How to improve your LinkedIn profile

At all stages of your career, it's important to keep your LinkedIn profile updated as it is your base to grow your network, build relationships and seek new positions. It is the foundation for your personal branding and with the majority of employers now checking your profile before hiring it is important that it is used properly.

In recruitment, LinkedIn is part of everyday life for finding candidates. So, we've taken a look at some LinkedIn best practices and what you can be doing to improve your profile.

Think about your summary

This section is for you to go over what industry you’re in, your skills and provide an overview of yourself. Make this catchy and interesting but to the point. People viewing your profile want to find out who you are and what you do with ease, try and see the summary as your story.

Keep your profile up to date 

Make sure to regularly update your profile with new roles, promotions, job changes or even projects that you have been working on. It presents you as enthusiastic, in touch with your career and allows potential employers to stay up to date with where you are in your career and your progress.

See your LinkedIn profile as your personal brand

As well as your companies brand we need to ensure that we spend time building our own personal brand, without it, we could miss a big opportunity. Ways to do this on Linkedin can involve posting thought leadership pieces such as blogs, having your Linkedin headline as more than just a title, having a visual background image to make your page stand out, adding skills and getting endorsements and recommendations. These can all help to build your page and present who you really are on Linkedin. However, with endorsements and recommendations make sure these come from colleagues, managers or employers and not just your friends.

Grow your network

This is the beauty of Linkedin having the ability to grow your network, connect with your colleagues, employers, influencers, contacts from business meetings or networking.  Get in the habit of following up from business meetings with sending a Linkedin connection request with a message, in order to stay in touch.

But don’t over connect

Unlike other social media platforms you do not want your Linkedin profile to be filled with as many connections as possible. You want professional connections from people within your industry and individuals that know you and your career or who have worked with you. Too many connections can, in fact, have a negative impact on your profile compared to a positive one.

Interact with groups & connections 

Linkedin is the perfect place for you to interact with your connections' posts or get involved in discussions on groups. This can get you noticed and also lead to you connecting with other industry members. Remember not to overdo it though and think about your comments and shares before you post them.

Follow relevant influencers

This is an interesting one as it helps you to get a range of interesting content on your feed that can be shared and in turn can start conversations with the rest of the network. Try and keep this industry relevant as it can provide key insights into related topics if you do it right.

Stay professional

Foremost always remember to remain professional on LinkedIn as your next big opportunity/ employer could be looking at your profile and making a decision about whether to get in touch or not.