How many contacts on your LinkedIn do you actually contact? Narrowing it down, how many of them have you actually met?
Microsoft’s LinkedIn has taken a step to change that. In a mail, I received from Sara Harrington, VP Legal at LinkedIn, she outlined changes to be made to the terms of service starting June 7, 2017. But, she didn’t fail to include two upcoming feature releases. One of which is the optional ‘meet-up’ feature which allows members find other nearby LinkedIn members. For instance, BellaRose, another LinkedIn member and I coincidentally attend a summer conference, we can find ourselves via the ‘meet-up’ feature.
However, at this stage, it is unclear whether the LinkedIn member to be found must be a connection or just any member. Although, what we know is that the person must have opted-in for the ‘meet-up’ service to enable their visibility to other members. This is akin to the ‘read receipt’ on most apps such as WhatsApp and Twitter. Where only people who turn on their read receipt will be able to see when other people read their messages. As expected, you control how long your location is shared with other members.
This might be a strategy to drive up their mobile app usage as the ‘meet-up’ feature would be limited to mobile devices. As of Q2 of 2016, only 59% of LinkedIn unique visiting members accessed it via Statista.
Unanswered questions in my head include:
- Would I really like to meet other LinkedIn members at conferences, events or by my office?
- What would be the foreseeable future of this feature?
- Could this increase their user (engagement) base?
Other updates to the privacy policy shared include productivity bots that serve as your digital assistant, increased profile visibility etc. User agreements were also updated. Check it out here.