How to Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile For a Better Career Growth - Part 1

As most of you must be familiar with the social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Pinterest etc. How many of you know that you can bag a high-paying and relevant job with the help of one & only LinkedIn. In this article, we’re going to discuss How to optimize your LinkedIn profile for better career growth.

It is a necessity nowadays to stay updated with the latest trends, tools, technologies, and skills. LinkedIn is none other than a social media platform but for professionals.

With the help of LinkedIn, you can not only connect with people all around the globe but also get a chance to pursue your career in the top companies.

Here’s how you can optimize your LinkedIn Profile

There are hundreds of courses and workshops available on the internet that tell you how to leverage LinkedIn for your career growth. In this article, we’ll take you through the best & proven practices that can help you bag more than expected results on LinkedIn.

1. Profile Picture: A happy face is a key to attracting people. Whether you’re a student, working professional, or fresher, LinkedIn has all that you need. When you create your LinkedIn profile, the first thing you’ve to do is to put a profile picture of yours with a happy face.

Some may disagree with the fact that your face has nothing to do with your career growth, but in our opinion, this is partially true.

When you put a happy face in your profile, people checking out your profile gets a positive vibe, and that is your first step towards letting someone get curious about you.

Don’t forget to wear formal attire in the profile picture and make sure that your face is clearly visible. A happy face, formal attire, and open eyes watching right into the eyes of the person who are checking out your profile.

LinkedIn accepts square size high-resolution images as profile pictures. Your picture must have dimensions of at least 800*800 pixels.

In the below image, you can see what should be a LinkedIn profile picture must look like.

For this part, that’s it.

2. Cover Image: Unlike the profile picture, the cover image is the image that gets shown behind your profile picture and has dimensions of 1584*396 pixels.

A cover image shows the brief, offers, specialities, skills, tools & technologies that you’re working on or you want to work with. Cover image must be a visual+text image that consists of a graphic relevant to your field, and a tagline or list of tools that you’ve hands-on.

If you’re a fresher, you must mention the tools & technologies that you’re an expert on. If you’re a student, you must write a tagline with relevant keywords that must reflect the name of the domain that you’re working upon.

If you’re a working professional, your cover image must mention your primary skills as well as your contact details like a website or email address for the people to contact you.

It sometimes gets difficult for you to edit the profile picture as per your needs or design the cover image if you don’t have any idea about graphic designing. To solve this issue, here is a lifesaver website that can help you design everything you’ll ever need. Whether it be a profile picture, cover image, banners, resumes, logos or PPT, this tool got you covered.

Go to the browser and type canva.com, Sign In to the Canva and type the keyword that you’re looking for, into the search box.

If you’re going to design a cover picture for LinkedIn, just type “LinkedIn Cover” into the search box and this tool has thousands of free & premium pre-made layouts to choose from. Open any pre-made template and start editing. You can download it from Canva and upload it to LinkedIn.

3. Headline: This is one of the key aspects that sets you apart from others on LinkedIn. The headline in your profile reflects the direction in which your career is moving.

There might be a lot of different opinions about what you should write on the headline, I’m going to briefly guide you on how you should be doing it.

If you’re a student or a fresher, you must write your headline seeking an opportunity in the relevant field. For example, if you are a fresher and want to work as a Data Analyst in an organization, you must write your headline something around this:

Looking For Opportunities as a Data Analyst

On the other hand, if you’re a working professional and have prior experience in the relevant field, your headline must contain the names of tools & technologies that have experienced with. Let’s say, you’re a working professional with 3 years of experience in Data Analytics, and you’re good in Python, Pandas, SQL, Data Visualization, and Business Analytics your headline must look something like this:

Data Analytics | Python | Pandas | SQL | Power BI

In step 1 towards optimizing your LinkedIn profile, follow this proven guide and stay connected for the next part of the article – How To Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile For Better Career Growth.