What do to with Linkedin Messages when communication is over?

[arunkw]

Linkedin has recently removed archive function from the messages.
So there are only 2 options left either to delete the message or leave it as-it-is (in read form).

What do you guys do as a best practice?

1. Delete and you get relief of empty inbox (like we do it for our emails) but at the same time, when the same person send message after 3 or 6 months, I have no clue what was the last thread, what we were talking about and Ironically the other person might be knowing what we had spoke and what was the context - One hack could be to keep on copy pasting the conversion to that person's profile note (an extra effort)
2. Leave it and your brain still thinks oh some things needs to be done to this pile of message - then you have to remind to brain No this is a special case all messages here are read-only and this is just a archive message list which dosen't need any action.

 

[TesTeq]

I've never treated LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram messaging seriously. For important conversations I switch to email. I don't care what will happen with all this stuff.

 

[Oogiem]

Linkedin has recently removed archive function from the messages.
So there are only 2 options left either to delete the message or leave it as-it-is (in read form).

First question is how important are those messages to you.

I'm a big fan of archiving and saving most everything. I've had to go back to 20 and even 30 year old e-mail exchanges to pull out information needed for current projects so I'd try to find a way to save them myself. So temper my comments with that experience of mine.

I don't use LinkedIn but is there an open API to get access to your linked in messages? Has anyone written a program to go capture them all in a text file like TweetKeeper has done for Twitter messages? If there is an API can you write such a program?

I'd look for some sort of third party tool that will alllow you to capture conversations and store them in either plain text or PDF files somewhere else. If you need to categorize them I'd find some sort of cataloging software. Mine is DEVONThink but there are other options.

A quick google indicated that LinkedIn ffers an archive function to save your messages to a file. Not as convenient as some systems but you can get them out. I'd still look for a 3rd party tool that might keep conversations and order of the messages.

 

[mcogilvie]

Put useful information in personal reference system. I have never found anything useful in LinkedIn.

 

[TesTeq]

Has anyone written a program to go capture them all in a text file like TweetKeeper has done for Twitter messages?

Interesting. Why do you need such program when you can download all your tweets from Twitter as a CSV file?

 

[Oogiem]

Interesting. Why do you need such program when you can download all your tweets from Twitter as a CSV file?

I find that it's harder to search for stuff in a .CSV file.

 

[TesTeq]

I find that it's harder to search for stuff in a .CSV file.

I've imported CSV to Excel but it wasn't a great success since tweets can contain line breaks and it breaks the conversion.

 

[Oogiem]

I've imported CSV to Excel but it wasn't a great success since tweets can contain line breaks and it breaks the conversion.

Exactly, TweetKeeper makes a plain text file that is a lot ewasier to handle and search if you do need to go back to something. On;y happens to me rarely but I'd rather take a bit more space on my computer with a searchable archive.

 

[rogfrich]

Hi, my first post.

I looked into whether or not If This Then That (a free service which connects online services which otherwise wouldn't work together) works with LinkedIn. It does, but only as an "action" - so you can use it post to LinkedIn automatically, but it can't respond to actions happening within LinkedIn. That's a shame - if it could, you'd be able to automatically save LinkedIn messages to Google Drive or similar.

As a very low-tech option, what about screenshots? Most of my LinkedIn conversation threads fit on one screen, so a simple "print screen" would grab them as an image you could save. Not great, but it should capture all of the key information (the message content and the other person's LinkedIn ID).

I'm with TesTeq, though - my LInkedIn conversations tend to escalate to email pretty quickly if they are of any consequence. I happily click "delete" once I'm done with them.

 

[richardjones]

I don't think people are using such social medias for serious conversation. Most of them are using official mails and phone calls for such communication

 

[Oogiem]

I don't think people are using such social medias for serious conversation. Most of them are using official mails and phone calls for such communication

It varies, I have fairly serious conversations with people on twitter but never use linkedin. But serious or not there is still often a need to keep track of the conversations. Sometimes the less serious nones are the ones that you really need to refer to later.