Don’t cut and paste your resume into your profile.
You wouldn’t hand out your resume before introducing yourself, so don’t do it on LinkedIn. However, describe your experience and abilities as you would to someone you just met.
Borrow from the best marketers.
Interject your profile with your voice. Use adjectives, colorful verbs, active construction (managed project team). Don’t write in the third person. Picture yourself at a conference or client meeting. How do you introduce yourself? That’s your authentic voice, so use it.
Write a personal tagline.
That line of text under your name is the first thing people see in your Profile. It follows your name in search hit lists. It’s your brand. Create your professional personality into a more eye-catching phrase that describes who you are at a glance. (Your e-mail address is not a brand!)
Put your elevator pitch to work.
Create a 30-second description
The essence of who you are and what you do, is a personal elevator pitch. Use it in the Summary section to engage readers. The more meaningful your summary is, the more time you’ll get from readers.
Explain your experience.
Help the reader grasp the key points. Briefly say what the company does and what you did or do for them. Use those clear, succinct phrases here and break them into visually digestible chunks.
Pat your own back and others
Get recommendations from colleagues, clients, and employers who can speak credibly about your abilities or performance. (Think quality, not quantity.) Ask them to focus on a specific skill or personality trait that drives their opinion of you. Make meaningful comments when you recommend others.
Build your connections.
Connections are one of the most important aspects of your brand. The company you keep reflects the quality of your brand. Identify connections that will add to your credibility and pursue those. As you add connections and recommendations, your Profile develops into a peer-reviewed picture of you and of your personal brand.