I’m a fan of linked in. I first created my account in 2008, and remembering what it was when I first signed on being an online resume type of platform to the content platform it is now is a nice progression. While Linked In has made some good partnerships with other large companies and acquisitions, this platform is still very much relevant for B2B and B2C if you’re aware of how to engage with the audience and users.
This presentation is a highlight of the ways to optimize your profile, tips with using the options for external promotion of other online repositories of your work or websites, along with best practices with creating posts. I’ll be posting the video to this soon for a full replay but in the meantime take advantage of the slides. If you have any questions feel free to contact me with ways you can create a unique offering on Linked In.
Creating a new user profile is essential when you’re going to have multiple people accessing your website. Below are the available roles for user profiles and what access and rights they have.
Administrator – The main account(s) with access to everything. Usually reserved for your web designer, and site owner.
Author – Can create pages and posts and publish them without the need to have them reviewed.
Editor – These user profiles are mainly used for people who will be reviewing posts written by Contributors.
Contributor – May create new posts and submit them for review by Editors or Authors and above.
Subscriber – Mainly to view new content that is published to your website. May also receive email notifications for new posts.
If you’ve been checking your emails over the past few weeks, chances are you’ve seen a bunch from Linked In with these messages from your connections endorsing you. When I first saw these I actually didn’t pay it much attention because it didn’t really seem official. I’ve had recommendations written for me, and those I take quite seriously. However an endorsement didn’t ring a bell. After about seven more endorsements from various people who normally aren’t frequent on Linked In, I had a newly sparked interest to find out what this was all about.
First lets take this back to the addition of skills that you can now add to your profile. The skills can be just about anything like web design, graphics, SEO, HR, filing, management, etc. If you haven’t yet, go through your profile and add all the skills that pertain to your work history and expertise.
Once you’ve selected all of your skills, you’ll have a list of them towards the end of your profile page. This is now also public so people who are connected to you to be able to click small plus buttons to endorse you for those selected skills.
So now what does all this mean? Well for now it’s kind of like a public notoriety display. It may be that people don’t take the time to write out recommendations for their connections, or Linked In figured they’d create something much faster for user engagement similar to the Google Plus 1 (+1) button. However you feel about it, I suggest you start listing all of your skills, and ask for others to start endorsing you. Before long you’ll have multiple endorsements that you’ll be proud to show a prospective client or HR manager.
Unless you’ve been diligently dodging the news of late, you are fully aware of the rants and complaints to online user privacy. Specifically from users and former users of Facebook. I’m not going to get into that too much because it isn’t necessary and I may post some links to articles you can read if you want.
Here’s the thing you really should be paying attention to; your digital profile. As a web designer and social media user, my information is all over the place. Most of which I knowingly posted and signed up to share. Some of which I did not particularly care to have shared about or past my set restrictions. As I Google my own name I find interesting websites that have farmed my information and added to their sites. Some relevant, and some not. What’s becoming a bit alarming to me is how my “digital profile” is starting to look like a social security number.
Why is this alarming? Well because if you’re one of the millions out of work and submitting your resume online to many different job forums, and career sites, your information isn’t always nested and secured within those sites. So yes, employers are searching for you by name and through Facebook, or Yahoo, and other social sites and engines. And yes they’re finding information. We all know banks check your credit history, but should they be allowed to follow your online history? What TV shows you “liked”? What web forums your signed up to (gun, porn, racial, gaming, etc). Even parents are getting into this by checking out their neighbors, or they’re children’s friends parents, or potential babysitter.
Remember cookies? Sure you do. Just as much of a pain that they were before, they are again now. Through these cookies websites like Facebook can see where you’ve been and associate that with your Facebook profile. They then use that to calculate the best advertisements you’d be interested in to try and pitch to you. Smart right? Haven’t you noticed the plethora of ads in the free apps on your smartphone? Those ads will be getting even smarter soon.
Moral of the story is to check out your online profile. There are sites that you can request to remove your personal information. Not all but there are some. For more details please feel free to contact us.
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