LinkedIn is growing in importance as a tool for professional and small business networking. Here are a few things worth knowing about the world’s second most popular social network.

• The average household income of a LinkedIn user is $109,000, and most of these members are business decision makers.
• LinkedIn has built a registered user base of over 100 million, up from just 32 million in 2008, and is growing at over one person per second.
• LinkedIn’s corporate customers have grown since 2008 to over 4.8 million.
• LinkedIn’s hiring solutions revenue for the first quarter of this year totaled $46.3 million compared to $16.9 million in the first quarter of 2010.
• According to Howes, making money, expanding their businesses, networking, and finding a job are probably the most important reasons the average consumer creates a profile and connects with others through LinkedIn.
• He also notes that, compared to the way businesses have networked and promoted their services in the past, LinkedIn is more efficient and less expensive.

A while back, I enrolled in LinkedInfluence, an online training course by Howes’s and his business partner Sean Malarkey. I have personally gotten a lot out of this course, and I think you will, too. Sean and Lewis are two really well-respected experts on Twitter and LinkedIn. I connected with them on the Third Tribe Marketing group a while back, and had an opportunity not long ago to interview Lewis for a Technorati article on LinkedIn’s recent IPO.

LinkedInfluence will help you really understand how to use LinkedIn to expand your professional network and gain career and business leads. I personally joined this program and have seen the benefits. I’ve gained new followers, expanded my network, and been offered new business opportunities based on what I learned. At this point, I can easily say that I have experienced at least a ten-fold return on my investment.

More importantly, I finally understand the power of this great tool, and can share my knowledge with others. I’ve already shared tips and tricks with my clients that have helped them with business and job leads.

But there is more…Sean and Lewis have figured out some incredible new techniques for increasing your Twitter  following and you’ll get those as a bonus for purchasing this course. I haven’t tried many of these techniques, but will soon.

Click the link below for a sneak peek at LinkedInfluence.

I hope you will check it out. LinkedInfluence was one of the best investments I made in the last year.