Three top tips for using LinkedIn to develop your personal brand
LinkedIn is a B2B platform, it is people’s (and businesses’) go-to social media channel to find out more about a person. It’s one of the top online channels to find, and demonstrate thought leadership on your topic of choice. LinkedIn helps you gain authority in your niche, with a large number of engaged executives, influencers and other like minded people who are serious about moving forward with their ideas, and learning new things.
LinkedIn is where people are actively looking for collaborations, or to employ people or where businesses demonstrate their people behind their brand. They may be on other platforms too, but LinkedIn is a key space for making real business connections that can lead to actual paid work. People who invest time in this channel are motivated to engage and build their online network because it’s first and foremost a business tool to make some solid connections that will help build your personal brand.
Here are our top tips:
- Make sure you have a good head and shoulders shot as your profile picture, it gives a good first impression and helps reduce the amount of times you’ll be ignored - no one wants to see a grey “cluedo icon” of the person they are trying to find out more about. Be visible to help people build their trust in you.
- When you have been to a networking event – make sure you find all those business card owners on LinkedIn that evening or first thing the next day and connect with them. When you send them a connection request, add a note to remind the person of how you met them like “Hi <name>, great to meet you at today’s <name of event>, Lets connect <name>. Personalising this will prove helpful when you look back through your messages at a later date and remind you of how you met.
- Within your personal LinkedIn profile, close down your connections so only you can see them. Often some people will connect with you just to get hold of your online “black book” of connections. If you have mutual ones, these will of course show up, but your thousands of connections are through your hard work, why would you open them up to strangers? Close these down by going to your settings and privacy, on the menu that appears click on the privacy tab (underneath the blue header), then look for the “who can see your connections” – change this to only you and LinkedIn in will automatically save this setting for you.
If you have any specific questions on LinkedIn or other social media platforms that you’d like us to cover in future newsletters (or you’d like more tips), then please let us know on admin@citywomen.org.uk