Whether you’re applying for a job with us or want to expand your career network, your LinkedIn profile is the most important online digital business card. These tips will help you enhance your LinkedIn profile.
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We have created this article to share tips on how you can make a stronger, more professional LinkedIn profile.
When creating a LinkedIn profile, it’s important your professionalism and personality show through. Wear neat and tidy clothing suitable to your industry and choose a photo with a neutral background to eliminate any possible distractions. Make sure you use a high-quality photograph in a well-lit environment. Face the camera directly and ensure the photo shows your head and shoulders. A natural smile whilst looking into the camera makes you appear confident and approachable, and an upright, relaxed posture shows professionalism and likeability. Don’t overly edit your photo, and keep it up to date. This makes you appear authentic and trustworthy.
To make the most of the LinkedIn algorithm, make regular, high-quality posts and interact with other users and content. This is because the algorithm favours active profiles. Use suitable keywords appropriate to your job area and skills in your profile. These could include job titles, specialist knowledge or sector-specific vocabulary. Some examples: project management, data analysis, marketing strategies and software development. It’s useful to include common abbreviations and certificates such as PMP, SEO, Scrum or CPA, as these are often searched for. Use these keywords in your profile text, summary and when describing your job experience. This increases your profile’s visibility for recruiters and specialists looking for new talent in your industry.
In your LinkedIn profile, you have the option of writing a summary about your professional experience. This is where you can showcase your professional accomplishments and describe your previous positions and job history. Choose between three and five keywords, ideally from your profile headline, and use these to write something that will really make your readers keen to find out more about you. By making your professional interests clear on LinkedIn, potential employers and network partners can get a better idea of what your career goals and ambitions are. This lets them specifically approach you when appropriate job opportunities come up.
When it comes to your summary, less is always more. Overly long summaries risk boring your readers. Keep it short and sweet: about five sentences is perfect.
One thing a professional LinkedIn page definitely needs is a background image. Don’t make it too bright and colourful – it should be neutral and professional. This will give your profile a personal touch and help you stand out from other people. But the most important thing for your LinkedIn profile is that you show the skills and competencies commonly used in your industry, such as job-specific skills, technical knowledge and any soft skills. These can include your professional knowledge, problem-solving skills, teamwork, communication skills and adaptability. Emphasize skills that highlight your experience and successes in previous positions. All of these things together make your profile much more attractive for potential employers and network partners.
Have you noticed your LinkedIn profile’s URL has an odd string of letters and numbers after your name (for example: linkedin.com/joe-bloggs-76b6a6165)? You can easily change this by modifying the URL in your personal settings. Log in to your LinkedIn profile and go to your profile. Click on “Edit public profile & URL” and then on the pen icon next to your current URL. Enter your chosen URL and check if it’s available. Your URL should contain your name or something to do with your job. Your new URL is active as soon as you save the changes.
An effective LinkedIn profile should contain the following:
If your name is already taken, use a variation. For example: linkedin.com/firstname-lastname-job or linkedin.com/firstname-lastname-city.
In your public profile, you can decide what parts of your profile people can see if they aren’t logged in. The more of your profile you allow people who aren’t your contacts to see, the more contactable you appear, making it easier to network. After all, it is only by being visible on LinkedIn that you will get noticed. Direct messages on LinkedIn are very important, as they let you communicate easily, build up contacts, expand your network and get to know more people in your professional area. That said, avoid sending non-personalized messages or messages to multiple recipients at once, as this can seem fake. Don’t be too pushy or demanding when contacting someone for the first time, such as by immediately asking for a job. Never share sensitive or confidential information. LinkedIn isn’t always completely secure.
Expand your reach by liking posts, making comments and sharing content made by others. Foster relevant connections to build up a strong career network. Networks like LinkedIn are only attractive if their members are active. Keep updating your status on a regular basis and share any relevant information with your contacts. For instance, when you share an article, perhaps you could write a brief comment on why you’re sharing it, or why the article interests you (or not). You should also actively involve your network, perhaps by asking questions about your posts. Ideally, you should update your profile every few months or when changing jobs. Add new skills, professional successes and training courses to your profile in good time to keep it accurate and up to date. Even small changes, like updating your profile picture or adapting your summary, can help keep your profile fresh. Regular updates show potential employers and recruiters you’re active and take your professional development seriously, and you want your profile to be more visible in search results.
Are you looking for a new professional challenge? You can find out more about job opportunities on LinkedIn and directly on our job portal.
By connecting with other people, you’ll increase your chances of receiving contact requests yourself, helping you expand your career network. As a general rule, you should only connect with people you’ve had contact with at least once before. This way, you can prevent your feed getting cluttered with irrelevant articles, and you keep the size of your network genuine. There are also a number of exciting groups on LinkedIn that are dedicated to your profession. By joining these groups, you are emphasizing your own expertise and how passionate you are about what you do. At the same time, this also helps you keep up to date with what’s going on in your industry. You can share your own knowledge and benefit from the expertise of people in the same profession as you. If you can’t find a suitable group, you can set one up yourself.
Recommendations from former managers, colleagues or professional partners can help boost your profile’s credibility. Two or three recommendations is a good start. There are always good opportunities for getting these recommendations, for example, when you’ve successfully completed a project, or if you’re changing positions internally or changing employer. Also, make sure you think about your own contacts and write recommendations for them, too.
You can measure how successful your LinkedIn activities are by measuring metrics such as profile views, engagement rates (likes, comments, shares) and new contacts. Increasing views and interaction on your profile is a good sign your content is working well and your visibility is improving. In addition, the number of queries and messages from recruiters can also be a good indication of success. Regularly checking these metrics helps you adapt and optimize your strategy. Keeping your LinkedIn profile and its content up to date whilst also engaging with other professionals on the platform is a lot of work, but it will definitely pay off.
