Some body rightly said “Active participation on LinkedIn is the best way to say, ‘Look at me!’ without saying ‘Look at me!”
As a business professional it is imperative that you have a powerful presence on LinkedIn else you are without any doubt missing out on occasions when you could grow your business. It is essential that you have a powerful professional profile and presence in LinkedIn to harness its power. As a business professional, where do you position yourself in the crowd? How will you differentiate yourself from the other professional users? What is it that you want your profile visitors to take back from your profile and so that they connect with you? Begin with establishing a strong foundation to build your influence, discover important business opportunities and generate introductions.
Complete Your Profile 100%
LinkedIn advises you to complete all the information required in your profile. It suggests that a completed profile gives you 40% more chances for effective networking. A complete profile is an impressive way to present your complete self through your background, experience, interests, passion, talents and areas of expertise. A completed profile makes you seem a more proficient user in the social network.
With a compact foundation you will be well placed for the next stage, where you can build your business and propagate your influence.
Checklist to Make an Influential and Complete Profile
1. Upload a Professional Image
Besides helping you friends recognise you, it is vital that you make a good impression on others, it is important to attract connections. After all first impression is the last impression.
2. Create A Captivating Headline
Use short and convincing key words to describe yourself so that your profile can be discovered by the right professionals.
3. Mention You Current Position and Experiences
In addition to mentioning your current position you should also mention at least two of your past experiences with positions.
4. Complete the “Summary” Section
It is recommended that you summarize about yourself in third person as using “I” too much could be repulsive.
5. Finish the “Specialties” section of Your Profile
Brainstorm for words that you think people in the targeted markets would use to look for someone with your skills, service offering and contextual. Using these keywords will help you show up in the search results of LinkedIn.
6. Give Recommendations & Get Recommendations
You need three recommendations so that your profile gets labelled “completed”. If you want someone to recommend your profile, recommend some of your friends or relatives profile, it’s as simple as that.
7. Complete the “Interests” & “Groups & Associations” Section
It is essential that you complete both these sections as both these terms will be hyper linked and will direct you to the network of others with same interests.