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LinkedIn public profile url bug

Note: LinkedIn fixed this bug, so this article is no longer useful or correct

You need to include “www” in your LinkedIn address!

http://linkedin.com/in/wfeigenson goes to the LinkedIn sign-up page if you’re not logged in or a member of LinkedIn.

linkedin-www-bug

http://www.linkedin.com/in/wfeigenson takes you to my profile.

I don’t know why they would do this, since many people don’t use the “www” prefix any more. I know LinkedIn management is aware of this problem. I’ll keep checking back and update this post when they fix this bug.

Don’t miss the opportunity to be found! If your LinkedIn profile address doesn’t have your name, but rather a series of numbers – and if you want to get found on the Internet – you need to make your profile public. Here’s how you do that:

Edit your profile: ChangeLI-Publicprofile

Pick your LinkedIn identifier – in my case wfeigenson – and then set your public profile preferences (how much people who aren’t connected to you can see). If you have a common name, you may have to try several combinations before you find one that’s not taken.

Use this LinkedIn address on your business cards, email signature, and anyplace else you want to promote your personal brand.

Oops department: just realized I haven’t done this on my own blog site. But I’m going to fix that now!

Update

I’ve heard back from LinkedIn support about the questions Allyn raised in her comment. Your numeric address will no longer exist after you make this change, but LI says that the search engine updates normally happen within one week.

Posted in Personal branding.

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4 Responses

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  1. Allyn McGillicuddy says

    Walt, I think they must have fixed this bug. You may want to check.

    One note regarding changing the url for your linkedin public profile: it takes at least a few weeks for the search engines to find and index it. So a search engine query performed soon after a change to the url in LinkedIn will show the cached link for the prior url, but then if you click on it, you’ll get “page not found”.

    You may want to explain that so people who follow your advice do not panic.

    • Walter Feigenson says

      Great point Allyn. I thought the update speed would be faster. This is worth some research – I’ll see what I can find out. On second thought – I believe your numeric address is retained, so either should work. I’ve just emailed LI to see if they can provide more info.

    • Allen says

      Allyn, your March 8th entry is the first I’ve seen anywhere on the net (including in LinkedIn) where anyone has mentioned a significant delay in a change to a custom public URL taking a long time to be picked up by the search engines. It has been about three weeks since I changed my custom link to a NEW custom link and it still is not being picked up by the search engines.

      Nonetheless, I still am not sure if there is actually something wrong or if I need to wait even longer. As expected, when I reported the problem to LinkedIn customer service, they were of no help (the respondent contradicted himself and did not directly answer the question!)

      So, after 3 weeks, should I wait longer or conclude that there is a problem and try to resolve it?

      Thanks!
      Allen

  2. Susan Walls says

    Thanks for the post, Walt. I noticed this issue with LinkedIn some time ago and recommend that people ALWAYS check any URL they reference on websites, resumes, etc. to ensure the links take the user to the intended site/page.

    I’ve also noticed that individuals frequently leave out the /in/ in their referenced LinkedIn URL. Of course, the link will not work properly if the /in/ is omitted!