Being a job seeker in this economy can be challenging, especially if you are unfamiliar with how to leverage social media in your job search. In this presentation, I show you how to build your LinkedIn profile to network your way to your next position.

1. How to Build Your Personal Brand on LinkedIn
Presented By: Doreen Olson & Christine Kaup
Job Seekers’ Saturday ~ September 21, 2013

2. LinkedIn… a brief overview
• Largest professional networking site with over 238
million members in 200 counties and 20 languages
• 84 million members in the U.S.
• 3 million company pages
• 4 out of 5 LinkedIn members drive business decisions
• Largest Industry
– Information & Technology Systems

3. How does it work?
• Think 6 of Kevin Bacon
– 1st degree
• Your immediate connections
– 2nd degree
• Connections that are connected
to your 1st degree connections

4. Building a Killer Profile in
10 STEPS

5. #1 Build a Summary
• Must speak to your target audience
• Tell your professional story in a way that is catchy &
succinct
• Convey:
– Your strengths
– Knowledge & experience
– How you can bring value (to an organization)
• Use the 1st person point of view
• IDEA!
-- Consider using your 30/60 second introduction as your summary

6. #2 Use your real name
• Do not use your email address or a username
• Do not put anything in your name line besides your name
#3 Use a professional photo
• Users are more likely to click on your profile
if you have a picture
• Using a consistent professional photo for personal
branding is a cardinal rule

7. #4 Contact Information
• Always be accessible and reachable
• With the new clickable contact button, employers can
contact you while on your profile
– No one wants to click a button that fails to work

8. #5 Experience
• Highlight your roles, expertise and skills
that make you shine
• Include more than just your last/current position
– Go back at least 10 years in work history
• Include more than just the company & your position title
– Add your job duties and responsibilities
– Include accomplishments
– Do not use the experience area to talk about your employer
• Add all education and training

9. #6 Add sections
• Add sections that reflect your achievements &
volunteer experience
#7 Add skills and accomplishments
• Include key words that report skills & accomplishments
– Skill: Mechanically inclined
– Accomplishment: Rewarded for $15,000 cost cutting suggestion

10. #8 Seek recommendations
• Get recommendations by giving recommendations!

11. #9 Join Groups
• Find others that share common interests
• Stay abreast of industry news
• People will find you
• Job opportunities
• Answer questions that other members ask
• Search your groups’ members and connect with them

12. #9 Join groups…continued
• Groups to consider joining as a job seeker
– College(s) alumni
– Industry related groups
• Regional groups
– New North Connection
• Regional, advice, job postings, local events
– The Undercover Recruiter
• Online job & career guide
– Networking
• DWD - R U Support
• FVTC - Job Seekers Network

13. #10 Update your profile
• 2-3 times a month
• To keep you top-of-mind with your connections
• Updating your profile will also help to keep you on
top of search results

14. #11 SEO (Bonus!)
•
Populate your profile with keywords & phrases that
increase the likelihood of being found by search engines
•
Use keywords in your profile, then check your ranking
among the results
•
The more complete your profile is, the higher number of
searches your profile will appear in
#12 Set a custom URL (Bonus!)
• Populate your profile with keywords & phrases that
increase the likelihood of being found by search engines
• Use keywords in your profile, then check your
ranking among the results

15. Your profile is complete, now what?
JOB SEARCH TIPS

16. How to be found…
• List more than just your last/current position
– If you do not, it may give the impression that
you are inexperienced
• Share professional content
– List credentials (licenses, certificates, specialized training)
• Follow companies you are interested in
– More than 3 million companies have a company page
– 90 of the Fortune 100 companies use LinkedIn to find
potential hires
(All data retrieved: 9/18/2013, http://press.linkedin.com/about)

17. Job search…
1. Complete your LinkedIn Profile
2. Connect with former co-workers, colleagues & friends
3. Join Groups & discussions
4. Get Recommendations (by giving recommendations)
5. On JOBS tab, use “Advanced Search” to job search
6. Explore where the Opportunity is (search similar job profiles)
7. Find out the skill sets required (find companies where similar folks work)
8. Research & Follow Companies (locate the hiring manager)
9. Keep growing your network
10. Expect the Unexpected!