LinkedIn Premium for PR & marketing ProsAlmost all public relations and marketing professionals have LinkedIn accounts, but should they pay extra for LinkedIn Premium subscriptions? LinkedIn recently revamped its subscription levels, downgrading its free services while enhancing premium subscriptions. That caused at least some users to re-evaluate their subscription levels.

Job hunters, recruiters and sales people have been main users of premium subscriptions, but PR and marketing people should also consider joining, says Mike O’Neil, president of Integrated Alliances. O’Neil told CIO that LinkedIn Premium is the “best monthly investment I have ever made.”

“Unfortunately, many people pay for LinkedIn and they don’t put in the effort,” he said. “It’s kind like an athletic club membership.”

An Array of Membership Levels

Monthly premium memberships range from $29.99 for job seekers to $119.99 for recruiters.  An all-purpose business plus plan is $59.99 a month. Besides costs, the confusing pricing plans pose the largest disadvantage.

These are some of the main benefits premium membership offers professionals in PR, marketing and other areas.

Advanced search capabilities. Premium subscribers can access advanced search filters. They can sift through the millions of professional profiles to find ideal clients or customers as well as blog posts and online training courses. PR agencies can search for new clients, and media relations can research journalists and their publications.

Premium users can refine searches by groups, years of experience, function, seniority level, interests, company size, and date users joined. That enables them to craft more personalized inquires.

Most people don’t realize it, but LinkedIn is one of the world’s largest search engines. Every single piece of content published and shared on the site gets indexed, sorted and categorized based on keywords, hashtags and more, says John Nemo, a LinkedIn marketing expert, in Social Media Today.

Who’s viewed your profile? Premium members can learn who’s viewed their profile. That means you can know who’s a warm lead are and engage them in real-time by inviting them to connect or messaging them.

And, because LinkedIn’s advanced filters let you see where a person lives, works, went to school, and so on, you can quickly and easily personalize your interaction.

“The name of the game with lead generation on LinkedIn is having context for your conversations, along with a 1-on-1, personalized approach,” Nemo advises.

Additional data. With a premium account, you can access exclusive insights, such as company employee numbers. You can see the growth and decline of a company’s employees, as well as the average tenure at that company. That reveals the company’s stability, or lack of it.

They can also see employee distribution in areas such as administration or sales. “Take this information and determine in what functions the company is growing and shrinking, and see if there’s opportunity for you,” explains LinkedIn marketing expert Viveka von Rosen in Social Media Today.

Messaging. Paying members can send a limited number of InMail messages to others even if they are not connected with them. If you send a message that gets a reply, you get that message credit back. Paying members can also opt for an open profile. This will allow other members who are not first-level connections to easily send you private messages. Messaging allows you to engage privately and more easily with prospects, clients and others.

Bottom Line: Salesmen, recruiters and job hunters sometimes pay extra for premium LinkedIn accounts, but marketing and PR pros might also like the enhanced features. Paying members gain additional research and networking capabilities that can improve job performance and boost careers. Whether or not the additional benefits are worth the costs depends on how you use them, experts caution.