How to contact people on LinkedIn without using InMail

Want to contact someone directly on LinkedIn?

A trick that seems to be not universally known is that if you are in the same group as a person, you can send her a direct message, even if you are not connected to her.

This proves very useful if you are doing research on an industry. Join some groups that are popular, and you can scroll through the membership and send people a direct message with a question, or invite them to connect.

Note: the default is that someone in a group you join can contact you directly, but there is an option to opt out and block messages. In my experience, only a small percentage of people opt out.