LinkedIn Connection Request, Why Must I Add an Email Address?

LinkedIn Account Restricted

I often get questions from people regarding LinkedIn. When I feel the question is shared by others, I post it here on my blog for all to read.

Question:
I AM SO SURPRISED I AM FACING A BIG PROBLEM:WHY NOW????BEFORE I USED TO INVITE FRIENDS AND PEOPLE TO JOIN MY LINKED IN NETWORK ONLY BY PRESSING CONNECT.NOW I AM SURPRISED I COULD DO THIS DIRECTLY I SHOULD KNOW THE EMAIL OF THE PERSON I WANT TO INVITE????IS THIS A SERVICE????SURE IT IS A VERY BAD SERVICE FROM THIS NETWORK.I AM WAITING FOR EXPLANATIONS.URGENTLYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY.REGARDS RIMA

Answer:

Hi Rima!

I don’t work for LinkedIn– I am just a person who offers a service to help people craft professional LinkedIn profiles. Regardless, I feel your pain. You see my account was once restricted too. It happened because I was rather loose and carefree in my LinkedIn invitation requests. That was back when I was young and naive and I sent invites to lots and lots of people despite not knowing or trusting them all that well.

You see, this is against LinkedIn’s User Agreement:

Any other use of LinkedIn contrary to our mission and purpose (such as seeking to connect to someone you do not know or trust, or to use information gathered from LinkedIn commercially unless expressly authorized by LinkedIn) is strictly prohibited and a violation of this Agreement.

So this is what happened: You sent invitations to connect with people who you didn’t know or trust. These people then marked you as either SPAM or I DON’T KNOW.

Your LinkedIn Account was Restricted

Once you get 5 people marking you as either SPAM or I DON’T KNOW, your account becomes restricted. This means that you must enter a person’s email address if you ask them to connect with you on LinkedIn as a friend.

LinkedIn does this because they don’t want you SPAMMING their membership despite how good-natured your connection request may be. SPAM is considered unsolicited bulk email correspondence and a definite no-no.

LinkedIn Invitation RestrictionThe good news is you may be able to unrestrict your account. By visiting this link, you must promise LinkedIn that you will be a good person and won’t ask people you don’t know or trust to connect with you on LinkedIn.

Sometimes this link works… sometimes it doesn’t.

When my account was restricted, I had no choice but to live with the restriction. And live with it I did for well over a year. But one day, the sun rose, birds sang and my account magically unrestricted itself. It was a good day that day.

So what do you do?

LinkedIn Connection Request1. Live with it. Stop inviting people you don’t know well to connect with you on LinkedIn. Or at the very least, join a similar group to the person you are inviting so you can state that you belong to a similar LinkedIn Group. Or you can invite LIONs to connect with you. LIONs typically include their email in their headline and summary so it’s an easy copy and paste.

2. Lie. Rather than saying you are friends with the person, state that you worked together at the same company or went to school together… even if you didn’t.

3. Grovel. Contact LinkedIn’s Tech Support and plead your case. Ask them nicely to remove the restriction. They might take pity on you and remove the restriction upon your LinkedIn account.

It seems to me that you are trying to be a LION (LinkedIn Open Networker) but aren’t entirely aware of the etiquette. Lucky for you, I wrote an entire blog post all about How to be a LinkedIn LION.

I also wrote a book: 12 Mind Blowing Strategies to EXPAND Your LinkedIn Network. (Proceeds from the sale of this book go to the Donna Serdula Pizza Fund).

I wish you the best of luck! And if anyone reading this has any questions about LinkedIn you’d like me to answer– COMMENT in the comments section below… just scroll down! 🙂

–Donna

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7 Comments

  1. Sometimes, part of the problem is people asking you to “connect” on LinkedIn yet they don’t provide an email address or otherwise indicate to make such a connection (such as joining a mutual group).

    A workaround I found (albeit nerdy) is to do a WHOIS domain name search on the person. Sometimes their actual email address is listed and that very well may be the same one used on LinkedIn. Worked for me earlier this week. Use diligently and with caution…or if your potential super-user connection forgot to share their email address 🙂

  2. Mohammed Faizan says:

    Hi Donna
    I am facing this problem from past 1 week.When ever i want to connect to some one,I would press connect and the LinkedIn will take me to page asking about whether we are classmates\friends\groups and below was the personal note box.

    Now when ever I am connecting to some one,it is directly connecting without asking for my personal note and it displays a message invitation sent.

    I am used to sending a personnel message before connecting. So it would be great if you can tell me how can I enter my personnel message if it is not showing that personnel page & connecting directly.

    Thanks & Regards
    Faizan

  3. Hello Donna – where did you find the information that you referenced here, “Once you get 5 people marking you as either SPAM or I DON’T KNOW, your account becomes restricted.”

    I am trying to validate this specific issue and have not found this specific information.

    Thanks for any help

    Teddy

  4. Very nice article Donna!
    I faced this in the past before reading your article. I used your #3 by contacting the support team and ended up with the “unrestrict your account” page. That’s how my account got back to normal state. However, I have no clue how some people keep connecting and adding 300 connections per week as read by some of the social media writer. 🙂

    Cheers!

  5. The new update for LinkedIn connect app is Terrible. After 800 connects through previous app this one gives out your personal email And or cell numbers. Just deleted this app permanently

  6. sampath kumar says:

    Hi

    10 days back I created free linkedin account and added 10 connections and joined 5 groups…..after one week I opened my linkedin account and they gave me free premium for 2 months.How this happen can any one help me

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