Roger, is a 53 year old who has spent most of his career as a marketing executive in the banking industry. He was downsized at the end of last year, and had been struggling not only to find his next career move, he was having difficulty getting an initial phone interview. Frustrated and stressed over the lack of attention he was receiving, he was sincere when he asked
“How can I differentiate myself among the millions of LinkedIn Profiles?”
Over the past several years of teaching individuals and teams how to maximize their LinkedIn presence we’ve invested hours learning the following four simple to execute and proven ways to answer his question.
1. Be Active: LinkedIn is a powerful search engine friendly site. It does a lot of thinking and “linking” for you, but you must update your profile with appropriate changes on a regular basis. Be sure to ‘like’ posts, news stories, job announcements, as well as congratulate and engage others with your comments, and expertise.
2. Connect With Others: Find and connect with other professionals in your industry, college friends, classmates, and neighbors. Don’t forget to network through LinkedIn with current and former co-workers.
3. Complete Your Profile: Don’t forget to include your education, any volunteer organizations you support, and examples of your work. Including images of you, a company logo, any images showing you in action are critical. Create a Slideshare account, highlighting several slide presentations of your work, and connect it to your LinkedIn profile for an extra boost.
I think a standout LinkedIn Profile starts with being complete. What are your experiences, your skills and perhaps most importantly your ambitions. What is it you ultimately want to do? … (Jeff Weiner, CEO LinkedIn)
4. Keep It Professional: Honor LinkedIn etiquette. Don’t attempt to connect with people you don’t have any degree of connection to. You don’t want to be known as “that guy”. DON”T be lazy by using the default LinkedIn invite message. Make sure to add a personal note when you invite others to connect; remind them how you met, who may have suggested you connect with them – just these few words show you made extra effort to connect with them.
After optimizing Roger’s LinkedIn Profile, we decided he needed to take a more active role in LinkedIn. He began making comments and sharing his expertise in bank related LinkedIn Groups, he proactively wrote several recommendations of former colleagues, and also connected with several influencers in the banking industry.
Now that Roger has a LinkedIn Profile he feels confident about and has a daily game plan of engagement he is well on his way to the new career he once doubted. Does your LinkedIn Profile Stand Out among the 433+ million LinkedIn Profiles?
As you review these four ways of standing out, which one do you need help with the most?
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