Alex Samuel suggests that one job requirement for journalists should be to have “500+” connections on their LinkedIn accounts. She writes that unlike many professions, journalists “live and die” by their networks, which help them find sources, experts and new outlets for their work.
As such, her advice for journalists is somewhat contrary to standard practice for the business-networking site:
“Normally, I advise people to follow LinkedIn’s recommended practice of connecting only to people you know well, because unless you know people well enough to ask for an introduction to a 3rd degree connection, it’s not helpful to have them affect your search results. But in the case of journalists, a wide net is worthwhile because you want your LinkedIn searches to turn up as many results as possible, and anyone who is at least a 3rd-degree connection will turn up in searches with a full name and job title.”
