Tuesday 6 December 2016

11 Best Ways Marketers Can Optimize Their LinkedIn Profile

The consistent growth in demand for LinkedIn has come as no surprise for most dedicated marketers. LinkedIn is definitely the place to showcase one's talents, experience and enjoy incredible networking and marketing opportunities for promoting one's own brand or that of your clients. LinkedIn makes for an amazing tool for a number of things, including support for professional credibility, maintaining client and prospect relationships, building thought leadership and much more.



However, most marketers don't know how to use this amazing tool to its full potential. One of the best things to do is to start with maximizing and optimizing your profile. The profile plays an important role in marketing. Right from reaching out to prospects to establishing connection with industry influencers on behalf of your client or making new powerful connections, your profile is the first thing people will see.

Listed below are some of the best practices and tips for optimizing your profile. This will facilitate you to use it to build your own professional brand. It can be converted into a dynamic tool to take your marketing objectives ahead:

1. The Publishing Platform


Try exploiting publishing platform of LinkedIn as far as possible. This offers a number of benefits. The platform helps your posts become part of your profile. These live in a section right under the top overview section. Additionally, publishing something new get it shared with your follower connections. Another advantage is that the content becomes searchable on and off LinkedIn.

2. Focus on Your Professional Skills


Have you added skills to your LinkedIn profile? If no, then you are certainly missing out on a chance to optimize your profile for specific keywords. This is how you get super quick endorsements from all of your connections for those specific skills. LinkedIn is capable of showcasing top 10 skills of yours based on endorsements to help people know about your expertise.

3. Promote Your Projects


It really helps to use the 'Projects' section. Initially, it has been created for students to share projects. You can use it to highlight services, products, services or other projects including podcasts listed on LinkedIn profile. Link each project directly to your website. Thereafter, include all of your team members when applicable.

4. Endorsements and Recommendations


It is important to get endorsements and recommendations from those you’ve already worked with. This ensures depth and much needed credibility to your profile. These people can better describe what you have to offer. So don't wait anymore and reach out to former co-workers, supervisors, or clients and ask them to endorse your skills. You may also ask them to write a recommendation. In-mail or email can also be used for the same. Simply scroll to the 'Recommendations' section at the bottom of your profile. Now click “Ask for Recommendations.” The action will facilitate you to select what job you wish to be recommended for.

5. Share Your Awards and Honors


This is a section initially designed for scholastic achievements of students. You simply need to use the Honors & the Awards section to highlight all notable lists and mentions received from recognized publications and authorities in your industry.

6. Pulse Content


When writing your posts, it is important to choose a topic you hold the experience and expertise in. Once you do that, stick to it. Including too many elements will make you lose out on readers. The platform can also be utilised to repurpose existing content. Make sure you write a click-worthy headline and use keywords. The content should be 300-600 words.

7. Showcase Specialized Certifications


Don't worry if you haven’t completed a higher-education degree. Use 'Certifications' section to showcase your specialized and niche educational achievements. You may also list a certification related to your industry in this section and link to it. This helps people learn more about it.

8. Add Examples of Work


Focus on adding documents, presentations, images, links and videos to different sections of your profile. You can narrate your story in a visual way which will allow people to see your work in action.

9. Professional Memberships


In case, you belong to any professional organizations within your industry, simply use the 'Organizations' section in order to highlight your membership as well as the position you hold beyond being a member. This ensures you an opportunity to optimize your profile for keywords. For instance, professional writers can include their membership to 'Professional Writers of America'.

10. Language Proficiency


Knowing more languages is a plus point. There is a huge demand for those fluent in multiple languages. Hence, if you know some languages, include that information in the 'Languages' section.

11. Experience


Apart from being specific yet detailed, it is important that you are crystal clear and concise. So start with a brief overview of your role. Thereafter, you can highlight your specific responsibilities, various accomplishments and results. Make sure you do it is a bulleted list.

Thanks.....
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