A job is a need. Not only does it give you means to spend life but also makes you productive, intelligent and most importantly busy. LinkedIn, the much-coveted online website was launched in the year 2003 with the primary objective of professional networking. With time, LinkedIn has evolved from being merely a networking site to a hiring hotspot, comprising several professionals having different skills, abilities, and proficiencies from all parts of the world. This prompts some of the finest business organizations to contact, communicate, analyze and hire the professionals registered on LinkedIn.
This creates the need to optimize and make your LinkedIn profile stand out so that more and more prospective employers are able to get impressed after observing your profile and can contact you for your services. Optimizing a LinkedIn profile is dependent upon several tips, which are covered hereunder:
Five Best Tips To Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile
1. It All Begins With Your Profile Picture
An employer search is obviously dependent upon the requisite keywords, which match your resume. And, after this, there is a long list of prospective employees that comes up in front of the hiring managers. While browsing, the first thing that a majority of hiring managers observe is your profile picture.
If you are showing all your 32 teeth (maybe less) in your profile picture or maybe trying modeling with all those different poses, then it’s high time that you optimized your profile picture. It is not that you have to be dead serious or wear a dark blue suit to show seriousness, but you ought to maintain decency and professionalism. Here are some of the best ways to optimize your profile picture:
A Professional Dress Sense
Wear a good dress. Now, what is it? A dress that attempts to achieve professionalism but in a friendly manner. Put on your decent and regular dress, which you might love to wear casually. It must not ooze fashion rather exhibit you as a committed and professional person. Still confused? Then, it is recommended that you check out the profiles of your peers, and other professionals from your industry to see what’s trending.
The Angle Of Face
There are several ways to present yourself in a profile picture, primarily these two are most followed:
- Option 1: You can see right in the camera, which will result in a straight neck
- Option 2: You can give a slight tilt or drop your neck towards either of your shoulders
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If you believe the experts, then ideally, a slight tilt of the neck towards your right shoulder depicts that you are a confident person and have the ability to perform with precision besides possessing a positive attitude.
How To Present Yourself?
When you browse the different profiles created at LinkedIn, you will certainly observe variety. A few people prefer to show themselves from head to toe, a few from head to torso, and the other few from head to the upper chest. Undoubtedly, the latter is the most professional way to present yourself in a profile picture. Further, it is also recommended to always wear a gentle smile on your face (with a closed mouth, no point in advertising your toothpaste brand) as it reflects your optimism.
2. Make An Appealing Headline
The primary objective of most working professionals on LinkedIn is to secure and attract promising job offers from the recruiters that will possibly boost their career and give a lucrative salary hike. Will it be possible with the same old boring headline? The answer is a big no. As a part of your optimization efforts, focus must be laid on updating your headline to make it more catchy, attractive and appealing. This can be done by:
- Using words like Senior, Pro, Expert, Pundit, Maestro, etc.
- Mentioning your job profile in two to three words, such as Digital Marketing, SEO consultant, Public accountant, Mechanical Engineer, etc.
- Stating your primary job role in a captivating manner, such as:
- I can enhance your website traffic ten times
- I can promote you worldwide and boost your sales
- I use best practices to prepare accounts, etc.
- Sharing your most special work experience, such as, Ex-Google employee, Facebook engineer, Apple’s administration manager, etc.
An ideal appealing headline, which follows all the tips mentioned above, usually, goes like this:
- SEO Pundit and an Ex-Google consultant – Hire me to make your company popular
- Senior Mechanical Engineer and an Ex-Tesla Employee – I play with car designs and 3D designing
- Pro Public Accountant with 25 years in the field – Call me a veteran with all the latest accounting knowledge
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3. A Specially Curated LinkedIn Summary
You got a professional profile picture, an attractive headline, but still, the number of job offers received by you are quite less as compared to your peers, mates and friends. The issue lies in your LinkedIn summary which is the first detailed explanation of yourself. This is more of a retaining part, where you want to retain an attracted employer on your LinkedIn profile by creating a stand-out summary. Be creative, and make sure to cover all the following points:
- Your work experience
- Your best skills
- Your best accomplishments
- Your passions
- Your aspirations (the job role you are seeking in an organization)
Step by Step Guide To Prepare A Stand-Out LinkedIn Summary
With an aim to ease things out for our readers, below is a step by step guide to prepare a detailed and comprehensive Linkedin summary:
- Step I: In the opening line of your summary mention the job role and your total work experience. For example, I am an ex-Google digital marketer with an overall experience of 5 years in the field.
- Step II: Mention the key roles performed by you. For example, I have strategized the whole branding processes, ran social media campaigns, and promoted companies using digital banners, flyers and brochures.
- Step III: Mention you technical strengths, that is, the software you are able to run and operate. For example, I have expertise in operating Semrush, Ubersuggest for SEO, Campaign monitor for Email marketing and Marketo for B2B marketing.
- Step IV: Quote your special work event, which demostrates your commitment and dedication. For example, I have the ability to handle several advertising campaigns simultaneously along with managing a team of writers, creative professionals and analysts. In my previous employments, I have prepared and handled upto 15 marketing campaigns alone.
- Step V: Share your special achievements and close your summary. For example, I was given employee of the year award by my ex-employer Google and the title of Mr. Hardworking by one of my client. I have a special knack to prepare promotional campaigns and have helped several companies to rank first on search engines.
4. Demonstrate Your Work In The Project Section
You will be hired because of your competencies, which must be exhibited by showcasing the professional work executed by you in the project section of the LinkedIn. Sell your skills, by:
- Uploading media files, presentations and videos
- Uploading your written literary pieces, publications and courseworks
- Uploading information related to the different projects executed by you
- Mentioning any volunteer and social experience gathered by you
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5. Secure Those Endorsements
It is always assuring, soothing as well as trusting for the employers to browse the LinkedIn profiles that have been endorsed. When a registered LinkedIn profiler is endorsed by anyother profiler, it appears at the bottom of the LinkedIn profile. This acts as a mark of quality and displays that you have the ability to be a genuine and dedicated employee besides indicating that you are an expert in your area of operation.
Hence, always strive hard, use persuasion, and manage to onboard a few of your references (your old colleagues, teachers, employers, hiring managers) who can endorse your profile and showcase all your skills and abilities through a short but encouraging note.
References
- https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03057240.2020.1755242
- https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11747-020-00739-x
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Sandeep Bhandari is the founder of PrepMyCareer.com website.
I am a full-time professional blogger, a digital marketer, and a trainer. I love anything related to the Web, and I try to learn new technologies every day.
All the team management, content creation, and monetization tasks are handled by me. Together with the team at PrepMyCareer, the aim is to provide useful and engaging content to our readers.