The Power of Your Personal LinkedIn Profile Page

When someone types in your name or your practice name into Google, do you know what shows up at or very near the top?  Bet you didn't guess your LinkedIn profile. This is not surprising because of the general tendency to lump LinkedIn with other social media networks such as Facebook and Twitter, but it is different. A personal LinkedIn page and a practice page can help you connect with others. It's also an opportunity to showcase your areas of expertise and knowledge.

Posted in Marketing on Saturday, January 30, 2016

While there is a widely held misperception that LinkedIn is just for job searches, LinkedIn has reported more than 80 percent of its users are actually not looking for work, but are either researching individuals and/or companies or looking to network with peers or others in the community.

It’s why LinkedIn promotes itself as a professional network.

With this in mind, it is important to use your profile to tell people about you.  Yes, it is a resume of sorts, but an effective profile allows you to reinforce your personal and professional brand.

So, what should you include?  A powerful profile …

• Includes a profile photo that isn’t too casual or too formal.
• Provides current information about you and your practice.
• Is available the public.
• Uses the professional summary as a commercial about yourself.  Be creative about how you talk about your values, beliefs and experiences.
• Includes unique “sections” to talk about different projects and experiences.
• Demonstrates both professional and community involvement.
• Uses media links to Powerpoint presentations, videos and other media to tell your story.
• Offers links to many resources and interesting content.
• Is updated regularly with information about your practice, what you’re doing in the community, as well as links to interesting articles. This allows you to provide insight into your values and beliefs, as well as how you run your practice.

Once you have your profile up, be sure to connect with people you know – patients, friends, business acquaintances from the community and family.  This is the easiest way for people you don’t know to find you as “someone you might know.”

Also, don’t be afraid to join LinkedIn groups. These are great places to ask questions, as well as provide information about topics you know.

As you can see, LinkedIn is a great marketing tool that allows you to tell others about your practice and yourself.  It’s easy, and it’s free.  Now that you have your personal profile set up, you can start thinking about your company/practice page, which provides a whole new opportunity, but we’ll talk about that soon.