One of the big challenges facing business owners and professionals is prospecting.

I have great news. It is easier than ever to prospect and to make contacts in today's online, connected, sharing everything with everybody world.

There are social networks popping up everywhere. I always recommend to clients that they have a Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn account.

All three are great business tools but today I want to share a tip with you to help you get more out of LinkedIn.

To get the most out of social media, you need to develop the right mindset about social media.

Social media is a place to develop relationships with existing and potential contacts. It is also a place to store and manage contacts. In a nutshell, social media is just a huge (almost infinite) electronic Rolodex.

Unfortunately, most people only use 10% of the potential that is offered by online social media.

In LinkedIn, you can create tags to categorize your contacts. In my case, I have categories for speakers, prospects, clients, musicians, venues, and a few others.

Here is how you can create a Tag (or category):

1) Sign into your LinkedIn account.

2) Click on Contacts tab and select My Connections from the drop-down menu.

3) Click on one of your contacts and a mini-profile will pop-up on the right side of the page.

4) In the mini-profile, click on Edit Tags and either add the person to an existing category or create a new category.

Tags allow you to have easy access to your contacts by category. You can also send eblasts to a specific category.

These Tags will also show on the left side of the page.

In addition to Tags, you will see Locations on the left side of the page. Locations segments your contacts by areas in the country. Check out some of the other links on the left side of the page.

Tags will help you organize your prospecting efforts and help you become more effective in your prospecting.

To Your Success,