LinkedIn Gets the Ball Rolling

 

Well all this updating, linking, poking, tweeting, sharing, posting, and friending my pay off for some lucky investors. Social media may be the new upswing in the economy.

 

LinkedIn, a professionals social media, went public on the New York Stock Exchange yesterday as "LNKD" and sold shares starting at $45 apiece selling 4,827,804 shares from the corporation and 3,012,196 shares from selling stock holders. Today that makes LinkedIn worth $4.3 billion. Yes, with a B. And other social networking companies are looking to follow such as Facebook and Groupon.

Lots of people are saying this could be the beginning of another "dot come era" or bubble like back in the '90s and venture capitalists are excited to start backing well-established companies and start making some money.

LinkedIn with Your Peers

LinkedIn is a social media site for professional networkers. Again, none of this Facebook shenanigans. 

Instead of having "friends" you have "connections."
These can be in the categories of:
friends
colleagues
classmates
partners
group members

You can upload your resume and the site will automatically create your profile that includes education, previous jobs and your current job. You can also request and display recommendations on your profile, and have a personal summary.

You can link other social networks like Twitter or Facebook.

Just make sure to keep your profile updated just like a resume — except people can see it all the time, and you never know who will be looking.