Removing LinkedIn connections that are irrelevant or inactive connections can enhance engagement and visibility by ensuring your network is composed of relevant and active individuals. This focused approach improves the quality of interactions and helps maximise the impact of your content.
Here’s a detailed approach to strategically manage your LinkedIn connections for better results.
Identify LinkedIn Connections To Remove
To reduce your connections without damaging your brand, focus on removing connections that no longer align with your current professional goals, including those from past industries, outdated roles, irrelevant target audiences, and inactive users.
- Industry Shifts: Connections from industries you no longer work in. If you’ve changed industries, maintaining connections from your previous industry may not add value.
- Role Changes: Individuals who were relevant to your previous roles but no longer align with your current job responsibilities or business focus.
- Target Audience: People who do not fall within your target audience or overall business community. Ensure your connections align with your current professional goals.
- Non-active Users: People who are rarely online or have not updated their profiles in a long time. These connections are unlikely to contribute to meaningful interactions or opportunities.
Handling Connection Requests
When you receive connection requests, consider allowing people to follow you instead of accepting every request. You can be selective about who joins your network, ensuring that only relevant and valuable connections are added. Followers can still see your content and engage with it without becoming a connection. This maintains the quality of your connections while expanding your reach.
Responding to Disconnections
LinkedIn does not notify users when they are removed from someone’s connections, this means you can prune your network quietly.
If someone notices that you have disconnected from them, a simple explanation or reconnection will probably work, I wouldn’t get into the detail of how they came to be disconnected.
Will Removing Connections Boost Engagement
We have anecdotal evidence that reducing the number of irrelevant or inactive connections on LinkedIn enhances engagement but it is not guaranteed
As you go you can track metrics such as likes, comments, shares, and overall reach and the type of person engaging to gauge if it is working for you.