5 LinkedIn SEO Tips to Outrank Your Competition

Having an optimized LinkedIn profile can improve your chances of finding your ideal clients. LinkedIn optimization involves strategic keyword placements in your profile so that your profile can be crawled by the platform’s search algorithm.

Below are 5 LinkedIn SEO tips that will help you optimize areas in your LinkedIn profile to help you outrank your competitors on LinkedIn.

1.  Name Field

In your LinkedIn profile, the first step is to replace your Last Name with the most important target keywords.

Don’t make the mistake of stuffing your keyword phrases in your last name field because it makes your profile unsightly. It also makes it difficult for LinkedIn users to find you when they look for your last name.

One thing to avoid is having a limited number of characters in your name field to increase your visibility of your Professional Headline in the People You May Know widget.

2. Professional Headline

It would be super difficult to rank high on LinkedIn when you put your job title in your Professional Headline since a lot of people do the same thing with their LinkedIn Profiles.

You can outrank your LinkedIn competitors by replacing your job title with your target keywords on your Professional Headline.

Not only would you boost your profile, you can also use keywords to promote your product or service. One example would be putting the title of a book in a Professional Headline. This has helped some people gain publicity.

3. Summary

Putting your target keywords in the Summary section of your LinkedIn profile can also boost your LinkedIn profile.  Always remember not to do keyword overstuffing to avoid looking unnatural.

You can use the Summary area to promote your products or services. However, you can have a more effective Summary page by explaining how your skills and talents can resolve business issues. Appeal to recruiters and managers by offering solutions that would help them grow their organization.

4. Experience

In addition to writing your job title, you can also write your target keyword phrases in the Experience section of your profile.

To strengthen your work history, you can create jobs highlighting your target keyword phrases, not only in the job title itself but also in the job description.  For example, if your previous marketing work entailed overlapping duties, you can write a job entry describing your digital marketing stint and another job entry detailing your branding and PR achievements.

5. Skills

The final one of our LinkedIn SEO tips is in the Skills section. The Skills section is an important section for including your keywords. Make sure to arrange your skills in order of importance.

Your clients, co-workers, and other LinkedIn connections can endorse you for the skills you’ve listed. Remember, the more endorsements you get, the higher the ranking you will get for that particular skill.