This past month I ran an experiment, not too scientific, but effective enough that I stopped. For one month I cancelled my Premium LinkedIn membership to see if it made a difference. It did, the general level of interest dropped. Now there could also be a number of other outside factors I am not controlling but its enough for me to see the value in what I do in having a Premium account.
But its not for everyone. I am often asked by people, is the premium membership on LinkedIn worth it?
My answer is always – it depends.
What are you using LinkedIn for? If you are planning on using LinkedIn to have a online placeholder for your professional presence and connect with a few people you know then you probably do not need to spend any money doing that.
If you plan to use it regularly and proactively then you may find the need to upgrade to get the extra InMail and searches to do that. If you intend to be a power user and be very active then you will definitely want to look at one of the Premium options.
There are a number of features that even the lowest cost Job Seeker membership gives you;
- More searches, but we do not know the actual limit, LinkedIn keeps this a secret!
- 5 InMails per month to reach out to harder to connect with people perhaps
- NEW! – Live chat help. LinkedIn help and support are a little notorious for being fairly UNhelpful, with cut and paste responses and dark holes where our requests go. Now there is live chat feature for Premium members.
I find the most worthwhile feature of Premium membership is the ability to look back at everyone who has looked at your profile for the last 90 days. With the basic membership you only get to see the last 5 and this can change quickly if you are active.
With the recent Microsoft takeover I would not be surprised to see additional features being added, perhaps like Skype and Office 365 – watch this space.
LinkedIn has a useful information page and video in its help section on membership, you can access that by clicking here.
The great thing is that you can go back and forth month to month, perhaps when you have a specific need or have more time to spend on the platform. The choice is yours, just remember to add value and be helpful.
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Here is what one recipient had to say: “I think it is fantastic and extremely relevant. As you pointed out, my role has changed – but unfortunately, my linked in profile has not. I will be trying to put in place some of the ideas that you have offered.”