 If you're active on LinkedIn, you're likely extending and receiving invitations to connect, but there is some etiquette involved in those LinkedIn invitations. Stick around, I'm going to show you some tips on how to handle them. Hey friends and LinkedIn connections, perhaps we are LinkedIn connections or perhaps we need to get started on being LinkedIn connections. But when extending and receiving invitations on LinkedIn, I'm reminded about why LinkedIn started in the first place. LinkedIn was meant to be a platform where you connected with people you work with and people that you knew. And it's moved away from that significantly over the years where now you link into, well you can link into almost anyone and not even know anything about that person if you share the same value system or the same ethical guidelines. People are just connecting with people all over the place. So there is some etiquette that I feel that we should be exercising when extending LinkedIn invitations and accepting LinkedIn invitations. So we're going to run through some of those tips really quickly today. Here are some dos on how to send a LinkedIn invitation. Number one, send a custom message versus the generic one. So instead of sending the template that LinkedIn has, send something that's very specific to that person. I did do a video about sending invitations in particular and you can find a link to that video in the description for this video as well. Number two, try to make a connection through something, anything. It could be a common person, a common association that you belong to, job that you used to work with together, an interest, maybe even a LinkedIn group you brought both participate in, something that you find some common ground with that person. And then again, in that uniquely crafted invitation, refer to that connection. And tip number three, provide some value. So again, when you're extending or even accepting an invitation, provide something of value to that person and you might not have anything of value and then it really becomes a question of should you be connecting with this person in the first place? So find something of value that you can share with that person to grow that relationship and nurture it. And the biggest don't when it comes to LinkedIn invitations is do not sell your goods when you're extending or accepting a LinkedIn invitation. Relationships are built on trust that are built over time. So the first interaction with a person should not be your entire sales pitch. It's going to get turned off. You need to build trust with that person before you launch into all the benefits of your goods and services. I've had people try and sell me stuff when extending invitations, but more concerning is when I accept an invitation and that person feels it's now licensed to give me their entire sales pitch. In fact, I had one the other day, they extended an invitation for me to connect. It was industry related, so I'm happy to accept that invitation. I did so. And in that email, I extended something that I think would have been a value to them. It was an 86 word accepting of the invitation. Okay, so I wrote 86 words. In return, this gentleman wrote me 580 words about his products and services. That's longer than most of my blog posts. I'm not kidding you. And this was in an email for a LinkedIn invitation. Folks, I didn't get past the first two lines. It's just way too much when I don't even know who you are. And that's just not the right place for you to sell your products and services to me. I could be wrong. And that's what I want to hear from you guys. If you feel there are different etiquette tips that I should be following regarding LinkedIn invitations, I am all ears. You let me know some of the practices that you like to practice because I'm always up for a great conversation and a great debate about LinkedIn because I love this platform. And I do want to learn how to best use it to the best of my abilities. So comment on this video below if you think I'm way off base with some of these do's and don'ts that I've shared in this video. Friends, I want to encourage you to keep extending and accepting LinkedIn invitations. Just make some guidelines of etiquette when doing so that you can set the relationship off on the right foot. And if you haven't extended an invitation to me on LinkedIn yet, feel free to do so. This is the perfect opportunity to do it. Reach out to us or find Stephen and I over on our company page at Stephening and Leanne Calderwood here on LinkedIn. That's this week's Two Minute Tip Tuesday. Hope you enjoyed. See you next time. Bye for now.