Mar 22, 2020 in Coaching

5 LinkedIn Profile Tips: How to make a GREAT LinkedIn Profile

LinkedIn a prime platform to to connect to new career opportunities and these are the tips to optimize your profile.

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LinkedIn is a powerful resource tool that can be used for professional networking and career opportunities. A few know of LinkedIn's advanced features and how to unlock its potential to the greatest extent possible. You can build your professional connections and networks, you could share your past and previous work experience, as well as your education and skills. It is an opportunity for you to find jobs and also connect to new endless opportunities. 

The numbers:

LinkedIn has about 700 million users. About 77% of recruiters utilize LinkedIn to find candidates and there are over 30 million companies listed on the platform. That means that if you are a job seeker and you do not have a LinkedIn profile, you are excluding yourself from a myriad of opportunities!

LinkedIn has a  well-deserved reputation as the most useful professional network for business owners and professionals, but many users are not taking advantage of all that LinkedIn has to offer. Like most networking platforms, it can be a quick and easy way to reconnect with a co-worker from way back when or an old college friend, but through building an outstanding LinkedIn profile, you can also connect to new opportunities.

Here are 5 LinkedIn profile tips to help you build an outstanding LinkedIn profile:

1. Have a Goal in Mind

It is very important to have a goal in mind. Are you looking for a new job opportunity or looking to build your recognition as a thought leader in your industry or are you looking to expand your professional network? Whatever that goal is, make sure that you have it clearly in your mind before you start optimizing. When building your profile, everything that you do from here on out, should it be aligned to this main goal.

2. Catchy Headline

Your headline is one of the first things that people see when they come across your profile, and thus it is one of the most important aspects. You want to make sure that your headline distinguishes you, but also relates back to your original goal. With over 700 million users you need to be able to distinguish yourself and to stand out. Your LinkedIn headline is a great way to do this. 

My formula for creating an outstanding LinkedIn headline is:

Job title or target job title | your specialization or career goal | passion or a life motto. 

Here is an example from my LinkedIn profile and if you are a job seeker, you could use these examples.

For my profile, I have my job title, my specialization, and my passion:

Founder of Hired institute | Career Strategist and Coach | Global advocate for women and girls. 

And for job seekers, you can use your target job title, your career goal, and a passion:

Business analyst | MBA candidate - May 2020 seeking full-time opportunity | youth advocate.

3. Succulent Summary

Your headline was the appetizer and your summary is the main course. A summary helps you further break down the goal or objective of your profile. This is a chance for you to elaborate on your professional experience, your key skills and achievements, and ultimately why you are passionate about the work that you do or the work you would like to get into. When you are writing your summary, you can think of the following questions: 

  • What do you do and what do you want people to know about you?
  • Why do you do it or why are you interested in that career or industry?
  • How do you do what you do? 
  • What have you achieved or accomplished? 

You want to use a combination of paragraphs and bulleted lists to break out your text and to add more depth. Think of this as telling your story, so keep it conversational. Write like you speak. You want to optimize your profile with as many keywords related to your career or your industry as possible. Keywords really helped to make your profile stand out and rank in the searches.

4. Reflect Your Resume

Your LinkedIn profile can be considered as your virtual or online resume. As a result, it is important that you include your work history or your past work experience, education, your accomplishments, any projects that you've worked on, key skills (very important!) and also recommendations that you've received. Recommendations are a great way to speak about your character as well as the value you offer in your work. So feel free to reach out to past classmates, teammates, professors, supervisors, managers, and ask them for recommendations. They will really help to enhance your profile. 

5. Call To Action

A call to action is a great way to bring your entire profile together. Place a Call to Action at the end of your Summary or About section. This call to action is telling people what action steps you want them to take after viewing your profile. Here are some examples of great call to actions:

“Connect with me if you want to chat about the current real estate markets in Miami.”

“If you are looking to create an app for your business, I'm your guy. Let's get in touch.”

“If you are seeking a fast- learning, curious, results-oriented summer intern, let's get in contact.”

Bonus Tips: 

  • Headshot and cover image: If you include a headshot and a cover image, you are seven times more likely to appear in searches in the LinkedIn platform. So most definitely make sure that you have a headshot that shows your personality (smile!), has good lighting, and a plain background.
  • Connections: Make sure that you build your connections by connecting first with people that you know, people that are in your immediate circle and then branching out.  
  • Keywords: Keywords are key! Use career-centered industry-driven keywords throughout your profile to be found by people in your industry and especially by recruiters. I

I hope you take these tips to enhance your LinkedIn profile, 10X your views, engagement and connections, ad ultimately make use of ALL the platform has to offer. LinkedIn is a power resource that can and should be utilized for your professional growth.  

https://youtu.be/PeFxou8H3Ks

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