6 Tips for a Great LinkedIn Profile

1. Have a professional looking profile photo

Choose a clear, friendly, and appropriately professional image, and pop that baby up there. Not sure what “appropriately professional” means? Take a look around at what the people in your target company, industry sector, or business level are wearing.

2. Keep your title specific to what you do

Just list what you do, what your role is eg Business Analyst. Keep it simple, it makes it easy for recruiters to find you and also is easier for those you are trying to connect with to see what you do before they click accept.

3. Use the summary section

Ideally, your summary should be around 3–5 short paragraphs long, preferably with a bulleted section in the middle. It should walk the reader through your work passions, key skills, unique qualifications, and a list of the various industries you’ve had exposure to over the years.

4. Highlight your achievements

Recruiters spend countless hours scouring LinkedIn in search of the high performers. And when they find them, they contact these high performers. Knowing this, you’ll surve yourself well to market yourself as a high performer in your summary and experience section (think accomplishments, talking about times you’ve been promoted or hand-picked for projects, awards won etc).

5. List your most recent role, even if you are now looking for new opportunities

If you’ve only listed the past positions you’ve held in the experience section but show nothing current, you’ll probably get missed in most searches. Because most recruiting professionals exclusively use the current title box to search for candidates; otherwise they’d have to sort through thousands of candidates who held a certain role. The simple workaround, if you’re unemployed, is to create a dummy job listing in the current section that includes the job title(s) you’re targeting—‘Financial Analyst”—followed by a phrase like ‘Seeking New Opportunity’ in the Company Name box.”

6. Connect with people

Having 50 or fewer connections on LinkedIn tells recruiters one of three things: 1) You are a recluse who knows very few people, 2) You’re paranoid about connecting with others, or3) Technology and social media are scary to you. None of these are good. You really should have at least 50-100people with whom you’re connected as a starting point.

Published by Amelia-Jane Hoffman-Bryant