LinkedIn Profile Optimisation - tip #2

There are links to the full series of the tips at the foot of this page.

(Time to complete: 5 minutes)

Most of us are interested in growing our LinkedIn networks. This can be by accepting incoming connection requests from people reaching out to you or by being proactive and sending connection requests to people who are relevant to you and who you would like to get to know.

Either way, people will often check your LinkedIn profile to assess how suitable and relevant you are to them before they add you into their LinkedIn network. It is therefore important that your LinkedIn profile gives a good first impression. There are a number areas of your LinkedIn profile that you should consider reviewing. In this article I'm going to look at Headline and Summary text:

What's what?

Here are the main areas in the upper part of the LinkedIn profile page with the Headline and Summary Section text highlighted:

Headline text

Your headline text is the short one-liner that appears below your name.

Use this text to focus on what you do and the end benefits of that you deliver. Try to include one to two keywords related to this and avoid using your job title or a vague description of your company or your role. For example “Financial expert helping people to reduce their tax bills” is far better than “Senior Accountant”.

Your job title, whilst it may be important to you, is unlikely to be of great interest or relevance to someone looking to connect with you for a business relationship so don't mention it.

How to update your headline text:

Go to https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/edit/edit/topcard/ and you will be able to update the text directly in the Headline box:

Summary Section text

The summary section text is the longer text that appears just below the headline area)

Use this area to focus on the benefits your customers will receive if they were to work with you, your company or use your products and services (rather what you do on a day-to-day basis). Aim to use this section to outline what you are good at and to promote your company, product or service. This should not read like a CV summary about you. Use bullet points and blank lines to structure your text so that the reader isn’t given a block of text to wade through. 

How to update your summary section text:

Go to https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/edit/edit/topcard/ and you will be able to directly update the text in the Summary box:

Applying these simple changes will only take a few minutes and is time well spent as it will help encourage people to connect with you on LinkedIn.

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Here are links to the full series of LinkedIn profile optimisation tips:

Tip #1: Profile and background images:

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/linkedin-profile-optimisation-tip-1-martin-soroka

Tip #2: Headline and Summary text:

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/linkedin-profile-optimisation-tip-2-martin-soroka/

Tip #3: Personalising your LinkedIn URL

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/linkedin-profile-optimisation-tip-3-martin-soroka/

Tip #4: Updating your Experience section

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/linkedin-profile-optimisation-tip-4-martin-soroka/

Tip #5: Maintaining your Recommendations section

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/linkedin-profile-optimisation-tip-5-martin-soroka/

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Martin Soroka / LinkedIn4MoreBiz / +44 7584 415452