How to Create the Perfect Linkedin Profile

How to CreateProfile
the Perfect LinkedIn

How to CreateProfile
the Perfect LinkedIn

As of 2nd August 2012 LinkedIn reported it had 175 million+
professionals members in over 200 countries and territories
around the world.
They will surpass 5.3 billion professional-oriented searches in
2012.

Data Courtesy of The LinkedIn Press Centre

That alone should be enough to get you thinking about
adding LinkedIn to your marketing strategy.

But more than that, LinkedIn has some unique features to get
you and your business / brand seen by your target market.

Firstly LinkedIn is very SEO friendly. Make your profile nice
and keyword rich and you could very well find your LinkedIn
profile at the top of google.

Secondly it is a great Lead generation tool. Join or start
groups to tap into the huge community of users who are
looking for professional advice.

Thirdly, it increases your brand visibility and won’t eat up half
the time you spend on facebook or twitter.

An hour a day making connections, commenting in your
groups and posting interesting updates will be enough for you
to grow a huge base of connections and catapult your
business.

There are many more reasons, including the very visible
social proof on your profile page in the form of endorsements
and recommendations, the fantastic facility to showcase your
experience, talents and expertise, the ability to add welcome
videos, slideshare presentations, feature your blog and loads
more!

Excited?

You should be, let me show you how simple all this is to
setup.

GETTING STARTED
Setting up an account on LinkedIn is easy and free. Just go to
www.linkedin.com and follow the instructions.

What we’re going to cover over the next few pages is how to
create your perfect profile.

Get this right and you’re over halfway to having a fantastic
LinkedIn presence, which will open up your business to yet
another big new network of people.

Chapter 1
Why Your Profile is So
Important

1ST IMPRESSIONS COUNT

The whole point of LinkedIn is to make connections and
engage with those connections in a meaningful way.

Unlike facebook & twitter where your profiles are
based on the content you’ve been sharing, LinkedIn is very
much more focused on who you are, what you do, what you
can do for others and your experience and
expertise.

Remember LinkedIn was orginally setup as a recruitment
network and still is the top recruitment network on the web.

Therefore your profile is like your resume. You
are in effect telling people why you are the ideal candidate for
them.

Now transfer that into the B2B world and the effect is just as
powerful.

Someone types my name or does a search for Social Media
experts and the first thing they land
on is my ‘resume’.

A full page telling them why I’m the ideal person to teach
them how to run their social media campaigns.

SEO FRIENDLY

As I said in the introduction, LinkedIn is very SEO friendly, so
utilising your profile to add relevant keywords may well get
you found on the first page of google.

You must remember though that google is changing it’s
algorithms all the time and moving much more towards social
proof.

So you need to add to your keyword rich profile, great
engagement, lots of likes, endorsements, recommendations
and connections.

Keyword stuffing may work in the LinkedIn search (and it
does), but it won’t hold much weight on it’s own in google
rankings anymore.

Thankfully by the end of this guide you will know exactly

how to

get more social proof to assist your SEO endeavours!

POSITIONING

Creating a benefit driven summary, showcasing your
experience and expertise, plus adding your specialities and
skills (plus a few more great tips I’m going to be giving you), will
begin to position you with credibility and authority in your
industry or niche.

Add to that the all important social proof element and it won’t be
long before you will have positioned yourself as the go to expert
in your particular arena.

Now before you start thinking this is beyond your reach or
sounds too much like hard work, LinkedIn lends itself beautifully
to building up connections and getting that social proof quickly
and easily and it all starts with an awesome profile!

YOUR PROFILE
So here’s what we’re going to be looking at in this report;

Your Photo
Name / Headline
Personalising Your URL
The Summary & Specialities
Your Experience

5. Your Experience

6. Projects

7. Skills & Expertise

8. Education

9. Recommendations

10. Customising Your Web Links

11.Groups

12. Adding Applications

13.Posting Status Updates

14.Start Connecting

15.What’s Next

Each section is short, to the point and has graphical
instructions.

It’s well worth putting aside an hour to create a fantastic profile
and start generating leads from LinkedIn today!

Chapter 2
Your Photo

Quite possibly the most important element of your page.
LinkedIn is not facebook.

It’s a different market.

So leave those photos of you with your puppies, cartoon
characters or quirky messages to FB.

What you need on LinkedIn is a nice clean professional
headshot with a lovely big smile.

If you think you have a face for radio SMILE! A great smile will
make you look and feel better!

Please, please brush your hair, put on a bit of make up ladies
and wear something appropriate.

That dodgy photo of you in your hoody on a windy hill won’t do!

You’re trying to create a great first impression here and it’s a
nice big image that pops up right at the top of your profile, so
make it good.

In fact, if you can afford it, at some point I would recommend
getting professional photos done, not only for LinkedIn, but for
your entire Social Media / blog presence.

But, it’s not necessary.

A clean shot, in good lighting and with a groomed appearance
is enough to make a great first impression and for people to
want to read on and find out more about you.

Chapter 3
Your Name / Headline

I know this sounds obvious but your name needs to be Your
Name. Once you have created your LinkedIn profile you can
set up business pages, just as you can on facebook.

So don’t set up your personal profile and call it your business
name.

LinkedIn is about connections between professionals.

So if you’re a CEO of a company hell bent on hiding behind
your brand, it’s time to step out of the shadows and introduce
the business comunity to YOU!

People do business with people they know, like & trust. Heard
that one before? Of course you have.

Directly under your name is your first opportunity to add some
keywords.

However, please ensure they’re relevant and don’t keyword
stuff.

I’ll be elaborating a bit more on that when we get to the
Summary section.

Your headline is your opportunity to grab people’s attention and
you have seconds to do that, so you need to make it catchy and
relevant to their search.

Here’s some example headlines to give you some inspiration.

Chapter 4
Personalise Your URL
When you first create your profile, LinkedIn will give you a URL
which is stuffed with numbers and is not attractive.

To increase the chances of people finding you and give you
the ability to post attractive links across all the other social
media platforms make sure you personalise your URL asap.

It may also help with google rankings. Not a lot, but every little
helps! Here’s how you claim your personalised URL;

Here’s how you claim your personalised URL;

Chapter 5
Your Summary & Specialities

OK, here we go! This is the part you’re going to want to spend
some time on.

This is your chance to showcase your talents, your experience,
how you can help the visitor and add some relevant keywords
to help you get found.

Your summary needs to introduce you, give you credibility and
tell the visitor what they will get by connecting with you,
clicking through to your web page, joining your group etc etc.

If you can get your summary right you will find it much easier
to create connections and build that all important social proof!

So before I show you how to do it, let’s look at some good and
bad examples;

Good Examples

(courtesy of Edwina Silver Profile)

(Courtesy of Chris
Carter Profile)

(Courtesy of
Mari Smith Profile)

Bad Examples

I think they speak for themselves. Just ask yourself, which
ones you would want to do business with?

Here’s how to write a fantastic summary;

1. Begin with a brief introduction to you and what you currently
do / offer

2. Follow up immediately with how you can help the visitor
(always write as if you’re speaking to one person - the person
visiting your profile)

3. Add some credentials. Why you’re the best person to help
them with this particular issue. What others have said etc.

4. Offer a free gift - this link will lead to an optin form

5. Add a personal paragraph, so they can get to know the
person behind the business

6. Add a list of your specialities - add some great keywords
here!

As you’re writing your summary please remember your
objective at all times. You are trying to compel people to
connect with you, contact you and / or engage with you.
Is your summary compelling enough?

Have you looked at others profiles in your niche and surveyed
their summaries? How can you make yours better, more
benefit driven, more compelling?

Spend some time here, it will pay you dividends!

Chapter 6
Your Experience

As we move down your profile you now have many more
opportunities to showcase your expertise starting with your
experience.

I see many people simply listing past jobs.

Don’t do this. Make this relevant and keyword rich.

Unless your looking for a job I suggest you don’t list every
position you’ve ever held since leaving school.

I’m fairly sure my stint as a Butlins Redcoat (holiday camp

entertainer for those not familiar with Billy Butlin) will not

influence someone to do business with me. In fact it may even

put them off! :)

Use this section to list your jobs or experience that is relevant
to what you’re offering now.

See mine as an example.

Note that I’m actually using my
various current activities as my experience and I have only
included what I feel is relevant about my background.

Make sure you add a decent job description with plenty of
keywords to make your profile even more interesting, relevant
and searchable.

Chapter 7
Projects

I love this one! This is an opportunity for you to open up and tell
people what you’re working on!

Perhaps you’re writing a book, planning a new course,
organising a webinar or event, building some new software,
launching a new product line.

Whatever it is, add it to projects, add some great and relevant
keywords and lots of anticipation and excitement!

This is a chance to get people excited about your business and
showcase your innovation!

Here’s how to add projects;

Fill out the blanks and click Add Project!

Chapter 8
Skills & Expertise

LinkedIn have recently put this section on steroids!

What’s great about adding your skills & expertise is, once
again it’s a fantastic opportunity for you to use relevant
keywords.

However, very recently LI introduced endorsements.

You may have seen them if you have a LinkedIn account
already.

When you add skills and expertise now people get the
opportunity to endorse you for each or every one.

So if someone truly believes you are an expert in one or more of
your skills all they have to do is click a button and their face will
pop up next to your keyword giving you that all important social
proof!

Here’s the best bit, all you have to do to start getting
endorsements is get out there and endorse others.

It’s the law of reciprocation. As soon as you endorse someone
they will get a notification and they will be asked if they want to
endorse you.

Now, please note, if you are not an expert in any of the areas
you have included and have absolutely nothing to back it up,
this isn’t going to work.

I’m writing this presuming you have a level of expertise in the
industry or niche you are promoting.

This is how endorsements look on your page.

Powerful stuff!

So make sure your summary looks great, make sure you have
posted plenty of relevant information (Chapter 5) and get out
there and start endorsing!

Chapter 9
Education
Now this is an interesting one.

Remember back in Chapter 1 I spoke about your profile being
like a resume? Well this is a prime example. Where else do
we want to tell people where we went to school?

The main reason for wanting to include your education is that it
can help you find old friends and colleagues.

If this is important to you and your business, then adding your
schools and colleges is a great way of you finding friends and
them finding you from a professional point of view.

Not only a positive way to get your recommendations campaign
(Chapter 10) off the ground, but also a great door opener to
build your connections.

Chapter 10
Recommendations

Social Proof, Social Proof, Social Proof!

Recommendations on LinkedIn are your testimonials.

Testimonials from people who have worked with you, for you,
have bought your products / courses, are a customer or even a
subscriber of yours.

Anyway that someone is positively associated with you is an
opportunity for a recommendation.

Just like endorsements, the best way to get recommendations
is to give them. However, don’t expect someone you have
recommended to come back and do the same for you.

I know I will only ever recommend someone who I have actually
worked with or who I have first hand experience of their work or
services.

But you won’t get anywhere if you don’t get out there and
altruistically start recommending others.

In fact to ensure your profile is 100% complete you need to start
by recommending three others.

Recommendations don’t have to be long. Just true!

Here’s an example of some of mine.

I read somewhere that you should be looking to get 10 - 20
recommendations as a rule of thumb to give you credibility.

Chapter 11
Customize Web Addresses
You have the option to add three linked web addresses to
your profile.

You can just add the links, but ask yourself, are you more
likely to click on something that says www.acme.com or
something that says - Click Here for Great Social Media Tips!

Chapter 12
Groups
This is an interesting one. There is contrarian advice out there
from the long in the tooth LinkedIn ‘experts’.

Some say join 50 groups, which is the maximum you are
allowed to join on LI. Some say just join 2 or 3, there is no way
you have the time or resource to join and engage with 50.

I tend to agree with the latter.

Whilst joining a group gives you the opportunity to place your
content in front of 1000’s of people and also to send out
emails to some of those people, you don’t want to be doing
that unless you have struck up a conversation first!

Have you got the time to start conversations in 50 groups? I
know I haven’t!

So, personally, I would go for a few relevant groups with large
member bases.

The point here isn’t to join as many groups as possible, but to
join and engage.

The objective being to strike up relationships, attract people
back to your profile and ultimately back to your offers, products
or services.

So don’t do things just for the sake of it.

Take action with purpose, always knowing what your end goal
is.

I’m just scraping the tip of the ice burg here with groups.
LinkedIn groups really are THE lead generation strategy on LI.

Both joining other large communities and of course starting your
own.

Here’s how to find and add groups to your profile;

Chapter 13
Add Applications

LinkedIn has a fantastic array of applications you can add to
your profile. My favourites are the Wordpress App and the
Slideshare App.

The wordpress app allows you to add your blog to your
profile. What better way of showcasing your content to your
connections.

The slideshare app allows you to add not only slides but
video!

I can’t think of a better way to welcome visitors to your LinkedIn
profile and make an instant impression than adding a video.

Please note at the time of writing LinkedIn are making some
improvements to the profiles and the slideshare app is affected
by this.

Remember LinkedIn now own Slideshare.

At this time, I can’t add a video onto the LinkedIn platform, but
here is an example of how it looks, when it’s working!

(courtesy of
Lewis Howes Profile)

Your video could be an on camera welcome message or it

could be a great information video showcasing a free gift,

some of your content or your services and products.

The best thing to do is to test different videos and see which
seem to attract the most connections or actions from your
visitors.

Here’s where you can add apps and here’s a list of some of the
others;

Chapter 14
Start Posting Status Updates

Your activity section shows what you have been up to.

Have you been recommending others, connecting with people,
publishing content?

Utilise your status update just as you would Facebook or
Twitter to post interesting and relevant information that you
believe your connections would like and benefit from.

There are no hard and fast rules for how often you should post.
There are many opinions and I have mine also, but they’re no
good to you as every market is different.

The goal here is to get likes and comments.

Every time someone takes an action on your content it shows
to their connections, opening the door for more invitations to
connect for you.

You need to test reaction and engagement.

So start by posting once a day and test different times.

Then as you begin to notice a pattern, you can test posting
twice a day, three times day, twice a week even.

It’s really going to depend on your market, what they’re used to
seeing, when they’re online and how relevant and interesting
your information is.

Here’s my Top 10 Tips for Maximum Engagement on all the
Social Media platforms;

1. Create relevant and interesting content

2. Be Consistent

3. Show interest in other people’s content by commenting and
engaging

4. Be inclusive - share other people’s content

5. Reply to comments on your posts

6. Spend time getting to know people and networking

7. Go out of your way to answer questions and solve problems

8. Stay ahead of the game in your niche and give regular
updates of new news

9. Never begin a relationship by selling

10. Be engaging!

Chapter 15
Start Connecting!
Congratulations!

You have just created a fantastic profile that will attract and
entice potential customers, business partners and opportunities
your way!

Now your profile is ready it’s time to get connecting.

There are several benefits to having lots of connections, but
the main one is to get people off of LinkedIn and onto your
email lists.

The more connections you have, the more people you can
get your content and profile in front of.

It also comes back to that old saying though, people do
business with people they like, know and trust.

The more connections you have, the more credibility and
authority you will build within your area of expertise.

Creating and building connections is a whole subject all on it’s
own, but to get you started here are my Top 10 Tips;

1. Create an awesome profile!

2. Reach out to friends & colleagues who you already know to
get you started

3. Ask people you trust to introduce you to people you would
like to connect to

4. Always send a personal message when requesting a
connection

5. Join groups - you’ll meet and network with loads of potential
connections

6. Use the import tool to import contacts already in your email
accounts

7. Add a Connect with Me on LinkedIn message to your email
signatures

8. Put your profile links on your blog / websites / articles etc

9. Make your profile more attractive my recommending and
endorsing others

10. Engage with people and they’ll want to connect with you!

Chapter 16
What’s Next?
Thanks so much for reading this guide.

I really hope you took action as you were reading it and if you
didn’t yet, please don’t let this end up an abandoned report on
your desktop.

Either get to it and build your own LinkedIn profile, or start

distributing this report to others so they can build theirs.

Either way take some ACTION!

Here’s what I want you to do next;

1. Follow this guide (if you haven’t already) and take an hour or
so setting up a great profile. It will be a great use of your time!

2. Get out there and start making connections

3. Join or start a group

How to Create the Perfect Linkedin Profile

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