In this Smart Spot video, Susie shares tips for how to best optimize your LinkedIn profile to attract leads and future clients.
We all know that LinkedIn is a good tool for sales prospecting, but have you considered how important your profile is? If optimized correctly, it can be the best place to attract new clients.
When optimizing your LinkedIn profile, here are the most important areas to consider.
1. Headline
The headline is the most important real estate on your LinkedIn profile. Most people make the mistake of using this to list their job title. While it is important to let people know what you do, you should also focus on the pain points you solve. Keep in mind it’s limited to 120 characters.
2. Banner Image
Your banner image is another place that can be used to address pain points, provide contact information, or utilize company branding. The branding becomes even more evident if everyone within your company uses the same banner image on their profile. The size of a banner image should be 1584 x 396 pixels.
3. Profile Picture
The photo you use on your profile should be professionally done head shot. To make it stand out, try using a light background. Profile pictures should be sized 400 x 400 pixels.
4. Summary
Your summary should be more than your resume. It should contain keywords that would be used to find what you do and most importantly focus on how you help your prospects and clients. The summary section allows you to add high-quality media, such as images, videos, documents, and links that can showcase your work or brand. It’s also important to add a call-to-action (CTA). It could be a link to your website, your email address, phone number, or a link to a meeting tool.
5. Experience
Your work experience listed on LinkedIn should relate to the job you’re doing now and the path you took to get there. It’s not necessary to list every job you’ve ever had and actually could be detrimental. List your greatest achievements and areas of focus.
6. Articles and Activity
You should write at least a few articles and share posts on LinkedIn regularly. Both are a great way to add to your credibility. Be sure to comment and share other posts from connections as well, after all it is a “social” channel.
7. Vanity URL
LinkedIn gives you the ability to edit and personalize your LinkedIn URL. This ‘vanity” URL is much simpler than the one generated by LinkedIn. Having a vanity URL makes it easier for you to share on your email signature, business card, or website.
8. Edit Profile Visibility
LinkedIn allows you to control how your profile appears for viewers who are not logged-in members as well as how it appears on search engines, profile badges, and services such as Outlook. I suggest setting your profile to public visibility with all options listed below set to “ON” for the best chance of being found by influencers, potential new clients, and even current customers.
So there you go, the eight best tips to make sure you’ll win on LinkedIn! If you want to learn more about how to utilize LinkedIn for your marketing and sales strategy, click below to schedule a consultation with us.
