Professionals around the world connect with each other through numerous online channels. One way is through a social network called Linkedin.com
What is Linkedin.com
With over 300 million users around the world, Linkedin is indeed the most popular social network for professionals. You can use it to build your identity online and connect with classmates as well as colleagues. It’s also a great way to find your next job or opportunity.
Here’s a video which explains it in a more visual way.
How Linkedin Can Help Your Personal Brand
- It can help you find new job opportunities or internships
- It can help you display your work experience
- Helps you find key contacts within companies
- Helps you maintain your professional relationships
- Helps you showcase your expertise or passion
Now that you see the true potential of this social network, you need to get familiar with how you can use it for your personal branding efforts.
Here are 5 ways you can use Linkedin.com for personal branding.
Summary of what is covered in this post:
- Know what you want
- Optimizing your profile
- Sharing your expertise
- Building your network
- Nurturing your relationships
Let’s get started.
1. Know What You Want Before Investing Time on Linkedin
I recently wrote a post 3 Questions to Ask Yourself Before Investing a Single Minute (or Dollar) in Your Personal Brand. In this post, I talk about the importance of focus when building your brand. It will make things a lot easier once you have clarity.
Ask yourself…
Who are you?
It’s a simple question yet, it’s one that not many people think of or have an immediate answer for. It’s all about determining what value you bring to those who connect with you.
Example:
My name is Alaa Hassan. I’m in eCommerce advisor, online marketer and speaker. I help inspire businesses to leverage the power of the Internet to generate profit and scale their online business.
What are you trying to achieve?
I’m sure you’re not simply thinking of building your personal brand for the fun of it. I am pretty certain you’re trying to get something out of it such as a new job, an increase in salary, selling your services or even speak at events. Figure out what is the ultimate goal.
Example:
I want to be recognized as an eCommerce expert so that I can be offered high paying opportunities to help companies grow online as well as speak at eCommerce events.
Why are you trying to achieve that?
We all do what we do for specific reasons. It can be for financial benefit, entertainment or education. Whatever it is, you need to know why you’re planning on investing time in your brand on Linkedin.
2. Optimize Your Linkedin Profile
Creating a profile is only the first step. Making sure it’s fully completed and well optimized is crucial if you want it to get noticed. Here’s a list of things you need to consider improving:
Display Your Complete Name
Make sure you use your exact name as well as ensuring it’s spelled out correctly. When people search you on this network, they tend to use your full name.
Use a Professional Headshot Profile Pic
Your profile picture is in my opinion one of the most important elements in your Linkedin profile. First impressions are key and you want to make sure your picture isn’t going to negatively affect that. I would recommend you use a professional photographer and have him or her create multiple shots so that you can change it once in a while.
Use a Creative Headline
Don’t just write the department you’re part of but also specify your current position so that it’s a little more descriptive. I would also recommend you use descriptive keywords in case you feel your position isn’t really exciting. For example: Passionate eCommere advisor at….. instead of “advisor”
Showcase Your Experience
Make sure you complete your Linkedin profile by adding all relevant experience. Just like your resume, you don’t need to add everything especially if it has nothing to do with what you want to be know as for your personal brand. For example: if you were a waiter at a restaurant and now you’re actually an accountant, there’s no point in mentioning that experience.
3. Share Your Expertise on Linkedin
I love how Linkedin provides you many features to help you raise awareness of your expertise. Not only can you showcase that using your profile experience but you can also post status updates, share industry related articles, post images and even publish your own article similar to a blog post.
If you want to succeed at this, you need to make sure you’re consistent with these initiatives. You don’t want to do this daily and all of a sudden stop for weeks or even months. Keep it balanced.
Share Status Updates on Linkedin
Think of a status update as a short piece of advice relevant to your industry. It can also be a thought or an update on a recent event you’ve attended. Whenever you post a status, people within your network will see it on their Linkedin newsfeed. If they like or comment on it, people within their network will also see your post. This can certainly become very powerful.
Share Articles on Linkedin related to your expertise
I’m sure you read many online articles on news sites or blogs within your industry. Make it a habit of sharing the most valuable posts on your Linkedin profile. I usually do this whenever I find something worthwhile sharing within the eCommerce industry.
Share Relavant (inspirational) Pictures
Once in a while, why not share a motivational quote or piece of advice through a picture. People are visual and images get noticed within newsfeeds. Not everyone has time to ready a post. Sharing something as simple as an image can still have an impact on your network.
Publish a Creative & Relevant Post
If you love writing and sharing your knowledge, you will love the fact that Linkedin now allows users to publish a post within their profile similar to writing on a blog. This will help you share your knowledge as well as raising awareness of your expertise.
4. Build Your Network on Linkedin
Join Relevant Groups within Linkedin
One of the easiest ways to expand your network on Linkedin is through joining all sorts of groups within your industry. You can add people to your network easily if they are part of the same group but I don’t recommend doing that too much since it’s not really personal.
Here’s a great article to help you get started called The Definitive Guide To LinkedIn Groups For Marketing.
Engage with People’s Content
Make it a habit of checking your Linkedin newsfeed once a day. During that time, engage with content by liking it, commenting or even sharing it if worthwhile. People love it and they will do the same with your content.
Here’s a list of ways you can engage with success:
1. Share someone’s post
2. Comment on someone’s update
3. Comment on a group discussion
4. Comment on someone’s new profile pic
5. Congratulate someone on their new job
Here’s a great article that describes in more details how you can engage effectively on Linkedin.com
Connect with People within Your Industry
A healthy professional life starts with healthy relationships
Linkedin allows you to expand your network with ease.
1. You can add individuals from the people who you may know page.
2. You can add individuals from the Alumni page to see people you went to school with.
3. You can add individuals from performing an Advanced People Search to find people by keyword.
5. Nurture Your Relationships Using Linkedin
Message contacts via Linkedin
Don’t simply add people to your network without ever getting in touch with them. Make it a habit of reaching out once in a while by sending them a message through Linkedin. A simple hello goes a long way. This initiative will remind people of who you are and what you do which is perfect for personal branding. You never know but a discussion might lead to a new opportunity.
Meet people at events
We all attend events during the year related to our industry. I attend a lot of eCommerce conferences on a yearly basis. My friend Sid recently wrote a post on How To Network Like A Ninja At Conferences where he mentions the importance of pre-conference initiatives where you reach out to your current connections in order to see if there’s an opportunity to connect with them during an upcoming event.
Using Linkedin, browse your connections and see who’s most likely to attend the event and send them a brief message. Event if they’re not, it will be regarded as a nice gesture and might even consider attending the event in the future.
Stay in touch on Twitter
Many professionals use Twitter for communicating. Although I wish Linkedin had an easy way of tweeting someone rather than messaging them, you can still use Twitter to nurture leads.
Make it a habit of following your Linkedin connections on Twitter. When doing so, you will be able to engage with their content similar to how you would do it on Linkedin directly. You can retweet, favorite or even send them a direct message which will certainly help you nurture the relationship.
Conclusion
If you want your personal brand to get noticed online, Linkedin is among the best places to start. Millions of people are in this network and that makes your job a lot easier but you will need to find ways of gaining attention since it’s very crowded.
Remember this: Stay authentic and don’t be annoying.
