I’m sure you’ve heard this before: it’s important to complete your LinkedIn profile. It helps you get a higher rank and it helps recruiters and hiring managers understand if you have the right skills and qualifications. It is known that around 50% of profiles are incomplete and also less visited. Maybe you’ve missed a few chances so far and you don’t even know.
Write a LinkedIn Profile summary
What’s the crucial element? I would say your LinkedIn profile summary.
It’s a key factor in today’s online job search on Social Media and it has to be smart and catchy. It’s one of the few parts that you can actually customize. It’s not supposed to be a summary of your CV, because that would be repetitive and boring. The point of it is to make you different. And you are – prove it by becoming your own Brand promoter. The best LinkedIn summaries are all about that.
You should try to be as authentic as possible. Therefore I wouldn’t speak in 3rd person, it makes you look snobby and distant. And I personally prefer to read summaries in first person.
Please don’t use all 2000 characters, nobody has got time for that. We’re all always busy and only pay attention to what’s more eye-catching. You should optimize your chances to buy more time from readers, so focus on the beginning. You have more or less characters depending on the platform used. On desktop 220 characters are immediately visible, whereas on mobile only 92. Give your best in the first 100 and users will do the next step: viewing your entire profile. Even better, contact you. That’s the real goal of the best LinkedIn summaries: make people connect with you, send you a message and start a relationship (and maybe come up with your dream job offer).
Profile summary examples
You can find many useful examples online and dozens of articles with LinkedIn summary tips, take a look at some material before starting your own text. I think you can find some of the best LinkedIn summaries even in your network, especially if you have a lot of senior contacts. Study the words they use and find a common pattern. It’s a good idea to take into consideration the most known SEO techniques to be well ranked by Google. However, don’t forget that humans read your summary as well, make it pleasant and interesting.
Learning how to use LinkedIn is getting more and more important to succeed in your job search. Make sure you stay up to date!
