If you are an active social network user then you probably already know about the power of LinkedIn for businesses and brands. LinkedIn is a Goldmine for Marketers, Businesses, Investors, and of course, recruiters, let’s take a look at how LinkedIn is transforming the world.
2013 LinkedIn Statistics:
- LinkedIn has 200 million total users and 135 million active users around the world
- 77% of job openings notifications and 48% of recruiters are posting their Jobs on LinkedIn
- B2B Businesses are now getting a 61% Customer Acquisition Success rate from LinkedIn
- 71% of American College graduates find their dream jobs via LinkedIn
- 77% of research Companies and 65% of Asian and European journalists use LinkedIn as their primary source
- LinkedIn is now available in 200 countries and in 19 different languages
- 2.6 Million Companies have a LinkedIn Business Page
- 320,000 Srilankans Using LinkedIn, This is 1.49% of the total population in Srilanka
Based on these mini LinkedIn statistics you can estimate the potential of LinkedIn, but there are so many other professional social networks available on the Internet as well, Yammer, Nimble, Zyncro, etc. Still, LinkedIn is the Giant Professional Social network so far! Let’s see how you can add Extra Cheese to your LinkedIn profile to make it professional and stand out from the crowd.
LinkedIn Profile Tips
LinkedIn for Personal Branding:
LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Quora, and Pinterest Profiles are all trusted by Search Engines and all of them have perfect search engine-friendly Profile Architecture. When someone is trying to find out your name on the internet, Your LinkedIn profile name will appear on the first search result pages (SERPs), so maintain your LinkedIn Profile like your own Personal website.
Your Professional Headline:
LinkedIn also having its own Search Algorithms like Google and Bing, but it’s entirely different from Google’s Algorithm. If you maintain perfect keyword density in your profile then your profile will appear in the LinkedIn Internal search results. To maintain better keyword proximity you will have to spice up your LinkedIn Headline tag with relevant keywords as your profession or industry specialization name very nicely with a maximum of 120 characters. Good Examples: UX Designer, UI Engineer, Graphic Designer, Multimedia Engineer, etc…
LinkedIn Profile Picture:
Your profile picture will say thousands of words about you for your potential audience and a good profile picture will create new ventures, so try using some nice “ Professional “ photos with good resolution.
Do not use LinkedIn Profile pictures that are taken outside with unprofessional backgrounds. Oh yes, if you have a professional photo with a nice smile then it’s perfect for your Linkedin profile, use LinkedIn for your Personal Branding.
Your Experience:
this is a very important part to attract recruiters and investors; Of course, you can add your previous employer’s name and your position, work experience, etc, etc, but when recruiters, investors, or Venture Capitalists are trying to shortlist for your profile then you will lose your chances from this point! Let’s say if you have more than 5 different Work Experiences within the last 3 years it’s clearly saying you are not working with any companies not more than 12 months and Recruiters and investors will hesitate to shortlist your profile for a long-term business relationship!
But they really don’t know the real story about your job history! So, always try to display a Maximum 3 work experience and make sure you have been there more than 12 months. And don’t forget to use the right keywords, Relevant Images, Slideshare Documents, or any Videos Related to your work Experience field as your Profession.
Secure Your Identity:
This is another priceless gift from LinkedIn; you have an option to secure your own Vanity URL. When you are changing your LinkedIn Profile URL then keep in mind it should be very tiny and make sure your LinkedIn Public URL reflects your name, profession or your industry Specialization.
- Right Example: lk.linkedin.com/in/maheshdesigner
- Bad Practice: lk.linkedin.com/in/pub/Mahesh-lastname/9587-hfja
Education:
Your Education is going to point out a very strong judgment for your Competitors, Recruiters and of course investors, so try to add enough information about your education details, Do NOT use a short name about your School or Courses. Try using the full name with correct abbreviations.
- Right Example: Srilanka Institute of Information Technology
- Bad Practice: SLIIT
Profile Summary:
Your Profile (Credo): Ah, This is very important! I have seen lots of people make huge mistakes in these sections! To write a 2000 characters perfect LinkedIn profile summary You need to think about some different important factors.
Third-Party Point of View: Ask questions about yourself and find out the right answers and make your profile like an interesting story.
- Call to Action (CTA): Write some effective call to action words and let the reader find out the answer him/herself to understand the value of the word.
- Supportive words: When you are trying to say something about you or your achievements then try to add supportive words Like “ Awarded by “, “ Offered By “ “ selected by “, etc! Do not say it alone like “I’m “I “, etc! Because readers don’t like to read these words again and again.
- Serve Nicely: Try to avoid using long paragraphs or too many spaces between the paragraphs. Give a Subtitle and Write a story match to the subtitle. Eg: Achievements, Business, etc
Get what you want: people are reading your profile for some reason, which means they need some sort of services or benefit from you, so, this is the right place to market your brand. Just write a few lines about how you can help them because this is what you/they want.
Milestone and Projects:
If you already did any individual or Group projects then simply add the above Project summary of your responsibility and outcome of this project along with Team members Details. Based on your project details investors and recruiters can get an idea about your teamwork, commitment, and contribution.
If you don’t have any Group projects or Milestones, No problem simply add your future milestone and upcoming project brief along with team member’s details.
Recommendation:
Recommendations are the secret weapons representing your identity, skills, and your professionalism! Like I said LinkedIn is a Professional Business network!
You can request recommendations from your Previous Employers, Co-Workers, or School Colleagues. But there is a way to request recommendations J First of all give them a nice recommendation about their Attitude, Experience, and Enthusiasm, now you have the right to request recommendations about you in return.
LinkedIn Connections:
Creating strong connections is the most beautiful part of LinkedIn Personal Branding. You DON’T need to have thousands of unknown people in your business networks. Establishing a good relationship with people who know about you or you know about them is important. LinkedIn is giving you a chance to gather all your email contacts in one place or you can import your Facebook, Twitter, Gmail contacts using Yahoo as a CSV file and Import all your well-known Contacts in your LinkedIn Network. All I can say, if you maintain a Good business Relationship with your LinkedIn contacts then it will create new ventures for your career.
Good Practice: Sharing some interesting, Informative, Relevant content is a good way to engage your LinkedIn connections.
Bad Practice: Sending Promotion News, Any Paid Offers, Survey links, Affiliate Links will create a negative view about you.
Customize Your Websites:
LinkedIn gives you a chance to add your personal Website, Business Website URL, and of course, you can connect your Twitter profile as well. If you have personal Blogs, Different social profiles then there is a chance to get inbound links to your website. But it’s “rel=follow”, but still this is a very effective way to build some backlinks from high authoritative websites to your site.
Be Professional & Stay Updated:
LinkedIn has its own User Policy, please read and understand LinkedIn Terms of services, Share your updates and collaborate with your connections, follow the latest posts and wall updates as a reader and share your feedback! It will create brand goodwill about you and you will gain Industry Experience from these regular activities.
If you really love to learn more about Social Media Marketing and Branding Strategies then I strongly recommend ebusinessacademy.org, they are really good at Social media strategy courses!
Conclusion:
As you can see, LinkedIn is the goldmine for Job seekers, Investors, recruiters, companies, and of course Brands! I just shared basic LinkedIn Profile Branding Tips only; there are lots of unrevealed secret strategies available to convert 60% of your LinkedIn connections as a customer and get at least two leads per day on demand using LinkedIn from entirely new unknown LinkedIn users.
