Forgive us for using an old cliché, but people do business with people, not with companies. You need to build brand awareness, sure. But people will always choose to do business with those they like, trust, and value.
That last one is important. Your clients must find what you have to offer—your expertise, your willingness to educate them, guide them, and challenge their assumptions—valuable.
Whether you’re the Director or Chief Creative Officer of your company or a middle manager working your way up the ladder, your personal profile on LinkedIn is an opportunity to help potential clients see your value and credibility as a leader in your industry.
Without further delay, here are 5 hacks for your personal LinkedIn profile.
1. Optimize Your Profile
LinkedIn profile optimization is so important, yet too many people think a grainy photo and a quick blurb in place of a thoughtfully written bio is enough. Your personal profile reflects your company, so make it count.
Here’s how:
- Your Profile Photo: Choose a professional, high-quality headshot (at least 400 x 400 pixels), and make your profile picture public.
- Headline and Summary: Create a keyword-optimized headline and summary. Keep it short but impactful. If you’re just starting out in your career or industry, boldly laying out your future goals and ambitions rather than focusing on your past is your best bet, especially in our hyper-future-oriented society.
- Recommendations: Ask for recommendations from former and current colleagues. Glowing personal recommendations are as good as gold. Don’t be shy about asking for recommendations, but always be gracious about returning the favor, especially when asked.
- Make It Searchable: Make your profile more visible in search by:
- Using relevant keywords in your headline
- Adding your contact information and city
- Joining industry groups
There are other ways to optimize your profile—these are just a few of the most important. LinkedIn has built-in tools to help you build a robust profile and craft a compelling summary—take advantage of them.
2. Share and Create Relevant Content
Given its business and professional networking orientation, LinkedIn can help you build a reputation as a thought leader in your industry more powerfully than other social media platforms. In addition to your company page, your personal profile can help new clients and job prospects get a sense of your company’s culture.
These types of content are known to perform well on LinkedIn:
- How-To and List-Style Posts: Something about the headline, “9 Ways to Create Better ____” just sucks you in, doesn’t it? An analysis of thousands of posts on LinkedIn found articles between 1,900 and 2,000 words with how-to/list-style headlines, titles between 40 and 49 characters long, and 8 images did best.
- Industry News and Research: Sharing white papers, case studies, and research studies relevant to your industry is a great way to engage LinkedIn users looking for this information. Users will appreciate the share, and if the white paper or case study was published by your company, even better.
- Blogs: Well-written blogs do well on LinkedIn. Always introduce the blog with a personal comment letting know readers what’s in store. Shorten the URL to make it less clunky. Include at least a few images and interesting graphics and preview the blog before posting to make sure it looks great. Consider promoting the post on LinkedIn to get more views.
3. Post Content at the Best Times
You wouldn’t apply for a job at 4:30 on a Friday afternoon, and you shouldn’t post content when it’s least likely to get noticed.
So, when should you post?
LinkedIn is different from other social media platforms in that it’s used mostly during—not after—business hours. It makes sense since LinkedIn’s primary demographic aside from job seekers is recruiters, salespeople, and professionals.
Data varies from one analysis to the next, but one common finding is that posting in the late morning or mid-afternoon on Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday is best. Friday through Monday is the worst time to post on LinkedIn. Not surprisingly, Saturday and Sunday posts have the least visibility and engagement.
So, post on Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday late morning/early afternoon to get the most bang for your proverbial buck.
4. Connect with Your Sharers and Followers
LinkedIn shows you who has shared your content on the platform. This is a stellar opportunity to engage. Send sharers a thank you for taking the time to share your content and ask them to connect.
Turn followers into connections by asking them to connect. To see who’s following you:
- Click the three dots at the top right corner of any post.
- Click “Improve My Feed.”
- Near the top of the screen, click on “(XXX) ”
- Review your list of followers and ask people who aren’t in your network to connect.
It might feel a bit strange to connect with someone you have never personally met, but engaging and connecting with those who have already shown an interest in your content makes connecting far less intrusive. Go for it!
5. Take Advantage of LinkedIn Groups
LinkedIn Groups can help you connect with target audiences for your product or service, but you need to be savvy in your approach. Bombarding groups with spammy content is a recipe for getting ignored or even banned. Here are some tips for joining groups and sharing content:
- In the Beginning: Start by identifying groups you already belong to. From your LinkedIn profile page, scroll down to the bottom of the page to the “Interests” sections to see your list of groups.
- Research: Next, find relevant groups to join. You can do this by searching for groups using keywords (g., “biomedical engineering” or “telecommunications”) or by joining groups LinkedIn has recommended. To see which groups LinkedIn recommends (based on information gathered from your profile) click on the “Work” icon next to your profile picture, then select “Groups.”
- Start Engaging: Once you’ve joined a group you can start conversations or reply to existing ones and post photos, documents, and videos. Carefully plan your content. Always provide original content aimed at readers in the group—industry news and updates, for example. Make your content interesting with graphics, illustrations, and images. Use an informative tone—remember, the goal is to post relevant industry content, not ad copy.
Once you’ve joined a group, don’t let the dust settle. Actively participate by posting new conversations or commenting on existing ones. Engaging with LinkedIn groups is a great way to enhance visibility for your company/brand, but it requires some finesse.
Get Help from Our Social Media Dynamos
Ready to take your LinkedIn marketing to the next level? Our social media and influencer marketing teams will create a dynamic campaign that includes LinkedIn marketing, LinkedIn profile optimization, and LinkedIn for sales to help you build your online community, promote your brand, and foster trust.
National Positions is a full-service SEO agency. We’re constantly researching and finding new ways to empower your campaign with the most innovative technology to drive traffic, leads, and sales to your website. We use an array of tools, licensed through strategic partnerships as well as proprietary technology developed in-house.
Call us today at (877) 866-6699 to get started on your social media campaign or use our contact form.