35 Facts about Linkedin, the world's biggest business network

Are you “Linkedin?”

If you’re sitting at work and online right now then there’s a great chance you are a member of the world’s biggest social networking site. But whether you’re a dedicated LinkedIn networker or just use the site every once and a while (i.e. when you’re looking for a new job), few people realize the scope and magnitude of LinkedIn’s growth since its formation in 2002.

These days, the Mountain View, California-based firm employs 7,600 people in 30 cities around the world, deriving most if its 2.99 billion dollar net revenues from selling access to user information to recruiters and sales professionals.

To prove to you just how prevalent LinkedIn has become, here are 35 facts about the social network that will shock and impress you. (All statistics have been updated as of February, 2016 or using the latest data.)

1. LinkedIn is a business focused social networking platform, by far the biggest of its kind in the world.

2. How popular is LinkedIn? LinkedIn now has 414 million acquired users.

3. In the United States alone there are 107 million LinkedIn users, which accounts for roughly half of the adult working population!

4. Every month, 100 million individual members visit LinkedIn.

5. The site gains 2 new users every second of every day, adding about 1 million new users every 12 days. Every day, more than 175,000 new LinkedIn profiles are created.

6. Currently one out of every three professionals and business people on the entire planet are on LinkedIn!

7. But that still pales in comparison to LinkedIn’s ultimate goal and vision: to have 3 billion registered users (which would be about 30-40% of the world’s total population depending on when they achieve this).

8. LinkedIn reported $2.21 billion in revenue in 2014.

9. Conceived in 2002 and launched on May 6, 2003, LinkedIn was the brainchild of Reid Garret Hoffman along with Allen Blue, Konstantin Guericke, Eric Ly, Jean-Luc Vaillant, the founders of PayPal.

10. LinkedIn went public in May 19, 2011, and now trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol LNKD.

11. Jeff Weiner has been the CEO of LinkedIn since 2008 after serving prominent roles for Yahoo and Warner Brothers.

12. The social network has now expanded to 200 countries and territories all around the world.

13. In fact, 70% of LinkedIn users are now outside the U.S., including India (number two behind American for users), Brazil, Great Britain, and Canada, in that order.

14. To serve that diverse user base, the LinkedIn website is available in 24 languages, including: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Japanese, Polish, Spanish, Swedish, Norwegian, Russian, Turkish, Dutch, Italian, Czech, Indonesian, Tagolog, Indonesian, Danish, German, Korean, Portuguese, Romanian and Malay.

15. LinkedIn is known for its Groups that connect and engage members. As of late, there are more than 1.5 million active LinkedIn Groups.

16. A big part of the social network’s experience is the endorsements users leave for each other. There are more than 1 billion endorsements to date at a rate of 10 million new endorsements every day.

17. The most recent estimate is that there have been more than 5 billion searches on LinkedIn to date.

18. As of Q2 of 2015 alone there were 35 billion LinkedIn member pageviews.

19. It’s now estimated that LinkedIn reaches 37% of the total U.S. digital population.

20. While many people realize sites like Facebook and Instagram are widely used on mobile devices, well over 50% of LinkedIn’s global traffic is from mobile users. In fact, LinkedIn has released five mobile apps to aid users: LinkedIn, LinkedIn Connected, LinkedIn Pulse, LinkedIn Recruiter and SlideShare.

21. All of those apps and mobile sites bring in 42 million unique mobile viewers every month, up 45% from only one year earlier.

22. Only a couple years ago, the majority of LinkedIn users were male, to a ratio of 56% to 44% female. But these days, the proportion is just about equal.

23. Who is the typical LinkedIn user? They are well educated, as 50% of LinkedIn users have Bachelor’s Degree or higher.

24. They also use social media differently, as 13% of LinkedIn users don’t have a Facebook account and 59% don’t have a Twitter account.

25. Executives from all Fortune 500 companies have a LinkedIn profile. (By the way, the average CEO has 930 connections on the site!) Likewise, 41% of all millionaires in the U.S. are on LinkedIn.

26. The average user has 393 connections on LinkedIn but 40% of users have between 50-200 connections only.

27. Paid accounts – called Premium – comprise 39% of all total LinkedIn users; a huge number compared to other social media platform’s paid users.

28. The average LinkedIn member spends only 17 minutes a month average in the site, and the average user has only 5 endorsements from others.

29. Millenials (America’s 18-34 generation, or Gen Y) are starting to flock to LinkedIn en masse, particularly when it comes time to hunt for a job or advance their careers. Reportedly, 13% of all Millenials use LinkedIn, and 39 million college students and recent grads have profiles on the social platform.

30. Research shows that LinkedIn is a valuable resource for both employers and job seekers. Interestingly, 89% of all recruiters have recruited someone off of LinkedIn.

31. And while 94% of all professional recruiters have profiles on LinkedIn, only 36% of job seekers use the site.

32. Last year, the top skills listed on LinkedIn profiles that led to people get hired were ‘Statistical Analysis and Data Mining.”

33. Your profile views will go up 11-fold if you post a profile picture

34. Listing your skills on your profile increases your views by 13 times.

35. LinkedIn is now a social media publishing platform as well, with 30,000 long form posts written and published every week.

15 Proven methods to detect if someone is lying to you.

"Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive."

-Sir Walter Scott

If you’re like most people, you probably tell a few white lies during the course of your day, half-truths to make others feel better, avoid conflict, or out of polite social necessity. But then there are the big lies – the manipulative or mean spirited falsehoods people spread that can really hurt others. So if someone lies as they’re trying to sell you something, lies to you at work, or the worst of all, lies to you in a relationship, how are you supposed to know what you can trust? How can you detect when someone is lying to your face? 

Numerous studies, such as those conducted at Stanford University as well as training offered by the CIA, FBI, and other intelligence organizations, have revealed that definitive patterns emerge in the nonverbals, physiology, and language of someone who is lying. These cues are accurate predictors of deception and when used in combination, are almost a surefire way to tell if someone is lying to you. 

1. Ask unexpected questions and watch their initial response.
It’s not the information in their answer you’re looking for as much as the way in which they answer. Carefully watch them during the first few seconds before they respond – if they pause, stall with “ums” and “ahs”, repeat the question, or lowers their voice and looks down, they are probably lying, no matter what they say next.

2. Look for insincere emotions and microexpressions.
It’s almost physical impossible for most people to fake a smile - the timing will be wrong, it will be held too long, turn into a frown at the end, their eyes will be too squinted, etc. This is just one manifestation of what are called microexpressions, which last only 1/25^th of a second and reveal the person’s true emotion when they are being insincere.

3. They provide too much information.
If you ask someone a question or to explain themselves and they lie to you, they often ramble on and give far too much information. They also tend to use qualifying language like “to tell you the truth,” “in all honesty,” and “as far as I know,” that’s easy to spot.

4. Ask the person to tell their story or go over the answer in reverse chronology.
Psychologists reveal that our brains aren’t wired to retell stories or reconstruct memories in chronological order, as we often start with the most emotional parts then fill in information. But when someone is lying, they carefully arrange the story – and retell it – chronologically, so asking them to do otherwise will trip them up.

5. Measure their attitude.
People who are being dishonest often become agitated, defensive, or uncooperative when you ask to discuss something or for help filling in the details.

6. Verbal cues and speech patterns.
Certain words and phrases or speech patterns reveal deceit. If a person uses excessive religious imagery (I swear to God), overemphasize their truthfulness and honesty, repeat themselves (a way to buy time while they’re gathering their thoughts), or question or attack the question, it may be an indication they’re lying.

7. Are they minimizing?
"Minimizing language" is used to try and downplay or distract from the importance of the question or the facts, such saying “It’s not a big deal,” or referring to “the company” when they would normally say “we.” 

8. Changing their head position quickly.
When you ask someone a direct question and they make a sudden head movement, they could be lying. If their head is jerked back, retracted, bows down, or tilts to the side right before they respond, it could be an inadvertent signal.

9. Their breathing shifts.
When someone tells a lie, their breathing usually changes, becoming shallow, their shoulders rising because the increased heart rate and blood flow, nerves and tension, change their normal breathing patterns. 

10. They either stand very still or shift their feet.
When someone gets nervous, defensive, or feels they are backed into a corner, their flight or fight response usually kicks in. That means they’ll either hold perfectly, unnaturally still, or shift and move far too much for relaxed conversation.

11. They touch or cover their mouths.
One of the easiest ways to tell if someone is lying or at least being shifty is if they touch their mouth, their face, or put their hand over their mouth when they speak or answer a question.

12. They cover certain parts of their bodies
Likewise, if someone inadvertently covers up certain vulnerable parts of the body like their throat, chest, head, or abdomen, assuming defensive positions, they may be lying. If they bite their lips, pull on their chin, or play with their hair, it may be more signs of fibbing.

13. It becomes harder for them to speak.
When someone lies, it can actually become physiologically harder for them to speak, as the automatic nervous system decreases the flow of saliva during stress, make their mouths and lips more dry. 

14. They don’t blink enough – or too much.
People blink more when they are nervous – like when they are lying - but some liars overcompensate and will hold a stare too long without blinking.

15. They point a lot.
If someone points a lot during their answers to questions or explanations, it may be an unconscious sign of the passive-aggressive nature of lying.

The art of listening is essential to helping our clients. (So we've heard!)

Many of us have the desire to improve our communication skills, whether it’s interacting with people at work, fostering closer friendships, or even becoming a better communicator with family or in our relationships. And whether we read a self-help book or attend a sales training, our efforts to improve usually focus on what we have to say and how we say it.

But in reality, listening is a far more important skill than just saying the right combination of words, our body language, or even writing skills for effective communication. Yet listening seems to be a lost art, largely ignored in business, with salespeople who instead clamor to have their advertising, marketing, or sales messages heard so they can influence clients and close deals.

But at the Alfano Real Estate Group, we understand that what our clients think, want, and need is truly the root of how we can best serve them – and the reason we are here at all! So we make enhancing our listening skills a priority, something we practice and train at. It’s amazing what we learn about the wonderful people who buy and sell homes with us just by listening, with the only intent to truly understand and help them. So we wanted to share a few things we learned about good listening skills during our training.

First off, some interesting facts about the lost art of listening as the first and best communication tool:

-We listen at a rate of 125-250 words per minute,

talk at a rate of 125-175 words per minute,

and think at a rate of 1,000 – 3,000 words per minute.

-It’s estimated that we comprehend only 25% of what we listen to.

-We spend 7 out of every 10 minutes of our waking lives communicating with other people.

-In an average business day, 45% of our time is spent listening, we’re talking 30% of the time, reading 16%, and writing 9%.

-85% of our total knowledge comes from listening.

-55% of the meaning in our words is interpreted from facial expressions.

38% of meaning comes from how the words are spoken,

and only 7% of a verbal message is conveyed from the words that are actually spoken.

-Less than 2% of people have any formal education on how to listen properly.

-Our brains can only retain about seven bits of information at a time. (That’s why we have 7-digit telephone numbers!)

-Words are processed by our short term memory,

but images are logged directly in out long term memories.

-Our communication has shifted from interpersonal human speech to interpreting messages and segments of information via social media and technology.

-For instance, there are 193,000 text messages sent every second,

more than 60 billion tweets every year,

and well over 1 billion Facebook users in the world.

-A study of Fortune 100 companies found that employees send and receive an average of 1,800 messages each day via telephone, email, faxes, memos, and face-to-face.

-Great communications skills are the number one trait employers say they want in their employees.

-Conversely, a U.S. Department of Labor survey found that 46% of workers who quit their jobs did so because they felt they were not listened to and therefore unappreciated.

-According to the Harvard Business Review, the ability to communicate is the most important factor in making someone promotable.

-The average business executive spends 75% of his or her time, or 45 minutes out of every hour, communicating with others.

***

As you can see (or hear!), listening is a far undervalued skill, yet is the most fundamental way to effectively communicate with deep and lasting meaning. Here are some things we teach all of our agents and staff about listening, so we can all understand and serve our clients to the best of our abilities. So far, they’ve said it makes a big difference – and we’re listening!

1. Most of the research on listening is antiquated, going back to the 1970s. They taught something called “Active Listening” which really just meaning clearing your thoughts as the other person spoke, focusing, and repeating back their message for clarity. As you can tell, the field has advanced a long way since a good sales person used active listening when they said, “So what you’re telling me is, you want to buy a big house and get a good deal?”

2. Of course you’ll want to focus in on the person who is speaking, eliminating as many external distractions as possible and clearing your mind of everything but hearing and visualizing their words.

3. It’s estimated that the majority of time we listen to someone we’re actually just formulating our next verbal response in our brains. Instead, work on not formulating a response or choosing your words until they are completely done speaking.

4. It’s important to not only register in the words people are saying, but to identify the subtle variations of how they are saying things. Vocal cues like pauses, intonation, speed, and tone, as well as nonverbal, are more vital to the message they are trying to communicate than just the words.

5. Register the feelings, emotions, and energy the other person is emitting as they speak. The keys to true listening and real comprehension come from taking in all cues at once, not just the words they speak. 

6. No matter who we are, our brains go through the process of interpreting what we hear for deeper

(not just literal) meaning based the entire context of information. So we understand that it’s both vital to interpret and also an imperfect process.

7, It helps to clarify what the other person is saying by occasionally summarizing what their message is and repeating it back to them for acknowledgement or correction.

8. Once the person is finished speaking, ask a few open-ended questions based on what they just said, like “What would that mean to you?” or “Why is it you don’t want that?” You’ll be surprised how a few simple questions can lift the barriers to their true thoughts and feelings about what they’re communication.

9. We always say that we should validate what a person is saying and respect their position, not judge it for right or wrong. A customer may be factually inaccurate but that doesn’t mean their opinion doesn’t matter. It’s up to us to validate them and then present them with new information so they can update their opinion, not “make them wrong” or show we know more.

10. There is always something we can learn from communication, so we listen carefully for things we don’t know yet. Our brains tend to settle into patterns or channels of thought, which become hard to deviate from, so challenge yourself as a listener to be prepared to change your mind, consider a new perspective, and learn whatever that person has to teach you.

21 Negotiation tactics that will help you close any deal! Part 2 (11-21)

Last week, we shared part 1 of our list of 21 negotiation strategies that will help you close any deal like the best sales pro in the world.  Today, we cover 11-21.  We hope you find these helpful whether you're negotiating a sale with a customer, a price on a new car, or even negotiating with your spouse where to go on your next family vacation! 

By the way, if you do it right, you're negotiation won't require a baseball bat like in this photo!

11. Ease their pain.

Know their pain points and show them that you’re genuinely trying to alleviate those.  They’ll appreciate it! 

12. Negotiate small to big or big to small.

Depending on how strong your position is and how much leverage you have, you may want to negotiate the biggest item first (and everything else will logically fall into place after that.)  Or if you have a hard sell in front of you and want to break the ice, get them to say ‘yes,” to several tiny, almost inconsequential items first.  So what if you and the car dealer are $20,000 apart on the asking price – you negotiated the cost of the floor matts, the stereo system, and know your color is in stock!  Believe it or not that helps keep the ball rolling.

13. Float a balloon and then pop it.

This is a fantastic tactic early on in the negotiation or to earn someone’s trust you don’t know.  At some point, propose something, but then immediately take it off the table, explaining that it makes no sense for them and you wouldn’t even consider it if you were in their shoes.  They’ll be pleasantly stunned that you’re thinking of their best interests and looking at things through their viewpoint, and the rest of the negotiation will take on a more favorable tone.

14. Timing is everything.

Don’t just reach for your desired outcome today, but keep an eye toward the future.  If you think you’ll want (or be deserving of) a pay upgrade six months from now, ask for a performance review then based on certain performance targets or incentives.  On the other hand, if you want to lock in favorable terms, then ask for a long-term contract. 

15. Watch your body language and tone.

Remain open and neutral with your body language, avoiding defensive or aggressive positions.  Likewise, keep a cool, calm, and friendly, and even tone.

16. Meet at your office or a neutral location.

Human beings are territorial like any other animal, no matter how much we think we’re evolved.  By meeting to negotiate at your office, your home, or a neutral location like a coffee shop, you’ll establish a subtle shift in power, or at least take away their unspoken advantage.

17. Silence speaks loudly.

We talk too much.  Especially when we are nervous or stressed or trying to convince someone, we tend to open our mouths and blab.  So when you first propose a price or salary or whatever number it is you’re negotiating, say it and then close your mouth and shut up.  Don’t say another word until they say “yes,” “no,” or ask a specific question.  They may hem and haw, and you’ll have to resist the overwhelming urge to jump in, but you’ll be amazed how silence is your best ally in leading them to a concrete answer.  By speaking, you’ll only let them off the hook.

18. Listen. Really listen.

Most people listen with the intent to speak forming in their heads.  Instead, actively listen to your counterpoint during a negotiation.  Focus on what they are saying, encourage them with non-verbals like shaking your head, look them in the eyes, jot notes, repeat key points back to them, and ask exploratory questions to get deeper into their pain points, goals, and desires.  They art of listening will help you close a favorable negotiation a million times more than anything you could say.

19. Keep a 10,000-foot bird’s-eye view.

Too often, we become fully engaged and embattled in the little stuff, without stepping back and looking at the big picture with perspective.  As you negotiate, be sure to ask them about their ultimate goals with their business and what they’re trying to accomplish.  Refer back to those goals often as you delve into the negotiation, showing how you’ll help them reach them.

20. Reach safe plateaus.

As you negotiate, establish psychologically safe resting places where everything is agreeable and you can move on.  Think of mountain climbers setting up a safe base camp for the night to rest before moving on.  So ask them if everything looks good and is fine and agreeable so far, and if you get their confirmation, you can move on with a great foundation to build on. 

21. Bring in a third party.

If a negotiation stalls it might not be because they don’t want to close the deal, but that you just can’t offer what they want.  Instead of walking away, think about bringing in a third-party to offer exactly what you are missing.  A win-win-win is just as good as a win-win!  Think of this like baseball general managers bringing in a third team to make players and salaries match up during a trade.