You want a great LinkedIn profile that draws attention, helps you connect with people, and advance your career.
Today, we’ll share tips on how you can optimize your LinkedIn profile so you can get found by recruiters and get hired faster. Plus, we've added a LinkedIn profile checklist for you to fully optimize every piece of your profile.
Let’s get started.
Professional Looking Photos That Represent You
There’s no way to seem more approachable and human, and give a sense of who you are by showing your professional photo.
Photos add more credibility, and recruiters feel more trusting towards you as a candidate.
LinkedIn data shows that people are 7 times more likely to click on your profile if you have a photo. It doesn’t have to be fancy - you can take a simple photograph in front of a plain background.
The pictures below look professional, yet it looks approachable and welcoming. You are more than welcome to add your twist to your photograph.
Here’s an article on how to take a painless free headshot from home if you don’t have a photo yet.
Write A Compelling Headline
Write a headline that best describes the job/role/skills you are performing or looking for in the future. If you want recruiters to find your profile, add some keywords to your headline.
If you aren’t sure what keywords to include, you can look at job descriptions for the role you’re looking for and add the word that is frequently used.
Some headline formats to choose from:
- Digital Marketing Manager | SEO | Google Analytics | Maximizing Profits
- Recent Finance graduate with a focus in financial analysis, accounting, and reporting
- B2B Inside Sales Rep | $2 M generated in 2021
- Digital Ads Manager | 3 Years Experience Managing 7-figure ad budgets
- Social Media Manager | Helping start-ups grow their social media to drive more sales
- Content Marketer specializing in ad copy, blog content, and social media
Include a Summary of Your Background
Include a summary of what you do, your professional background, achievements, or any expertise you have.
It should address what you do and how you can help a potential employer. Feel free to show your personality and you can write your summary in any creative or catchy way you want.
Unless the industry is formal, it is best to write your LinkedIn in the first person. It makes you more approachable to the person who is viewing your profile.
This is also a good place to add a CTA to your portfolio or samples or website (if applicable), and add featured posts, links, or media that reflect what you do.
Here’s an example of how Bree Warren has used the Featured section to showcase her work:
Some ideas to consider:
- Write about something that you love or excites you professionally.
- Explain what you do in the simplest form - what problem you solve
- Share something interesting about you besides work
- Write how you speak
- Tell stories
- Ask for what you want your viewers to do after they read your summary (e.g. connect with you, check your portfolio, the message you, etc.)
Here are some of our favorite examples you can choose from:
In both examples, they have shared what they do and how they help by adding their creativity and personality. Ready to craft one? We’ve created a LinkedIn summary template that you can download right away to boost your LinkedIn summary to get recruiters inspired to reach out to you for a job interview!
Update Your Work Experience
Put at least 3 recent jobs with a detailed description of your daily responsibilities, achievements, and results you achieved.
Focus on the outcome and the results of the work you did. For example, in customer service, you can talk about how you handled customer complaints that led to fewer refunds and negative reviews.
Be creative! No matter what job title or industry you worked in, you can always come up with results you were able to create! You can also attach photos, files, or videos from your work.
Here’s an example from Terry Shilling's LinkedIn profile:
Here are some examples from Novo Resume on how you can write it in bullet points:
- Hit and exceeded department KPIs by 20% for 5 months in a row.
- Managed a team of 5 software engineers to develop software solutions for clients.
- Worked with a team of 6 to create award-winning ad campaigns for Company X.
- Sent 200+ cold emails daily, managing to set up calls with 10% of the recipients
- Revamped Company X’s social media accounts, improving user engagement by over 60% on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
Want some useful tips to write a winning digital marketing resume? Check out our digital marketing resume template.
Include Skills, Endorsements & Recommendations for Extra Points
This is a great way to show and not tell hiring managers what you can do. People are more likely to believe you if they see people are recommending you.
If you don’t have any recommendations yet, think of 1-3 people you have before worked for that you could reach out to. More often than not, people will be happy to write you a recommendation, which gives you extra credibility for your skills or experience.
Add at least 5 key skills and then ask your connections to endorse you for those skills. Choose to keep relevant endorsements. It’s ok to delete endorsements for topics that you don’t want to be found for.
Education
Check to see if you’ve included the schools/colleges you’ve joined. It is not a deal-breaker if you don’t have a degree (depending on the industry), but it is good to mention if you have relevant skills or experience.
Some LinkedIn members also add their certifications, courses, training, or volunteering experiences that relate to the job.
List the classes that show off the interests or skills you’re passionate about. If you have any projects- talk about what you did and how you did it.
Create A Personalized LinkedIn URL That Is Easy To Remember
LinkedIn allows you to easily customize your profile URL, instead of using generic LinkedIn links that will be difficult to use in your resume.
Your LinkedIn profile has a URL. You can edit this by adding your name (www.linkedin.com/in/yourname). This also looks more professional when you include it on your resume or email signature.
Here’s how you can change your LinkedIn profile URL.
- Click the Me icon at the top of your LinkedIn homepage.
- Click View profile.
- Click Edit public profile & URL on the right side.
- Under Edit your custom URL on the right side, click the Edit icon next to your public profile URL.
- It'll be an address that looks like www.linkedin.com/in/yourname.
- Type the last part of your new custom URL in the text box.
- Click Save.
More information on the LinkedIn page.
Build A Personal Branding
Share helpful insights, blogs, posts, or articles that might interest your target visitor. You can share an article, information about a presentation you are joining, or some new interesting thing you discovered.
Top candidates are the ones who leverage LinkedIn not just during a job search, but also to create new connections with people. One awesome way to show credibility on LinkedIn is to add experts in your niche and share helpful insights about your industry.
Even if you’re new in your field, you always have something to share. You can start by commenting or engaging with other people's posts if you don’t feel ready to write your posts yet.
Set Your Profile to Open to New Opportunities
By turning on this feature, you let recruiters know that you are open to new opportunities and specific roles. Keep your profile public so people can view all your profile information.
More Takeaways
- Do you have an up-to-date professional profile picture?
- Do you have a background image?
- Is your location accurate and optimized for somebody trying to recruit in your particular area?
- Is your profile URL customized in a simple way?
- Do you have a compelling summary of your professional career and interests?
- Do you list the required skills for the kind of job you would like to have?
- Do you have a professional headline that goes beyond your current job description?
- Is your profile integrated into your community with connections, education, and experience?
- Do you have genuine recommendations and skill endorsements?
- Does it have your contact information readily available?
- Are your connections relevant and useful?
- Have you set your profile’s “open candidates” preferences to show recruiters you are looking for a job, what kind of role you prefer, and written a “note to recruiters?”
- Do you have any relevant links or media on your profile?
Hope you got some helpful tips to optimize your LinkedIn profile.
When you’re applying for jobs, you don’t want to just be one of the random resumes in a pile. Your LinkedIn profile should showcase your work experience, volunteer experience, background, areas of expertise, and your personality.
Take our LinkedIn profile checklist and cross off every step until you have a profile that employers won’t be able to ignore.
Download it below!
