Posted by Recently LinkedIn announced that due to an updated Twitter policy users can no longer have their tweets automatically appear as updates in LinkedIn. LinkedIn suggests that you update your status in LinkedIn and send it to Twitter, rather than sending tweets to LinkedIn. However, for many, that may not be an optimal workflow.
Most lawyers have little time to maintain a steady stream of updates in multiple social media channels, and connecting them – the “post once, update many” approach – often works well. While there are social media dashboards like Hootsuite (How To… training August 21!) to get the job done, the seamless “set it and forget it” approach of sending tweets directly to LinkedIn was a nice feature. So, what to do?
Thanks to @mikemcbride, who reminded me of IFTTT (If This Then That). IFTTT gives users the ability to write “recipes” to combine tasks on the internet based on a trigger. For instance, if someone retweets or mentions you on Twitter you set up IFTTT to automatically thank them for the mention. Or, if the weather forecast calls for rain send an email reminder to take an umbrella. How about if someone mentions one of your clients in a tweet send it to a shared Evernote folder? IFTTT works with many channels, including email, most social networks, DropBox, SMS, ReaditLater, Evernote, and hundreds more. You choose which channels to turn on. The possibilities are endless. In response to Twitter’s new policy there are a number of “recipes” already written to keep your Twitter stream flowing to LinkedIn. Remember to keep it clean, as Twitter characters and hashtags can detract from the update in LinkedIn. There are recipes including ones with limitations like no replies or retweets sent to LI or only post those with the #in hashtag. As is often the case, when one door closes…