In this exciting session, we explored LinkedIn from top to bottom with our friends Chantel, Melanie, and Dawn from LinkedIn Local. This amazing trio assisted our large audience in uncovering the latest trends, must-know tips, optimization hacks, and awesome features. Whether you’re a LinkedIn veteran aiming to spruce up your profile or a newbie eager to make the most of LinkedIn, this session had something fun and useful for everyone!

Chantel Soumis, Senior Marketing Executive, spoke about Personal Branding on LinkedIn

If you haven’t heard about personal branding by now, it’s the art of how to sell yourself! Digital marketing and social media help you build a cohesive presence across all of your online platforms. Opportunities flow in when you share your story and learn to be authentic. 

On your LinkedIn Profile, make sure your personal branding comes through on your profile by: 

• Creating an engaging and unique headline. This can be more than just your title. Think about what makes you unique, and be sure to include keywords.Do some research on what hashtags to include in your headline, as well. This is where you should include the top things you would brag about.
• Include a call to action in your banner image. It can be a subtle or visual call to action, but it should be there. If you’re trying to get people to buy your book, use a photo of the jacket cover. If you’re an amazing speaker, use a photo of you on stage. If you want people to hire your services in a particular area, make sure you’re highlighting those skills in some way using your banner.
• Be sure to use a profile photo that shows you smiling or laughing. It conveys warmth and is inviting. Even if you’re in a more serious industry, or you are a more serious person, it’s important to put your best foot forward with a smile.
• Creator Mode is dead. RIP Creator Mode.
• Add a booking link, contact info, or a link to your website into your bio. It’s an under-utilized resource and can help drive business to you, but also just lets people get to know you and your work better.
• Make sure your profile is set to public! If it’s not, no one will be able to find you. This is HUGE. 

In addition to simply creating and optimizing your profile, being consistent on the platform, both in terms of what you’re sharing on your own profile and how you’re interacting with other posts is really important. You should be showing up twice or three times per week to post and you should be interacting with posts just as frequently.

Your personal brand should be authentic to you, so it doesn’t have to be all about you pushing out content or hyping yourself up all the time if that’s not your personality. Chantel shared a great example of a LinkedIn person who gained a ton of followers just by engaging and commenting on other people’s posts. Do what feels right for you! Just remember, there’s a difference between vulnerability and oversharing.  

Melanie Lee, Founder of Hustle Happiness, spoke about New Features + Optimizations on LinkedIn

• You can now edit the posts that you schedule in advance.
• Verification is worth it, despite the hoops. 
  • It can build trust and credibility. 
  • It helps your profile become more visible and helps you grow your connections quicker.
  • It also reduces the chances of impersonation. 

• Top Voice Badges: 
  • These are earned by contributing to collaborative articles – LinkedIn.com/advice. 
  • You have to consistently score in the top 30%. 
  • The badge isn’t evergreen – it will be active for 60 days and then the platform will re-evaluate.

• Voice Messages: 
  • Adds a personal touch to your communication.
  • Only available for your first-degree connections.
  • Only available on LinkedIn Mobile.
  • Taps out after 60 seconds. 

• Audio Events: 
  • New within the last 6 months. 
  • No pressure for having to be on video. 
  • Are super flexible because you can host conversations from anywhere.
  • These allow you to connect w/your audience, host Q&As, demonstrate your expertise, etc.

• LinkedIn Newsletters: 
  • Can quickly grow your newsletter subscribers because they invite all of your current connections to subscribe, and also anyone new that you connect with. 
  • Great for getting business, networking, or sending more personalized updates to your followers. Also great for building your personal brand. 
  • Downside is that you can’t extract emails and/or use them in another platform, so if LinkedIn went down tomorrow you’d lose your whole subscriber base.
  • However, sending newsletters through LinkedIn avoids the email spam filters and can help get your news to more people without getting lost.

Dawn Mullarney, the Founder & CEO of Unique Connector, spoke about Networking on LinkedIn

• Through the LinkedIn App, use the QR code scanner in the search bar to help you connect with people quickly and easily – it’s basically the new business card.
• Personalize your connection requests, show genuine interest and mention mutual connections, lead with value: why should someone connect with you?
• Engage thoughtfully through comments. Ask insightful questions, share relevant experience, add value. Be an active participant!
• Posts that receive comments see a 4x increase in views compared to posts that don’t receive any.

Embrace an abundance mindset! There’s room for everyone at the table. Learn from your competitors, collaborate with your connections to drive innovation and growth, and share knowledge and resources to build lasting partnerships.

More Resources

• Link to this Presentation Deck
• Photo Recap of the event