apps and other services as described above. So it is now really worth having your LinkedIn profile up to date as your clients may be seeing that information about you in their email clients. Just like on other social media platforms, you can opt out of this and retain your current privacy settings, however, this may mean that you miss out on some great opportunities

LINKEDIN CREATING CONNECTIONS

LinkedIn will be releasing an upgrade of their to make it quicker for you to type responses when you are sending messages to people. It’s much like Google where you will start searching for a particular term and the search engine will make recommendations based on the characters that you have already entered.

If you enjoy networking then a new feature will help you meet up with local members. You will still have the capacity to find people in your area and connect with them. It will bridge the gap and close the geographical distance that has previously been faced by the online community. If you don’t want to use this feature, you have the option to opt-out.

 

Note: Although LinkedIn is owned by Microsoft, they say it still run as an entirely separate entity and simply plans to leverage their software and other features from the current infrastructure provided by the software business.

If you are a big user of LinkedIn to connect with people make sure you also check out Crystal Knows.

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