Gale, I've been experimenting with the social networks for about 2 years now. Linkedin is the most fantastic tool I've found for claims professionals. First from an adjuster standpoint, you can build your online resume. Once you join
www.linkedin.com it gives you a public profile link like yours posted above. It will have a numeric number. If you click on that public profile link you can change it to a personal id like you did with the galehawkins name. Adjusters can then use it on their business cards as a link to their resume on line. I think that alone is a great feature since most exhibit shows at conferences ask you just to leave your business card. Our Linkedin profile for ClaimSmentor or Dimechimes Claims Staffing is
www.linkedin.com/in/dimechimesclaimsmentor.
I have also found it great for claims management. You'd be simply amazed at the number of claims executives directly with the carriers particpate there so claim firm owners would have direct contact info for marketing their services. There are many names on there we all recognize like Crawford and Company, State Farm, etc. Once you upload your resume (copy and paste it actually), the Linkedin system picks up your employer names in your current or past positions and shows you everyone on Linkedin that is now or formerly associated with those firms. There are just simply outstanding networking opportunities as well as claims job postings on the Groups postings and you can elect to follow a group and get an email telling you. I had no idea that there were so many great - especially staff_ job opportunities posted there.
I've had the pleasure of running into former mgmt associates that have moved on from the same carrier I used to work for, to old friends, etc. Linkedin in my opinion is definitely the best source for business firms.
I'm experimenting the last few weeks with Twitter and Facebook and although it seems everyone has one of those accounts in business these days, I hadn't really seen the benefit from an adjuster standpoint, business, or management standpoint....UNTIL last night. We were watching tv and my husband had his "Tweeter Deck" open on his laptop and got a "Tweet" and he looked at it and it was an Auto adjusting firm we follow their posts on Twitter about 11pm saying they'd just started getting carrier deployments calls for the midwest storms in MO last night. Now imagine being an adjuster with that kind of advantage seeing this immediate update and being able to call that adjusting firm and say "hey-just saw your Tweet" and I'm packed and ready to go and already on your rosters! They wouldnt have had to wait for a mass distribution email that is probably just going out today and got there first by sending a post reply (a tweet) to that adjusting firm owners post.
The blogs are fantastic too. We've had ours at Wordpress (
www.dimechimes.wordpress.com) and we will run over the 100,000 viewer mark in the next week according to wordpress stats they keep in about 1 yearof operation. The great thing is the blog software programs automatically feed to the search engines with each blog post driving new viewers to your main website so it is a form of advertisitng for your services AND providing a service to your readers who have similar interests to you such as yours in estimating for claims. There are various blog programs you can use- some you can post ads on and some you cannot. Ours is not so ours isnt income producing but you can use other blogs to generate additional revenue if you chose to.
Last but not least, Wall Street Journal has a wonderful management blog and they just recently posted this article on the 12 things different about the "Facebook" generation vs Fortune 500 companies and how these social network services will change expectations of the new generation of employees. I thnk we have all already experienced many of the trends the author points out and I've read several other articles on these new social media networks replacing blogs and forum as folks are now more into the "micro-blogging" services of Twitter, Facebook, and other immediate post programs. I think that is why we all see folks who don't want to go to archives and research forum topics. Also as we all witness, there are lots of forum followers but not alot of responders. The new social networks for micro-blogging (140 words or less posts ) advantage is that they allow anyone to follow the post and require no disclosure of id etc. They have been trained to get immediate answers in seconds through social media. I do think it is here to stay.
It is all very user friendly to use Gale so I'd highly suggest you play around with it as I think it is here to stay. Once you get involved, you will find that you wonder how your business lived without. I'll also come back and post a Harvard Business Journal article from a week or so ago that addresses the question of not having time to deal with all of those services. Basically the article says ifyou are in business and wish to stay current and customers usiing those services, you cannot afford NOT to be using them as they will be using those services to find quality services they hear about in groups they participate on and the print advertising just isn't getting the customers in like sites using the modern media networks.
Here's the link to the WSJ Management article on Social Media and 12 ways it transcends to employees we deal with today and their expectations of employers: