LinkedIn: 5 tips to boost your profile (and your employer brand)
It's hard to ignore LinkedIn when looking to recruit. It is the first professional network most used to source these candidates.
However, few business leaders think of optimizing their LinkedIn profile in order to create an attractive profile, thus making it a lever for recruiting.
Each person who views your profile is someone who may be interested in applying or who can recommend you to their network.
Note that this process of enhancing your profile is, therefore, part of a more global process consisting of establishing a real recruitment strategy on LinkedIn.
1. Tell your story
Human beings memorize information more easily when it is part of a story, of a story.
This is what you want to do with your LinkedIn profile so that you and your business are remembered. This is what Justine Hutteau does very well with Respire through video content that makes the buzz. You can thus follow your entrepreneurial adventure step by step.
The story has the advantage of marking intellectually but also emotionally, even spiritually.
It serves to mobilize emotion and create meaning to allow the audience to identify themselves, to put themselves in the shoes of the hero of the stories. Want to create a story that sticks, that you remember?
Certain ideas mark your interlocutors and thus push them to hold back for a long time and even to act. Others, on the contrary, are forgotten as soon as they are heard. Do you all know Disney? Well, they use these techniques.
If stories grab people's attention, it's because they open a hole in our brains.
And until the breach is closed, the brain processes the information. When the circle is complete, the brain can finally move on.
History is effective because it opens a gap! Some questions you can ask yourself to help you in this process.
- What is the mission of your company?
- What is the vision for your business?
- Where do you come from?
- Why did you start this business?
- What's yours why?
- What are you fighting against?
2. Dress up your profile
Your LinkedIn profile is your showcase just like your website. So that it makes you want to stay and consult it, the profile picture, as well as the banner, are two elements of your profile that should not be neglected.
Although the formatting of LinkedIn profiles is standardized, you can tell the difference.
Your profile picture should match you and reflect 100% who you are. To do this, hire a professional photographer who will photograph you in your best light.
This step should not be neglected since the profiles with a LinkedIn photo are 7 more visited than those without.
The banner also allows you to be identified quickly. It is also your asset. The easiest way is to insert a banner with your company logo.
For a more sophisticated banner, I recommend that you also put the other social networks of the company and a clear call to action: we are recruiting throughout France at the moment for sales positions, apply on our website.
3. Show yourself personally
You are unique. There are not two like you on Earth. You are competing with a multitude of companies to attract your talents.
Today, everyone offers the same thing to applicants: a job and a salary. But what makes you and your company choose you over another?
Your personal brand.
In short, YOU with your values, your attitudes, your experience.
We want to know the humans behind the professional. This is what allows you to make your personal brand.
Working on your personal brand means ensuring as much as possible that the traces you leave on the Internet and with the people you meet are positive and can become an asset for the development of your business. How do you plan to progress on your own? You need to be surrounded by the right people. Others are your strength.
Building your personal brand will allow you to be more visible in order to naturally spot your future recruits and that they can see you.
Building your personal brand is a daily job. You don't have to be famous to start, quite the opposite. This is how you can build your notoriety and attract your future recruits to you.
You can start by completing your resume by telling your story as a business owner and showing why candidates should apply to you.
Also, remember that your professional experience can also be useful. Also, I recommend that you do not hide your professional experiences and find a tip to enhance your values.
For example, on my LinkedIn profile, I directly mention my academic failures. This sends the message that I am not perfect, that I assume, and above all that I admit errors for myself as well as for those around me. This allows me to attract atypical profiles or people who appreciate this vision of the working world.
4. Make use of your profile to 100% (really)
LinkedIn provides you with some tools like Your dashboard in your profile which allows you to check what level you have.
As long as you are not at the Expert level, I recommend that you follow the instructions given in order to quickly improve your profile.
LinkedIn also provides you with a free tool that allows you to do more work on your LinkedIn profile, the SSI.
5. Make recommendations (and ask for them)
You can write a recommendation for all users whose work you want to identify as a colleague, a collaborator. Likewise, you can also receive recommendations from former collaborators, collaborators, or even interns.
Recommendations have a triple advantage:
- bring your profile to life
- give you credibility as an employer
- increase your visibility since your name is also available on the profile of the person you recommend and vice versa
Recommendations help bring a profile to life.
I strongly encourage you to systematically give recommendations to your former collaborators whose work, personality, personal and professional qualities you value.
This thus demonstrates qualities of benevolence and recognition greatly appreciated by employees. This practice is all the more appreciated if you spontaneously recommend your employee.
Conversely, receiving recommendations from your employees is vital. They will thus be able to attest to your personal and professional qualities as well as your role as a manager in the company.
In summary
Your LinkedIn profile is a great tool to grab the attention of your future recruits.
It would therefore be a shame to do without it in view of the growth of this professional network.
In summary, the 5 tips to boost your LinkedIn profile and develop your employer brand:
- Tell your story
- Dress up your profile
- Show yourself personally
- Really leverage your profile
- Make recommendations and ask for them
What is the trick you are going to apply to boost your LinkedIn profile and your employer brand?
