Episode 42
Leveraging LinkedIn with Bianca Jackson
September 10, 2020
LinkedIn has gone from being a job-hunting platform to a multi-faceted social network for professionals, but many people still struggle with how to use it to their advantage. In this episode, LinkedIn expert and career coach Bianca Jackson talks with Diana about the many ways LinkedIn can support your goals. Regardless of where you are in your career, if you’ve been waiting for the right opportunity to jump into LinkedIn, this is the episode for you.
You can connect with Bianca on LinkedIn.
Leveraging LinkedIn: Key takeaways from Episode 42
Over the past 15 years, LinkedIn has quickly evolved from a job search tool to a professional platform giving people a voice, visibility, and opportunities to network and learn. It’s not a matter of having time to spend on a social network—regardless of where you are in your career, you need to make that vital time to be an active participant.
Understanding who is on LinkedIn can help you understand how to use it to advance your own goals. The membership is largely college educated, skews slightly male, and averages between the ages of 30 and 39. When users are on LinkedIn, they’re typically looking for ways to advance their careers or scale their businesses.
By knowing your customer avatar—that is, who you want to engage with in your LinkedIn audience, regardless of your goal for doing so—you can begin to identify the types of people you should connect with. It’s less about hitting a high number of connections and more about the quality and relevance of those connections.
Monitoring the trending topics on LinkedIn can help you stay abreast of what’s going on globally, as well as what people in your desired audience are talking about. In doing so, you’ll be able to tailor your message to address the topics that are relevant to your audience.
Three tips for improving your LinkedIn profile:
1. Don’t treat it like a resume. Instead of showing your history, show how your past will influence and support what you’re going to do in the future. Where are you going? Why are you unique?
2. Make your profile about the person you’re targeting. Whether that’s a future employer, prospective customers, speaking opportunities—whatever the case may be, write your profile with that audience in mind. Highlight your accomplishments and entice visitors to want to have a conversation with you in order to learn more.
3. Explain why you do the work you do. Show what you’re passionate about and help your audience to care about the things you care about. Build that human connection.
Remember that LinkedIn has evolved, and so should you. There are great opportunities there, but you have to work for them. If you’ve been dissatisfied with your experience on LinkedIn in the past, give it another shot from the standpoint of understanding what you wish to achieve on the platform. Have a strategy and pursue it. Build a community around yourself with your long-term goals in mind.
Speaking of strategy, have one for engaging with your audience. A great profile is only a portion of your presence on LinkedIn. Put out meaningful content and create a strategy for getting conversations off the platform.
Focus on making meaningful connections—not sales pitches. Bianca reaches out to people who view her profile just to say hello and ask how they’re doing. Her goal is for people to remember her. An authentic conversation will get you much farther than a canned response or salesy promise.
When creating your personal brand on LinkedIn, or any platform for that matter, be yourself. Don’t shy away from sensitive topics, but realize that you may need to stand behind your words once you’ve put them out there. Being true to yourself and unafraid to be vulnerable is difficult, but it also makes you memorable.
Be very clear on who you are, as well as who you aren’t. Once you understand this, you can make decisions and attract opportunities based on what’s right for you—and you’ll also have a clearer compass for saying no to the opportunities that aren’t the right fit.
Are you lost on LinkedIn?
For more from Bianca, download her free ebook, “Lost on LinkedIn.” You’ll learn why you need to dust off your profile and how to use this social media platform to find the career and business opportunities you're looking for.
