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Not Sure What to Do with Your Linkedin Profile? Start Here

We co-hosted a webinar on how to build a stand out LinkedIn profile with Alyson Weiss -- Social Media Specialist at Career Moves, a division of JVS. In the webinar she outlined a few strategies for crafting a headline and summary, making the most of endorsements and recommendations, and how to organize your profile to fit your goals. Here are a few tips that stood out:

Identify your audience and your purpose

Why are you using LinkedIn? To find a job? To make a career change? To build your network? A big factor in completing your profile is understanding the people and opportunities you want to attract. This affects the keywords you include in your summary, the headline you choose, and even the way you organize your profile. It's worth spending a little time reflecting on this before jumping into writing. 

Pick the right kind of headline

There are four kinds of headlines you can use, each emphasizing a different aspect of your work:

-Your transferable skills

-Your value-add

-Your mission statement

-Your various roles or 'hats'

 Alyson refers to your headline as your 120-character elevator pitch, so choose the one that allows you to put your best foot forward and gets you closer to your goals.

Turn off notifications!

Seems simple, right? But if you don't do this, you'll spam your network every time you make a change on your profile. Turning off notifications is also key if you're job hunting and want to keep your search discreet.

Have more questions about writing your LinkedIn profile? Download the slides from the presentation.


by Allison Jones

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