Online Business Management Software

LinkedIn is the mature, older sibling as far as social media sites go. LinkedIn started in 2003, before Facebook, Twitter, Quora or whatever your favorite social networking site is. As more and more sites popped up, many others fell to the side like Classmates.com and MySpace. LinkedIn remained strong and is still one of the largest social media sites in the world.

The reason for their success, in my opinion, is their ability to add site features and applications that the users were looking for. LinkedIn started as basically an online version of your resume. Over the years they have added features, sections to their site and made it an interactive site for professionals to connect, share their expertise and market themselves.

If your LinkedIn profile is still just an online version of your resume, it is time to optimize it and make use of key applications to help you be found when people are looking for you, eistablish yourself as an expert in your industry and expand your online network.

Fill out every field in your basic profile – Fill out every field that you can. Name, headline, location, current and previous employers, education and any other additional information. For privacy reasons, you can leave your address and phone number blank but the rest is all pretty relevant. People search for just about everything. People search in LinkedIn but also, search engines, like Google, give LinkedIn a lot of authority so your LinkedIn profile can easily show up in a Google search.

Set custom text for your websites – As you add your website to the links section, choose the ‘Other’ option and add custom text to let users know exactly where that link will go. Instead of the link being titled ‘Company Website’, ‘Personal Website’ et al., let the user know exactly where that link goes. For example my links are set to ‘Hall Internet Marketing’ and ‘Social Media Breakfast Maine’. We have all been burned clicking a link and getting the bait and switch. Tell people exactly what your link is to and they are more likely to click on it.

Set your privacy settings and create a custom URL – Under the Public Profile option be sure to select what content you want public. The more public the information, the more that will show up when people are searching for information on sites that are not LinkedIn (like Google, Yahoo, Bing etc.). Also, above the public options you can create a custom URL for your profile. When you set up your account you are given a default address. Switch this to something that is easier to share like your fullname.

Add connections – LinkedIn ranks searches by how closely you are connected to what you are searching for. That being said, the more connection you have, the more you will show up in internal LinkedIn search results. Add your current and previous coworkers, customers, vendors, people you have met at conferences and anyone else you can think of. LinkedIn is all about reputation. Show people that you are connected and be found more in searches by having more connections.

Give and receive recommendations – LinkedIn is all about showing you who is the most qualified and who you should be connecting with. Recommendations are social proof that you are as great as you say you are. Bulk up your profile by getting some solid recommendations for your work. Ask your network or people you have worked with. One of the other great ways to get recommendations is to write recommendations. Recommend someone that makes your work easier, a partner who exceeded your expectation or anyone else that you can think of.

Update your status regularly – From the Dashboard screen you will see an option to update your status. Make a mental note to come back a few times and add something in this space. You can add a thought, question or post a link. Social Media sites are great for driving traffic to your website. Take your connections from LinkedIn and give them a reason to go to your website. Have a new blog post, new update, newsletter? Add the link here and share it with your network.

Hopefully if you develop these pieces of your personal profile, you will begin to get more value out of LinkedIn. After your profile is optimized then you are free to participate in Groups, Answers, create Business Page or any other place on LinkedIn. Before participating in other parts of the site you want to make sure your home base is set up and ready for visitors. Good luck and happy connecting!

Source: Amanda O’Brien