Top 10 LinkedIn Profile Best Practices

1. Invest in a professional headshot. Smile.

 

2. The banner photo is valuable real estate. Use it to grab attention and show off your graphic design skills. Canva can help.

 

3. Use your headline to say more than your current job. You can include volunteer work, skills, passions, and/or what you aspire to be.

 

4. Make sure your profile's URL is simple and without random numbers and letters. At the top right of your profile click "Edit public profile & URL." Then click the pencil symbol near "Edit your custom URL." Delete random numbers and letters. Save. Return to your profile and see the improvement. Now use your new URL on your resume, business card, and in your email signature.

 

5. The About section is a brief autobiography. Tell your story. Talk about who you help, how, and why you do the work that you do. Write it in 1st person.

 

6. The Featured section allows you to showcase content including Word docs, PDFs, and video to showcase your work and talents.

 

7. Experience-Use this section to highlight your accomplishments. Did you grow revenue or profitability? Lead a new division? Think about what would stand out to others.

 

8. Volunteer experience-Illustrate the skills you learned while contributing to the greater good. Volunteer experience is valuable for numerous reasons including showing dependability, your ability to work with others, and it shows that you are investing your time in an altruistic manner.

 

9. Skills-LinkedIn lets you choose up to 50 skills and highlight a Top 3. Make sure your Top 3 are relevant to your current work and not work you were doing 5 years ago.

 

10. Recommendations-Recommend others who have done great work for you. Also, ask loyal clients or a friendly supervisor for a recommendation. Recommendations can be for quality work and/or a character endorsement.