Just like creative professionals use portfolios to showcase their skills, your LinkedIn profile should do the same.
Short on time, but ready to refresh your LinkedIn profile? Here we have four tips that will rejuvenate your LinkedIn profile, freshening it for the eyes of a prospective employer.
A skills assessment is an online test that you can take that will provide you with a verified skills badge. Upon completion of the assessment, you will be able to add the badge to your profile, giving credence to any skills that you’ve already listed. There are several available skills assessments, categorised under technical, business, and design, including all programming languages, Microsoft suite, and others like SketchUp or Keynote.
According to LinkedIn, having verified skills increases your odds of being hired by 30 per cent. Using these skills testing results as examples in an interview process could help boost your answer to the age-old question: Why are you the best candidate for the job?
Want to get more endorsements on your LinkedIn profile? The best way to attract more endorsements is to first provide them for your own connections. If this doesn’t prompt your connections to return the favour, don’t be afraid to reach out with a polite message. Simply explain you were hoping for an endorsement for a certain skill as you are looking for a career change.
Endorsements will help to substantiate your claims of skills and experience. Once you do start receiving more endorsements, ensure they paint the right picture. You may have more enthusiastic endorsers promoting your project management skills, for example, but want your career to veer towards design. Be proactive in managing your endorsements, so the best, and the aptest, are highlighted front and centre on your LinkedIn profile.
If you’re not actively looking for a job, or you don’t rely on the platform for your work, it could be easy to let your activity on the platform lapse. But this is a platform that needs to be kept warm.
It’s important to go one step beyond sharing content; add comments to your content and ensure you engage with other posts as well. Being able to eloquently express your opinion is something you will perfect and develop over time. This will go some way to demonstrate thought leadership.
Just like creative professionals use portfolios to showcase their skills and past work, your LinkedIn profile should do the same.
Attach materials to your LinkedIn profile that either you have created or have been produced by your business. This could include case studies, white papers, or even videos. This showcases any special projects you have been a part of as well as the type of work you have contributed to while with your employer. It adds meaningful context to any tenures listed on your profile and highlights what you consider to be meaningful or impactful work in your career.
(Just be certain you have relevant permissions to share the content!)
If you are a hiring manager it is also important to update your LinkedIn profile to be a genuine and positive reflection of your company to showcase to prospective new employees.
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