It’s obvious, Facebook is the most used social networking site on the web but there are too many reasons why you should have a LinkedIn profile too in addition to these Facebook, Twitter, G+ ones.
There are too many profiles existing on LinkedIn but researchers say, only 3% of the users are using LinkedIn in the right way and the rest of the 97% profiles are just nothing. People just create them to raise their hands when a question of LinkedIn profiles rises.
Before actually speaking about the ways to create and develop your LinkedIn profile to get the most of the network, you should know why you should have a LinkedIn profile.
You Come First
If you are offering your freelance services to your clients, most of them (almost all of them) will Google your name to know more about you.
LinkedIn is one of the most popular sites and so it obviously ranks top on Google. So when a client searches for you, your LinkedIn will appear on top and so you can tell a lot about you to your clients just by having a single profile on LinkedIn.
Your Relationships
I’m not talking about your personal relationships here.
As a blogger, writer, freelancer or whatever the job you are doing, you’ll have a network of fellow men of your stream. So LinkedIn is considered to be the best place to maintain your professional network online.
Because Recruiters Also Have A LinkedIn Profile
Statistics say that every team member of the HR department of each company has a LinkedIn profile of their own. So they use LinkedIn to search for better people so that their company can hire a better person to get the work done. If you can manage to prepare a nice and attractive LinkedIn profile, the chances of getting a job are better.
Okay fine. We’ve had enough of lines about the reasons why you should have a Linkedin profile. Now let’s get on to the actual topic. Like a website, LinkedIn can also be SEOed.
Give A Reason
What is a LinkedIn profile? It’s undoubtedly the best place to show your skills to the business people or the others.
So, show up your skills on your LinkedIn profile. When a person is searching for someone to hire, that should be you. Write down all your skills. Give them a reason why they should give you the job.
Fill Out Completely
LinkedIn gives you a form to be filled which includes your current job status, academic qualifications and some other things too (I don’t actually remember them all). Fill out the form completely. Generally talking about these online forms, people usually fill the fields where a * mark is seen. (a * mark indicates the field is required).
Keep It Clean
Layout is one of the most important parts in maintaining a good readership for websites, blogs, magazines and profiles too. So maintain a clean and attractive layout for your LinkedIn profile and make sure the page is not messed up like Orkut ones.
SEO
Wondering what kind of SEO you are supposed to do for your LinkedIn profile? As the usage of keywords is the most important thing in a proper SEO, use keywords in your LinkedIn profile. That can make your profile rank top in search engines and so obviously in the site’s internal search.
Add Stuff
Now it’s time to add some other things to your LinkedIn profile to make it even more attractive. Add some good articles on your blog in the profile and let the people know what you’re reading using the Amazon Reading List. You can also use Slideshare and some creative apps to display your best presentations.
LinkedIn Tools
LinkedIn tools can really make your profile look attractive if you can properly make use of them. Instead of using the standard old-school default bullet styles, you can add some cool browser-supportive symbols as the bullets. You can also customize the names of your website using these tools. You can use a your site name instead of the URL so that people can easily remember your site.
Update
It’s very important to keep your LinkedIn profile up-to-date. I know, you update every single status of yours on your Facebook account. Do care about your LinkedIn profile too. When you get out of your school to pursue higher studies at a renowned college, update it on your profile. Or when you get a job in some ‘X’ company, update it too. People will come to know your qualifications and job experience through these.
So you see how important having a profile on LinkedIn is? Try searching the names of random bloggers on Google, you’ll see their LinkedIn profile on the very first page itself.