Are Professional Networking Sites Worthwhile?

I’m having a tough time deciding whether or not online professional networking sites are absolutely brilliant or a waste of time, especially in SEO. We’re talking the LinkedIn / Spoke / Xing brigade; you fill out information about yourself but you aren’t required to provide a list of your favourite movies or whether your body time is “athletic” or has “more to love.” Instead, your information is all about your education, work experience and various fields of expertise.

It all sounds fantastic. What better way to market yourself? The sites in question are generally very tidy, clean, professional  affairs. They’re what corporate offices’ waiting rooms would be like if they were web pages.

From my short time in search, I’ve determined that being well educated, passionate and intelligent is only part of the deal. Your personality is equally important, and it’s hard to get charisma or flair across on LinkedIn. Although I’m well aware that this industry is probably more personality-driven than some others, I do wonder whether these sites are as useful as they seem.

For starters, it’s hard to build an online relationship. Through various other online means, I “met” quite a few SEOs before actually coming face to face with them. However, I did not communicate with them on professional networking sites and I’m convinced that, had we all been using a more formal site, we’d not have been networking and forming relationships in quite the way that we were. As it were, we used sites and messaging services that better allow users to flaunt their personalities.

There is the question of potential clients reaching you or your company through these sites, but we’ve found that the companies and people who we end up working with virtually never find us through a professional networking sites. Did I say “virtually”? I meant just plain “never.”

Granted, there are professional fields where anything personal or informal is not acceptable. If you wish to have an online presence in these worlds, you’ll find the sites I’m questioning to be of great use. For me, though, I don’t have the drive to keep a quality, up-to-date LinkedIn profile, as I’ve found the most rewarding and profitable SEO relationships don’t require such a formal platform. What do you guy think? Is it worth maintaining what amounts to an online resumé in our industry? Or is the “well, it can’t hurt” argument just not enough to make it worthwhile?

UPDATE: For those who are interested, here’s a really sweet guide on SEO’ing your LinkedIn profile. Still might not help you find drinking buddies, though 🙂