-
- News
- Books
Featured Books
- smt007 Magazine
Latest Issues
Current IssueBox Build
One trend is to add box build and final assembly to your product offering. In this issue, we explore the opportunities and risks of adding system assembly to your service portfolio.
IPC APEX EXPO 2024 Pre-show
This month’s issue devotes its pages to a comprehensive preview of the IPC APEX EXPO 2024 event. Whether your role is technical or business, if you're new-to-the-industry or seasoned veteran, you'll find value throughout this program.
Boost Your Sales
Every part of your business can be evaluated as a process, including your sales funnel. Optimizing your selling process requires a coordinated effort between marketing and sales. In this issue, industry experts in marketing and sales offer their best advice on how to boost your sales efforts.
- Articles
- Columns
Search Console
- Links
- Events
||| MENU - smt007 Magazine
Focus and Clarity: Match Your LinkedIn Profile to Your LinkedIn Goals
October 28, 2013 |Estimated reading time: 3 minutes
I got a request from a business person a few weeks ago to help her with her LinkedIn profile. After discussing what she did for a living and how she was using LinkedIn, we looked at her profile. Like most users, it was more or less an online version of her resume. It was obvious that she had done some reading on how to set up a LinkedIn profile, as there were media attachments, endorsements, and it looked really slick.
In other words, her LinkedIn profile was a mess.
She had the same problem many LinkedIn users have: Aiming a LinkedIn profile at the wrong audience. There are two reasons for this:
- Because LinkedIn Profiles have been called “your online resume” for so long, that is what people think they are, and that is how people write them. If this user’s goal was to get a job, then this is a good way for her write her profile.
- If LinkedIn users do seek to improve their profile, they tend to follow the advice of the various self proclaimed “authorities,” and before you know it their profiles are papered in LinkedIn endorsements, “rich media” and keywords. I think because the various “authorities” tend to be solo consultants, they think everyone should have a profile like theirs--set up to appear high on the list of LinkedIn Search results.
But the woman I was helping sells office equipment for a major player in her industry. When was the last time someone went “we need a better photocopier; maybe a shredder too. I think I will go look on LinkedIn for someone who sells that stuff here in Chicago.”
Like this office equipment salesperson, most LinkedIn users are not consultants, or entrepreneurs, or active job hunters. They are business professionals. They are engineers and salespeople, they are in administration, manufacturing, and IT.
So what kind of LinkedIn profiles do these people need?
These people’s profiles will be viewed because of something they did on LinkedIn:
- They started a discussion or commented on one in a group;
- They commented on an article in LinkedIn Today;
- They sent out or commented on a status update;
- They shared something with their LinkedIn network; or
- They reached out to someone new.
In all these cases, the profile viewer wanted this question answered: “Who is this person?” In all these cases, the LinkedIn profile is there for one purpose: For most users the LinkedIn Profile is an instrument to establish their credibility. Let’s use the example of the office equipment sales person I've been referencing.
What should be the goal for that person in using LinkedIn? For the most part, she is finding and contacting prospective new customers. What does her LinkedIn profile need to do? It needs to present her as a credible person to prospective customers. And this distinction points to a different approach. Typically, someone in sales will write something like this in her summary or experience section of her profile: I am the number-one sales rep, with 28 new accounts, and 42% sales growth in the past four years. But who is that written for? A prospective customer? I sure hope not, because it translates to, “I would love to make you part of next year’s statistics.” There is nothing wrong in this approach if this person is trying to find a job, but there sure is if he or she is writing for prospective customers. So how about this instead: I am the number-one sales rep and 98% of my customers stay with me year over year. Seven of my customers have written recommendations for me on LinkedIn.Now there's a fit between what her LinkedIn profile says and what her intended audience wants to see.
This is the reason that I used the words “focus and clarity” in the title of this column. Be clear on your LinkedIn goals and focus on what is important. If you're an entrepreneur, or if you are trying to find a job, your LinkedIn profile is your storefront window, and it should have some bells and whistles on it. But those are not the reasons that most people are using LinkedIn. Figure out who your audience is, what they want to know, and write your profile for them. Bruce Johnston is a sales consultant specializing in social media and especially LinkedIn. He has over 25 years experience in high-tech sales and management. He can be reached at brucej@practicalsmm.com or through his profile on LinkedIn.