Day 1 of 5: Why are you here (on LinkedIn)... that is the question.

Yes. Be sure to tune in each day this week. 5 days of posts dedicated to getting your profile working for you to help you get where you want to go

Whether you are a business leader or owner, an entrepreneur or an employee, a sole trader, contractor or consultant or even if you are just starting out in the world of business or work, you probably know you need a LinkedIn Profile.

...BUT unless it’s a LinkedIn Profile that works for you, it is highly likely you are wasting your time.

Given 70% of my new business emanates through people ‘finding’ me on LinkedIn – I know it works and so I want to show you how you can use the insights your dashboard feeds up to you to make it work for you.

 Day 1 of 5: Putting your foundations in place and Dashboard introductions

FOUNDATIONS

PROFILES Rule...

They do and the reason Personal Profiles are so important is because Profiles over Pages on LinkedIn are the power-house. Why? Because People buy People. The clue is in the term connect. People connect with People on LinkedIn. Yes Pages are important from an SEO (including Google) but all the ‘happenings’ are generated person to person.

 Profile RULES...

If you are going to use LinkedIn or any other social media platform, for personal, business or career purposes, it's important to be very clear on two things. Alas, if not, you’re going nowhere. So, here we go:

2.Your LinkedIn WHY

What is it you want to achieve? The answer will be personal to you and it may well change regularly. At any given time however, it’s your answer that will help or stop things happening.

Action: Write down your Why; your goals right now. Is it industry-wide visibility; new business; trust and reputation; positioning or repositioning yourself as an expert in your field; a thought leader; a new job; new client; raising your profile within your own company. The list goes on and on. Write yours down.

1.Your LinkedIn WHO:

On whose radar do you want to get? Who is it you are targeting? It’s likely you will have more than one target audience. There will be companies, industry sectors and types of businesses; organisations AND there’ll be individuals – the job titles their likely to hold. 

Action: Jot them all down including the geographic areas you are interested in.

Obviously, being visible to your ideal customer or prospective employer or other target audience is essential to achieving your goals. As we move along this week, you’ll discover why this planning stage is so important.

HELLO DASHBOARD

'You'... meet your Dashboard. Dashboard – meet 'You'.

Your dashboard serves to help you gauge if your profile is working for you.

Were/are you aware that you had/have a dashboard? From discussions I have had with many people, I’m guessing either you are not or if are, you just skip over the data.

Where to find it:  

It shifts around a bit, but you’ll find it in your Profile View (click on your photo icon top right of and scroll down to View Profile).

Scroll down a bit. You’re looking for a rectangle either just above or under the About or Featured sections. It appears as a set of 3 figures: 

Who Viewed Your Profile | Post Views | Search Appearances

Now you know what you are looking for, here's what is coming up:

Tomorrow we’ll be diving into Search Appearances and getting you found IN SEARCH.

Wednesday – we’ll look at who viewed your profile and why it's important

On Thursday – Post Views...

On Friday – we’ll sum up and talk OPTIMISATION

Need help:

If you need help with Optimising your Profile – ask me about my January/February Offer | A Profile Audit supported by a Recommendations Report - ￡99 + VAT (usually ￡250) 

Author - Elizabeth J Floyd

Elizabeth is an established Strategic Marketer.

Her driver is helping Business and Individuals position and reposition themselves to help get them where they want to go; their message out there; to get and on the radar of connections and respective audience prospects.

Follow: #LizzieJsTopTips

• Connect/Contact Elizabeth here on LinkedIn | Call +44 (0) 7787742848 | Follow Twitter @LizzieJFloyd