Transitioning from your Military Career with LinkedIn – Jo Saunders, LinkedIn Expert
Thanks for attending my workshop for Working Spirit.
With more than 645M+ members, and a steady growth of 2 new members per second, and 20M open jobs, LinkedIn is an essential marketing and sales tool for anyone at any stage of their career.
Whether you are looking to start a business, become a consultant or seek employment, the decision makers, recruiters, and potential clients are already on LinkedIn. In fact, out of the monthly active users, 40% are reported to log in daily.
- Do you have a profile that stands out and backs up your career achievements and goals?
- Are you building a network of relevant professionals that could become important in building your career?
The 5 Most Important Parts of Your LinkedIn Profile
- Visuals – Profile photo and background
- Copy – Headline, Summary, Experience
- Media – Documents, Video, Images and links to support your profile
- Social Proof – Skills endorsement and Recommendations
- Activity – Engagement, posts and articles that add value and credibility.
LinkedIn Career Networking
Aside from being one the best career branding profiles to optimise your presence, LinkedIn is the largest professional network, and a powerful research tool. It is a search engine for people, companies, content, and a place to list and find jobs.
In preparing your profile for the job market, research the roles you aspire to be in, and look at the language used, requirements and see how you can reflect in your profile. And follow the people who are where you aspire to be.
- Who are the decision makers that you could follow or connect to?
- Who works for the organisation that is worth following?
- Don’t forget to follow the company page.
Creating, curating and conversing on LinkedIn allows you to reach your network beyond your 1stdegree connections. Focus on posting content that adds value not volume, and put the rest of your focus into relationship building activities. Post and engage consistently to increase your visibility to start building authority, and take the time to join conversations and ask questions in your own content to invite engagement and build influence.
RESOURCES
Here are my slides and a link to my Profile Blueprint to help you get started reviewing and updating your LinkedIn profile.
SLIDES
LinkedIn Profile Blueprint
PROFILE BLUEPRINT UPDATES
ACTION
5 LinkedIn Profile Mistakes
- 3rd Person Summary – It is hard to connect with someone talking about themselves, so write in the first person.
- 1-way communication – Talking AT your network isn’t the best way to build relationships – Engage.
- Incomplete – update your profile as you achieve more and learn more about yourself and your purpose.
- Spammy – Build relationships rather than trying to sell something or yourself too soon.
- Out of date & inactive – Update your brand image and content often (use keywords) & engage with your network.
10 LinkedIn Profile Essentials
- Well-positioned headline – 120 character positioning statement.
- Branded visuals – Background & profile photo.
- 1st person summary – Tell your story with personality, using my formula.
- Optimised experience – Focus on outcomes and achievements (include internships and work experience).
- Media – Include a video introduction, PDF resume, portfolio links …
- Relevant skills – Make top 3 most relevant (expertise/delivery) and seek endorsement.
- Accomplishments – Add memberships, accreditations, awards, publishings, projects.
- Contact details – Make sure they are up to date and professional: mobile – email – website/blog.
- Connect to organisations – Link your experience and education to the the correct Page
- Add value – Find your voice and write articles, create intersting posts, and most importantly engage with your network.
Further Reading
- LinkedIn – The Career Tool for Students & Graduates
- How to say thanks with a LinkedIn Recommendation
- How to publish content on LinkedIn
- 21 Steps to a perfect LinkedIn presence
- How to use your network and data to find a job #HireKoka
- Subscribe to #TheLinkedInCouch where we discuss LinkedIn tips about positioning, connection and content with a focus on how to use video with your LinkedIn strategy.
- Join the FREE 7 Day LinkedIn Challenge
Episode 10 – How to update your LinkedIn Headline the right way. WATCH >>>