LinkedIn Profile Tips, Tricks and Techniques - WorkOne · LinkedIn Profile Tips, Tricks and...

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LinkedIn Profile Tips, Tricks and Techniques Profile Picture Everyone starts off with this suggestion because it is the most important and most ignored. A professional headshot includes one person. No one else should be cleverly cropped out of the photo or moved to the side. The person should be smiling and professionally dressed. The photo should be a professional looking headshot with a solid background. Summary Include a thorough summary of your qualifications. The summary is a quick snapshot of unique skills and qualifications. Use keywords that describe the type of job you are interested in. List responsibilities and accomplishments in bullet point format to make them easier to identify. Your summary should answer these questions: 1. Who are you? 2. What are you great at? 3. Why do you do this type of work? 4. What type of position are you looking for? Participate in Groups It’s not enough to join groups; you need to participate. You can join up to 50 groups. Even that number may be too hard to manage. Pick out no more than 5 groups with which you can consistently contribute valuable information. Once you have joined, “Like” and “Comment” your way to proper and effective participation.

Transcript of LinkedIn Profile Tips, Tricks and Techniques - WorkOne · LinkedIn Profile Tips, Tricks and...

LinkedIn Profile Tips, Tricks and Techniques Profile Picture Everyone starts off with this suggestion because it is the most important and most ignored. A professional headshot includes one person. No one else should be cleverly cropped out of the photo or moved to the side. The person should be smiling and professionally dressed. The photo should be a professional looking headshot with a solid background. Summary Include a thorough summary of your qualifications. The summary is a quick snapshot of unique skills and qualifications. Use keywords that describe the type of job you are interested in. List responsibilities and accomplishments in bullet point format to make them easier to identify.

Your summary should answer these questions: 1. Who are you? 2. What are you great at? 3. Why do you do this type of work? 4. What type of position are you looking for?

Participate in Groups

It’s not enough to join groups; you need to participate. You can join up to 50 groups. Even that number may be too hard to manage. Pick out no more than 5 groups with which you can consistently contribute valuable information. Once you have joined, “Like” and “Comment” your way to proper and effective participation.

LinkedIn Profile Tips, Tricks and Techniques, Page 2

Connection Maintenance Optimize your LinkedIn account by connecting with colleagues, clients, friends and family. As new people are added to your database, tag them with categories like finance, marketing, sales, engineering or accounting. Tags make it easier to filter your connections and find certain people.

Professional Headline Your headline is a descriptive title that represents who you are, what you do, and who you do it for. Make your headline stand out:

1. Include one adjective that describes you. 2. Add what you do and/or what you are very

good at. 3. Add who or what types of companies you

do it for.

Volunteer Work Counts List any work that you have completed with your church, nonprofit or school. Volunteer work can display organizational and leadership skills that are just as applicable as in for profit positions. Include any language proficiencies (spoken and written). Finally, special projects should be included with results achieved.

Status Updates Yes, there are status updates on LinkedIn. However, instead of what you had for dinner, share an article you read (or wrote). Your connections will see these updates in their news feed and in their weekly updates. Make sure that you specialize your updates around a theme. This focus identifies you as a subject matter expert.

Verbs! Use action words to describe what you have done. Words like: Exceeded, Implemented, Negotiated, Illustrated and Strengthened are words that illustrate the contribution you made to the organization. Couple these words

with the results of participating on a team or project.

Your professional experience section should set you apart from the competition. Who are your friends? Do not try to connect with everyone. It is not a numbers game whereby the person with the most connections wins. Connect with people with whom you share common professional interests and ideas. When you connect with someone, you expose him or her to your connections. Similarly, your new connection has access to your contact information (e.g. - email, phone number, social media platforms, etc.).

Example Headlines

Energetic Sales Executive Providing Excellent Customer Service and Strong Follow-Through for Companies in the

Technology Industry.

Detail-Oriented Project Manager Serving SharePoint Developers in Today’s High Tech Offices.

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Dates? Dates of graduation do not need to be included on your LinkedIn profile. Leaving the graduation dates on can lead to age discrimination. Dates of employment are considered professional because they demonstrate time on the job and can be perceived as showing mastery of a field.

Professional Experience Complete your professional experience section to the best of your ability. Include dates of employment, location and the name of the company. When possible, insure the logo of the company is displayed, especially for large, well-respected corporations. Describe the work you did in a positive manner and include results. Similar to your resume, employment dates should go back 15 years. Recent positions should have a longer description than older positions.

Your description should include:

What was your role?

What did your daily activity include?

Why did you enjoy the position?

The Extras Honors, Awards and Interests can help you form a professional and personal bond with recruiters. Sales awards, military honors and athletic participation interests can also set a person apart from the competition. Listing professional extras such as running, entrepreneurship or personal finance can spark more conversation during an interview. Similarly, they can be used to help with key word searches on your profile.

Got Skills? Skills and Endorsements immediately demonstrate expertise in an area or industry. The best part is that they determine your areas of competency to be displayed. A person can have up to 50 skills listed. Max out that number. Following a project completion, presentation or team participation, ask members or audience members for endorsements, when they get a chance. In less than a year you will amass a list of connections who are publicly vouching for your skill level.

Make Time A financial advisor landed a $70MM account using LinkedIn. His time commitment: 20 minutes in the morning and evening. Like other social media sites, dedicate a modest amount of time to finding new connections, maintaining existing relationship and sharing content. Social media, even LinkedIn, is just one leg of your job search stool. However, all of the legs are important. Make sure you utilize all of them.

Follow Companies Following companies provides you with timely information on product changes, job postings and organizational activity. Similarly, following companies provides another avenue for meeting other professionals and expanding one’s network.

Similar to your resume, employment dates should go back

15 years.

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Contact Information Email: Use a professional email. Make a new email account just for professional use if needed. Examples:

Yes – [email protected]; [email protected]

No – [email protected]; [email protected]

LinkedIn Vocabulary

1st Degree Contact - People you have a connection with on LinkedIn

2nd Degree Contact - This is a friend of a friend. Example: If Sue is connected to Jim, then Jim’s 1st connections are Sue’s 2nd connections

3rd Degree Contact - A friend of a friend of a friend; 2 degrees of separation; example: if Sue is connected to Jim (1st connection), and Jim is connected to Bill (2nd connection), then Bill’s connections are 3rd connections to Sue

Activity Broadcasts - When you make a change to your profile, this is the information that is shared with your connections. This should be turned off when making a series of changes to your profile. Every time you change your profile, it sends that change to your connections in their Newsfeed.

Company Page - This is the profile page set up by companies. Businesses use these to provide updates, job information and information about products and services.

Connection - LinkedIn members who have accepted invitations to connect are connections. Connections can view profiles and networks of one another

Follow - Electing to receive information from people, companies or groups

Groups - An online gathering of professionals to discuss like-minded topics; members can “Like” comments by other members or post comments as part of a public discussion

Hide - Make posts (personal and sponsored) and updates hidden from view by clicking on the Hide icon on the post

Inbox - This is where personal messages from other LinkedIn members are kept; works similar to your email Inbox

InMail - A benefit of the Premium membership, this feature allows the user to send “email messages” to people whom they are not connected to

Invitations - Reaching out to another LinkedIn member and asking them to connect with you; you may only connect with people you know (e.g. - colleague, classmate, friend or member of the same group).

LinkedIn Premium - Special membership option that gives the user benefits such as InMail, extra Introductions and the ability to see who has viewed your profile

Mentions - Similar to other networks, you may mention the name of other LinkedIn members in a post or update

Network - This is comprised of 1st, 2nd and 3rd degree connections; professionals must be in your network before they can be invited to become a connection

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News Feed - When a person initially logs into their LinkedIn page, this is the stream of information that appears; the information consists of news (Pulse), updates by connections, news from companies followed, sponsored posts

Profile - This is the personal and professional information people choose to display for their connections to view; this is a collection of publications, work history, recommendations and personal information; privacy can be adjusted by the user

Pulse - This is the news platform for LinkedIn. When a user opens their LinkedIn Page, this is the first item listed in their Newsfeed. It gives current information on business and employment.

Recommendations - People can write recommendations for their 1st connections. These public references must be associated with particular positions. These carry a lot of weight because people have to take the time to write specific information about how you did on a project or presentation.

Skills and Endorsements - These provide a quick way of showing support for someone’s knowledge base or skill set. Users can select up to 50 skills to be displayed. 1st connections can then select skills in which they have seen competence or mastery.

Sponsored - Companies can share relevant content with an identified customer group. The information is not just for people who follow a company page; it is for a specified user. The information appears in the Newsfeed of the identified person.

Vanity URL - LinkedIn assigns a specific “website” for each LinkedIn user. This page id is a compilation of words, letters and characters. A Vanity URL is a page ID that the user chooses with the format: LinkedIn.com/in/______________________. The last set of spaces could be a company name, personal name or phrase. These make people look more professional and knowledgeable about LinkedIn.