LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional network with over 810 million members worldwide. As a networking platform, LinkedIn aims to connect professionals to each other and help them grow their careers. One way LinkedIn facilitates these connections is by suggesting connections to its members.
When you receive connection suggestions on LinkedIn, it means that LinkedIn’s algorithm has identified other members who it thinks could be beneficial for you to connect with based on your profile, network, and activity on the platform. There are a few main reasons why LinkedIn suggests connections:
To expand your network
LinkedIn’s primary goal with suggesting connections is to help you grow your professional network. The algorithm looks at your existing connections and profile information to find other professionals who work in similar companies, industries, or geographic locations as you do. Connecting with these people can help expand your overall professional network, which can lead to new opportunities.
To reconnect you with past coworkers or classmates
LinkedIn also looks at your work and education history to suggest connections who may be former coworkers, classmates, or alumni from your schools. Reconnecting with these people from your past can help strengthen your overall network.
To connect you with people you may know
The algorithm also looks at your contacts and connections to identify 2nd and 3rd degree connections that you may already know but aren’t directly connected to on LinkedIn. Suggesting these connections makes it easier for you to expand your network through mutual acquaintances.
To help you stay up-to-date on your industry
By identifying and suggesting connections who are influential or active in your industry, LinkedIn helps ensure you are connected to professionals, thought leaders, and organizations that can keep you up-to-date on the latest news, trends, and opportunities in your field.
Who does LinkedIn suggest you connect with?
When generating connection suggestions, LinkedIn’s algorithm pulls from a few main pools of possible connections:
People in your network’s network (2nd & 3rd degree connections)
One of the main sources for suggestions are people already within your extended network. These are 2nd and 3rd degree connections – people connected to your 1st degree connections but not directly to you. Suggesting these connections makes it easy to expand your network through mutual acquaintances.
Coworkers & classmates
LinkedIn actively looks through your work and education history to surface former coworkers, classmates, and alumni from your schools. Reconnecting with these acquaintances from your past can strengthen your professional network.
Professionals who share connections, companies, locations
LinkedIn also identifies professionals who don’t already appear in your extended network but may be good suggestions based on similarities like shared connections, employers, industries, groups, or geographic locations.
Thought leaders & influencers in your industry
To help keep you informed, LinkedIn identifies key thought leaders, influencers, and active professionals within your industry and suggests connecting with them.
People who have viewed your profile
Sometimes people you don’t already know will come across and view your LinkedIn profile. LinkedIn may then suggest connecting with some of these professionals as the initial profile view indicates they may be open to connecting.
Why are LinkedIn’s suggested connections relevant?
While you may sometimes get suggestions that don’t seem very relevant, LinkedIn’s algorithm works hard to generate useful, personalized recommendations:
It leverages extensive profile data
With over 810 million members, LinkedIn has a vast amount of profile data to leverage to understand professional relationships and make qualified suggestions.
It utilizes your 1st degree network
By identifying 2nd and 3rd degree connections within your existing 1st degree network, LinkedIn suggests people likely to be relevant based on mutual acquaintances.
It emphasizes shared attributes
Factors like shared employers, industries, locations, groups, and connections help ensure suggested connections are more likely to be useful.
It focuses on your activity
Things you actively engage with on LinkedIn, like content, companies, and groups, also informs the algorithm to make recommendations tailored to your interests.
It incorporates your profile and settings
Details explicitly provided in your profile like your skills, experience, education and location settings further help LinkedIn suggest professionals relevant to you.
Tips to get the most relevant LinkedIn recommendations
While LinkedIn’s algorithm works hard to suggest useful connections, there are a few things you can do to improve the relevance of the recommendations you receive:
Complete your profile
Filling out details about your background, experience, education, skills, and interests ensures LinkedIn can understand your professional profile and needs.
Follow companies and topics you are interested in
Actively following companies and topics helps LinkedIn identify professionals with similar interests to recommend.
Join industry relevant LinkedIn groups
Participating in niche LinkedIn groups expresses specific industries and topics you want recommendations related to.
Engage with content from influencers & thought leaders
Liking and commenting on content helps LinkedIn identify industry leaders you want to connect with.
Follow up on ‘People Also Viewed’ suggestions
The ‘People Also Viewed’ section offers tailored suggestions based on who else has viewed a profile.
Why you should connect with LinkedIn suggestions
While you shouldn’t feel obligated to connect with everyone LinkedIn suggests, there are good reasons to regularly accept relevant recommendations:
Broaden your professional network
Accepting relevant suggestions helps you efficiently and effectively expand your overall professional network.
Increase your number of 2nd & 3rd degree connections
Connecting with new 2nd and 3rd degree connections diversifies who you can reach through your extended network.
Gain access to someone’s full profile
Connecting lets you view a person’s full profile with more details about their background and mutual connections.
Interact with connections of connections
You can only message and interact with other members if you are directly connected on LinkedIn.
Receive tips and leads
New connections may provide tips, job leads, or business opportunities you otherwise wouldn’t have access to.
Develop your circle of trust
Connecting with recognized experts and thought leaders can help establish a circle of trust and advice.
Potential risks of connecting with suggestions
While there are benefits to thoughtfully adding new connections, there are also some potential downsides to be aware of:
Too many connections dilutes your network
If you connect with too many people untargeted, it dilutes the value and relevance of your overall network.
It clutters your feed and notifications
Each new connection adds updates to your feed and more notifications to stay on top of.
Spam or sales outreach
Some suggested connections may use an acceptance as an opportunity to spam you with mass messages and sales pitches.
Appearance of endorsements
Accepting suggestions may appear as endorsements and indications you know or trust someone you don’t.
Impacts on privacy
New connections increase how many professionals can view and access portions of your profile.
Harder to prune later
It takes more effort to prune inappropriate or unhelpful connections down the line.
Tips for managing LinkedIn connections
To limit any risks from accepting suggestions, keep these tips in mind:
Be selective
Review each suggestion carefully and only accept people likely to be relevant and trustworthy.
Customize notifications
Control notifications from each connection to reduce social media fatigue.
Hide feed updates
Hide irrelevant connections from your feed to avoid clutter.
Manage visibility
Limit what key connections can view and access within your profile.
Sort and group
Organize key connections into relevant lists and groups.
Prune regularly
Periodically review and remove dormant, irrelevant, or unhelpful connections.
Report spam
Utilize LinkedIn’s reporting tools to flag abusive or deceptive connections for review.
How to use LinkedIn suggested connections
While you should be selective and strategic in accepting suggestions, here are some best practices for utilizing this LinkedIn feature:
Review profiles thoroughly
Evaluate each profile before connecting to understand someone’s background, skills, and experience.
Personalize connection requests
Send customized connection invites clarifying why you want to connect.
Look for shared connections
Pay attention to mutual connections as a signal of relevance and trustworthiness.
Connect strategically
Target suggestions working in functions, companies, or industries you want to learn more about.
Follow up thoughtfully
After connecting, reach out, share relevant content, or find ways to help.
Conclusion
LinkedIn’s suggested connections can be valuable for expanding your professional network with relevant industry contacts and opportunities. But you should also be selective and proactive in evaluating each suggestion. By connecting thoughtfully, maximizing mutual acquaintances, personalizing outreach, and actively managing your ongoing network, LinkedIn’s recommendations can become a useful tool for growing your career.