Updating information about ourselves can be difficult to do and is most likely the last item on our to-do list. If you haven’t looked at your LinkedIn Profile in a while, you could be missing a big opportunity to be found.  In order for your profile to be fully searchable on the LinkedIn network, it needs to be 100% complete. To find out if your profile is complete, log into LinkedIn, go to your personal profile (in edit mode), and on the right hand side of the screen it will tell you the percentage of completion that you have. LinkedIn has also gone one step further by walking you through what you need to do to complete it. Simply click on the “Improve your Profile” button and follow the steps they ask you to complete. Once you have gone through the steps needed, you will get your profile to completion.   As you go through this process, here are 3 tips to keep in mind:

  1. You need to have 3 recommendations in order to have a complete profile. Through the recommendation tool, send an email to customers, colleagues or vendors that you have worked with. Once they have written a recommendation for you, you will have a chance to review it before posting it to your profile.
  2. Be sure to add Skills & Expertise regularly to your profile. This is a newer feature to LinkedIn and it is also a tool that will make your profile more searchable. Think of these skills as “keywords” on your profile. Simply select as many skills as you like to represent what you do, what community you work in, and where you have expertise.
  3.  Add your company website, blog links and Twitter link to your profile. You are entitled to have 3 website links on your personal profile and a link to your Twitter account if you have one. These can create some good inbound links for your company and blogs that you are participating in, not to mention bring more awareness on how to stay connected to you.

Keep in mind that completing your profile is not something you should only do once. You need to make a note on your calendar to take a look at your profile and update it on a monthly basis. Making small updates such as adding recommendations, adding skills, or updating your summary can keep your profile from going stale. LinkedIn is a great business tool where your business contacts go to find out more about you – what are you showing them?

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