LinkedIn is becoming increasingly popular in Germany. The platform can indeed be helpful when looking for potential business partners, especially when you use the LinkedIn Sales Navigator.
While you might be able to identify quite a number of relevant decision makers in some distinguished industries, please consider that many of them may not be accessing their inboxes regularly. Additionally, many German social media users are (still) not open to communicating with people outside their network(s) – no matter how full or empty their inboxes may be.
Another platform that many Germans know is XING. I, personally do not use it anymore, but it cannot harm to upload your profile. You can use XING for checking out people (though, for proper research, you need a premium profile, i.e. paid account, and even that — from my experience — is not convenient and does not deliver satisfactory results).
What I, however, increasingly use, are the matchmaking tools that trade show organizers are offering. For example, you can currently find me on embedded world networking app and the one offered by LogiMAT, called LogiMAT.digital.
If you like, let’s connect on LinkedIn, and I am happy to help you get in touch with people in the real world over here in Germany.
