Social media is a great place to learn about and create a digital conversation with your market. Potential employers do not want to be talked-to, or worse yet sold-to on these platforms. Your followers want to know they have a place to come learn, to ask questions about things THEY care about, and to know they are being heard.
Thursday, January 30th… Your LinkedIn TASKS: An exploration of three key tasks in putting together your LinkedIn presence.
Here are some things we’ve learned from listening to those we’ve served since the advent of LinkedIn, the preferred place for professional level job seekers to leave their “digital footprint.”
What’ll IT BE, Push or Pull?
In “PUSH Marketing,” you need to take a low-key approach and offer 90% of insights and education to your market, with only 10% of things that would be seen as a sales pitch. Of course, ALL your social media content is “selling” in one way or another, but your market will be turned off if it comes across as a hard sell.
On the other side, don’t just post silly photos or motivation quotes. Position yourself as a subject matter expert and a source of real help to your followers, by sharing valuable information your market cares about (using UPDATES to post white papers…or sprinkle them in to your Profile).
“PULL Marketing,” on the other hand, requires a concerted effort to optimize your keyword concentration (SEO) to attain high page ranking in keyword searches. This is where most beginners start as they learn and gain confidence with the various functionalities offered by LinkedIn
The challenge is that either approach, when taken to an extreme, could be viewed as manipulative or ‘gaming the system’ (extreme pull)… or just too much narrative fluff (extreme push). So in this brief handout we will be taking a down the middle approach which will give both beginning and intermediate users of LinkedIn the ‘best of both worlds’ in LinkedIn utility.
In-Sync, NOT Duplicate Personal Marketing Collaterals
While one’s resume is all about wise use of two pages worth of ‘vertical space,’ your LinkedIn Profile has no such limitation, but contains the very same elements of content: A clear positioning statement, a concise qualification summary, evidence of your supportive experience, and your education/ training.
Task#1: A Dynamic Profile
| Your RESUME | Your LinkedIn Profile | |
| A clear and specific positioning statement + defining KEYWORDS | A compelling HEADLINE that speaks to your professional branding efforts | |
| A Qualification SUMMARY that directs the reader to your value proposition | “Your story” in a nutshell, providing the reader a SUMMARY of your value to them | |
| Professional Experience: Provides the reader with proof that you have the requisite experience to meet requirements and perform well | A chronological look at the jobs you’ve held: Proof that you have the requisite experience to meet requirements and perform well | |
| EDUCATION or related training and certifications | EDUCATION or related training and certifications |
When employed, your HEADLINE might present you as the <<Billing Manager at LSC Communications (formerly RR Donnelley>>. However, when seeking your next right employment opportunity you have some choices. Using “Pull Marketing” tactics, you could present yourself as…
OFFICE MANAGEMENT: Financial Analysis | Operations Accounting | Customer Service | Database Administration
-or-
Using the more narrative “Push Marketing” tactics, you could present yourself as…
Resourceful OFFICE MANAGER, skilled in Financial Analysis, Operations Accounting, Customer Service, and Database Administration
You’ll want to use all the space available to you in your headline if possible as this is where search engines ‘look’ first, leaving your “digital footprints” throughout your usage of LinkedIn’s functionality. Your ‘editing window’ will stop you at the maximum character level.
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