LinkedIn Profile Optimisation - tip #5
Martin Soroka
LinkedIn Lead Gen Specialist with a passion for helping B2B businesses grow organically through LinkedIn (and at weekends a bit of a mountain biking fanatic)
There are links to the full series of the tips at the foot of this page.
(Time to complete: ongoing)
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.
Today's article will look at:
Maintaining your Recommendations Section
The recommendations are a part of your LinkedIn profile many people will check when assessing whether to accept a connect request.
It is an important area of your LinkedIn profile yet it is possibly the one that is most undervalued and under used. This is probably because it requires input and help from other (often busy) people and so updating it isn't in our direct control.
Ideally aim to have a new recommendation added every 4 to 6 weeks so that you build up a good body of positive feedback. This ensures there will be a relatively recent recommendation at the top of the list showing you are still at the top of your game as well as a history of recommendation going back evenly over a period of time.
How to request a recommendation:
To request a recommendation, click on your name on the left side of your LinkedIn home page:
Scroll down your profile page until you reach the Recommendations Section and click "Ask for a recommendation":
You will then be asked a series of questions related to the recommendation request starting with the name of the person you wish to ask:
You will be able to send a personal message - I would recommend replacing the default message "can you write me a recommendation?" with something more personal, possibly with some suggestions of the type of feedback you are especially looking for. Then click the Send button to submit the request.
The recommendation will be sent as a LinkedIn message with a special link.
Once the recommendation has been written and submitted then you will receive a LinkedIn message to notify you that it is ready for review (via an embedded link). You can then either send it back with suggestions if you would like it amending or publish it on your profile page.
Of course there considerations of etiquette - for instance you may want to verbally discuss your wish for a recommendation and which aspects of your work are most relevant with the person before submitting the request through LinkedIn
More often than not you will find you have to remind people several times that you are looking for a recommendation. I would suggest putting a reminder in your calendar to help both with chasing pending recommendations and requesting new ones. This way your account hold a ever growing list of recommendations paced out at regular intervals that demonstrate that you are consistent right up to the present time.
It does take time and effort to gather regular recommendations however the work is always well spent.
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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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