Linkedin is the social network for professionals. There are over 350 million LinkedIn users, about 187 million unique visitors access the website monthly, and it has a reach of over 200 countries and territories, so it makes sense to be on this social network if you want to connect with other professionals. In this article, our experts give you LinkedIn Profile Tips to create a killer profile.
Q. Give us your top 5 guidelines to create an excellent LinkedIn profile
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A. Cendrine Marrouat (Social media coach, blogger, curator, and author)
1. Complete your profile
- Take the time to add information: industry and location, current and past positions, education, and skills.
- Upload a professional photo.
- Include an optimized tagline and relevant keywords in your descriptions.
- Promise only what you can deliver. Avoid claiming bombastic words and titles. We want to connect with a human being.
2. Feature your SlideShare presentations. You can do it directly via LinkedIn or your SlideShare account.
3. Optimize your public profile link.
4. Focus on relevant connections. No one cares about the number of connections you have.
5. Take advantage of recommendations
6. Bonus tip: Publish content on LinkedIn
A. David Leonhardt (Ghostwriter)
I think my top 2 guidelines are pretty obvious and apply to all social media platforms:
1. Make sure your profile is as complete as possible, or at least as comprehensive as reasonable
2. Make sure that you have a professional avatar that represents the image you want to portray. No avatar is bad, but a silly avatar (unless you run a clown agency) is just as bad. And I have seen some bad ones on LinkedIn.
3. Get recommendations. These are like testimonials, in that it’s not you, but somebody else who is saying how great you are.
4. Post at least three times on LinkedIn Pulse. These posts will show up under “Posts” on your profile. These posts help define you.
5. Add links to at least five articles you have written. These will show up under whatever job you have listed them – yes, you have to list them under one of your jobs. The first five listed under each job will show up. It does not matter what your career is; even an engineer or a pastry cook is more impressive if he or she has written on the topic.
A. Edwin Dearborn (CEO)
1. Quality photo. This will be your very first impression for the majority of people who connect with.
2. A unique description after your name. Do not go with generic or bland, yet be truthful.
3. Lots of great content, paying attention to keywords
4. Endorsements of your character
5. Having many connections.
A. Brooke (Top 5 Guidelines to Create a Great LinkedIn)
Your LinkedIn profile can be a great tool for hiring managers to take a look into your professional life. You want to keep it top notch with these five tips for how to create a great LinkedIn profile:
1. Treat it like a resume. You should separate your professional experience in the same way you would on your resume. LinkedIn helps you to format your profile this way by walking you through the steps. I like to use bullet points to lay out my job duties at each company so that my profile is concise and to-the-point. Think about what you’d take the time to read, a bulleted list or paragraph’s about a strangers work experience? The bulleted list caters to the short attention spans and gets the right information across. It also leaves room for you to explain or further discuss job duties if asked. Make sure and have your education portion filled out, along with your interests and expertise at the bottom. This will allow others to look for common qualities, and also allow them to endorse you for specified skills.
2. Make use of the summary option. The more you have on your LinkedIn, the better it will look. Connections like to see a full summary to get a good general idea of what you are about. Fill the summary discussing what kinds of things interest you about your job, what you’ve learned thus far, and what you are hoping to learn in the future.
3. Keep up with Connections. The more connections you have, the better, but make sure they are relevant to your field. Someone with, say, 500 connections on LinkedIn looks like he/she has got it all figured out more than someone with, say, 50 connections. That also leads to a higher likelihood of getting noticed by a friend, or friend-of-a-friend who is looking to hire someone in your field. You should also keep in mind that the more connections you have, the more likely you are to receive skill endorsements and recommendations, and those look great on a LinkedIn profile. Nothing says you know what you’re doing better than recommendations from those who’ve worked with you in the past.
4. Add documents and publications. Depending on your field, you may have written something somewhere along the lines in the professional realm. If so, add it to your LinkedIn. Press releases, newsletters or other types of projects will showcase your skills and your knowledge in the subject matter. Publishing these works to your LinkedIn is a great way to show connections, and possible hiring managers, that you aren’t all talk. You do know your material.
5. Update. Stay active on your LinkedIn. You don’t want to update all of your information and then put it off to the side to be forgotten. Look at your home feed and interact with your connections by sharing, commenting and liking their material. Share your own updates and get some of that communication coming in as well. The more active you are on your LinkedIn, the more people will come and view your page. That means more opportunity to be recognized by the right person.
A. Sunita Biddu (Social Media & Blogging Coach & Strategist)
- Keep your headline professional and specific. Instead of starting with Founder, write that conveys your skill. For example, Leadership Speaker, Chief Marketing Strategist and so on.. And end with Founder @ YourCompany if needed
- Share a professional story in the personalized manner. Keep it simple, short and meaningful to the reader with power words and industry keywords. Remember that people on Linkedin will connect with you for a professional reason most of the times.
- Arrange a minimum five relevant recommendations from people you’ve worked with in the past. More, the merrier.
- Add a few professional case studies or whitepapers if available. This authenticates your profile and adds credibility.
- Use Linkedin Publisher and make minimum one post a month. This gives you an opportunity to share your expertise with huge Linkedin userbase via pulse. Publishing posts attract high quality connects and prospects across the globe.
A. Dade Ronan, MMIS (Context is Diva)
Do you want to obtain a high visibility LinkedIn profile, then you must optimize your profile. Here are five techniques to help you reach that goal:
- Make sure you give an email address not only visible to your connections, but also in the section called “Advice for contacting (your name).” What good is it when you have a #TotallyAwesome LinkedIn profile, and nobody can contact you.
- Add any PowerPoint presentations that you have created on SlideShare.com to your LinkedIn profile. Since LinkedIn now owns SlideShare, SlideShare has a setting that allows you to link/add your presentation to your LinkedIn profile. This looks very professional.
- Include a photo, video, or presentation to each of your “Experience” entries. Looking at too much text tends to make people gloss over it, but adding something visually appealing will make them stop and read about your work experience.
- Include a promo video on your “Education” section of your LinkedIn profile. This adds that extra touch that says you are not only a college graduate, but also recommend them.
- Write at least 3 “Posts” that speak directly to your industry or area of influence. These posts will automatically be added to your LinkedIn profile and tell the world you are not only experienced in your field, but also able to speak and communicate about it.
Making these changes, you give you that additional lift needed to place you above par and launch you into #TotallyAwesome status.
A. Catkinson (Inbound Marketing )
1 – A profile that is clean and straight to the point
Potential employers want to know as fast as possible who you are and what do you do – and if what you do would help them. So, make sure you add a professional picture where you look well groomed. Also, add your professional title. Avoid long bios.
2 – Answer this: What makes YOU different?
Another way to ask this question is, what value do you bring to your potential employer or client? What can you do for them? What is different about working with you? How do you make work fun and productive? If you manage to answer all these questions in your Linked In profile, your prospective employers or clients will pay more attention to your profile.
3 – They don’t care about you. They only care about themselves
Don’t talk about yourself and how many awards or certifications you have. Instead, talk about what you’ve done for others and what you can do for your prospective clients.
4 – Catch the attention
On Linked In, you are not able to use bold text. However, you can use CAPS to bring attention. For example, you can make some headlines all caps: WHAT I DO? WHO I WORK WITH?
5- Add your contact information
Make yourself available, don’t act like you are a celebrity (unless you are one of course). Add any contact information that you feel comfortable sharing publically. This could be email, phone, address; you name it. just make sure you always reply fast.
This is just an outline; I can elaborate more on this if you’re interested in a full article.
I’ve written a piece on Linked In before http://www.daynews.com/social-media/2017/06/update-linkedin-profile-26691
I look forward to speaking with you.
Thanks.
A. Minuca Elena (Minuca creates awesome influencer roundups that provide quality content, brings huge traffic, and helps bloggers connect with influencers.)
To create a great LinkedIn profile, you need to follow these steps:
1. Add a high-quality professional headshot as your profile image. No party or selfie shots. It is the first thing on your profile that a potential employer or business partner notices.
2. Fully complete your resume. Focus on highlighting your unique skills and career achievements
3. List your education experience, community involvement, and professional recognition/awards. All these can help you stand out from the crowd.
4. Drive traffic to your profile by adding keywords that people are searching.
5. Proofread everything and make sure you don’t have any grammar or spelling mistakes