“LinkedIn strengthens and extends your existing network of trusted contacts. LinkedIn is a networking tool that helps you discover inside connections”

Personally I don’t think people really understand the far-reaching power of Linkedin whereas pertaining to extending and getting the most out of just the random people you come in contact with in this world I also think the psychological genius behind the site should be pointed out. In the world of social networks, I think it is the goal of social networks like Facebook, Myspace to in a way emulate a person’s real life experience inside their social network environment. So in essence the way you interact in the real non-internet world should directly parallel your experience in these various social networking communities.

Taking this into account, the reason Linkedin is so brilliant is that there is a direct correlation behind every aspect of socializing on Linkedin to a person’s everyday common social life. For instance, on Linkedin if you don’t know somebody and you aren’t connected to them through your network you have a couple options if you want to connect with this individual. You could blindly add to them to your network and hope they accept and or you could pay a little bit of money for the ability to send a message to them.

So in essence you are taking a slight risk just for the possibility of interacting with this person that you don’t know. The parallel situation to this in real life is when you have the option of randomly trying to speak to somebody that you don’t know at a networking event. At a networking event you have two ways to connect with this person if you aren’t connected to them through your network and or friends. You could (A) blindly try to connect with this individual by going up to them and saying “hi” and introducing yourself. They then have the option of declining your connection request by not giving you their telephone # or saying they have to go or just not paying any attention to a word your saying during this conversation or (B) offer some monetary exchange for them to connect with you this could mean buying them a drink or laying some type of financial risk on the line just to connect with this person. This social situation is no different in the virtual world than on Linkedin.

Linkedin does an amazing job of enabling people to connect with other people through their present off site network that they already had before they joined Linkedin. No other site has mastered this art. LinkedIn is mainly for business networking connections; I guess the looming question is can the model work for another niche “lets just say online dating”?

In examining this model as it pertains to the Online Dating niche it appeals to a number of senses such from both a business standpoint and an engagement/usability stand point. It appeals from a business standpoint due to the factors of scalability. In this day and age one of the most difficult tasks is to create a scalable social network comprised of “die hards” who will use your site for their all-socializing needs. With a Linkedin style dating site the scalable viral growth could be nothing short of amazing as people really start to understand that the more people they bring in to the site the more they can leverage their personal networks of friends and acquaintances to find dates. This will in turn give people what I like to call intrinsic motivation to go out and recruit their friends and acquaintances to be apart of their network.

If you see this post and understand the logic and rationale that I am speaking about, I would greatly appreciate your comments on if you would use such a transparent site of “open network connecting” as I call it as it pertains to online dating. Your feedback is greatly appreciated.