7 Tips for Getting the Most Out of Your LinkedIn Profile

Potential customers or clients will often view your LinkedIn profile to learn about you and what you can offer their businesses. Is your profile telling the story that you want them to see? Optimizing your LinkedIn profile will help to ensure that you attract the right people and that they will take action to contact you and work with you.

Profile Picture
As the saying goes “a picture is worth a thousand words.” Having a professional looking picture of yourself is important if you want to attract professional clients. It is worth it to have a professional photographer take some pictures of you.

Banner
LinkedIn allows you to upload a banner to your profile. Just like your profile headshot, the banner should look professional and represent your business. You can include branding on the banner that describes what your business offers, images of books you have written for sale, or courses.

Media
Adding media to your profile will give visitors a clearer sense of who you are and the solutions that you offer to your target market. You can add introduction videos, pictures and presentations to your profile.

Keywords
It is important to weave keywords into your profile so that you will be found by LinkedIn and Google searches. The Google keyword tool can help you find words that people are searching for in your target market. Don’t forget to include keywords in your headline and job title sections.

Summary
The summary section of your profile should be used to introduce yourself and your company. It is best to use first person writing style, which is most engaging to audiences. Create an elevator pitch that describes the results that people will get from working with you. Think about what your audience would want to know about you and give examples that demonstrate your achievements.

Formatting
Make your profile easy to read by writing short paragraphs and including formatting such as subtitles, bold letters, bullet points, and capital letters.

Call to Action
People often forget to include a call to action in their profile, but this is perhaps the most important element of all in your profile, which can make the difference between whether or not someone takes the step to contact you. So create a message in your profile that stands out and invites people to contact you. Include your contact information. An optimized profile will lead to more connections and more great customers!