Maximising your professional digital footprint with LinkedIn
With the cyber era we find ourselves in, now more than ever, it is vital to be visible digitally in a manner that showcases your professional brand. Often, this occurs through company profiles, publications, articles, merits, and awards however, LinkedIn is a dedicated professional platform and the top site in the business world where one can distinctly structure their profile whilst connecting with a global audience.
There were 8 560 000 Linkedin users in South Africa as of January 2021, which accounted for 14.4% of South Africa’s entire population. People aged 25 to 34 were the largest user group totalling 5 200 000 NapoleonCat.com
Globally, LinkedIn boasts a community of:
738M+ Members 55M+ Companies listed on LinkedIn
14M+ jobs on LinkedIn Jobs 90K Schools listed
36K Skills listed
As of mid-2020, the top 10 industries globally on the platform were as follows (in order of ranking 1 - 10):
Information Technology & Services Hospital & Health Care
Construction Retail
Education Management Financial Services
Accounting Computer Software
Automotive Marketing & Advertising
With the above information in mind, it makes sense for an individual to have a profile on this platform and leverage the global professional populace to learn and catapult your career.
Setting up your profile
LinkedIn’s site is user-friendly and intuitive, with its development over the years evolving to showcase the best of an individual. The platform provides a templated guide in setting up and completing your profile. This includes the following sections, structured similarly to a CV:
A professional photo.
About - Your personal summary.
Featured - What goes on your feed e.g. Posts, Articles, Links, and Media.
Background - Work experience, Education, Licenses & Certifications, Volunteer experience.
Skills - This will cover Industry Knowledge, Tools & Technologies, and Interpersonal Skills.
Recommendations - You are able to give a recommendation to other people and similarly, others can recommend you, providing merit and references to your work. There is no limit to the recommendations you receive and they can come from anyone you have worked with including a client, colleague in another department, manager, etc. You can choose which recommendations to display on your profile.
Accomplishments - Patents, Publications, Courses, Projects, Honors & Awards, Languages, etc.
Interests - Groups, Companies, or Organizations you follow on the platform.
Customize your URL - Customise the default URL to make it distinct to your profile i.e www.linkedin.com/in/namesurname.
Settings & Privacy - enables you to configure your account preferences including which sections are visible to the public, job seeking preferences, profile visibility off LinkedIn, notifications, etc.
If you have done the work to ensure your CV is up to date and adequately reflects you professionally, replicate this in your LinkedIn profile. Do make use of their guide which has pointers on setting up your profile. Ensure your LinkedIn profile is remarkable by minimizing or eliminating buzzwords - adjectives that are used so often in LinkedIn headlines and summaries that they become somewhat meaningless. These terms include - specialised, leadership, focused, strategic, experienced, passionate, expert, creative, innovative, certified, hardworking, quick learner, motivated. Rather look for synonyms to replace the buzzwords.
Build a network and interact
Once you have set up your profile, make meaningful connections based on people in your industry, colleagues as well as expanding your connection with subject matter experts, industry giants, etc. Whoever you follow, be it, people, organisations, and companies form your daily feed. The value you gain from the platform will also be tied to this but more importantly, how you intend to use the platform. Is it to connect with more people in your industry? Looking to pivot and learn from others who have done so? Keep up to date with company news? Gain insights for industry giants? Expand your job market? Share your expertise and career journey? Regardless, LinkedIn can be the aforementioned or none at all, it is entirely dependent on you.
There are over 2,180,000 groups and even more companies and people to follow. This is an opportunity to follow and interact with a niche group of people or others beyond your reach physically or industry-wise, now you can through LinkedIn.
Interact - Linkedin is similar to any digital platform, engage with content on your feed which includes commenting, and sharing. This is how you spread the knowledge and information and gain the most from it.
Share your own insights - Whatever you have to offer be it subject matter expertise, news, thoughts, etc, there is an audience for everything.
Showcase your work - This is the platform to boast about all the extraordinary work you do. Make yourself visible in how you contribute to the company of employ, community, and economy. Consider this to be your digital archive.
Professional Development
LinkedIn Learning requires a premium membership to have unlimited access, however, you can make use of a 1-month free trial to acquire as much knowledge and receive a certificate of completion after. The learning platform has various courses including learning software e.g. SAP ERP, Salesforce, Microsoft Project, and many more.
Some of the 16,000+ business, creative and technology courses available to expand your skillset:
Data Analysis HR Strategy UX DEsign Interactive Web Content
Corporate Finance Entrepreneurship Typography Design Thinking
Educational Technology Agile Project Management Sound Design 3D Modelling
Content Marketing Service Metrics DevOps Tools Client Operating Systems
Career Management Business Intelligence Internet of Things Full Stack Web Development
LinkedIn Job Portal
As of October 2020, LinkedIn reports that 40 million users search for jobs each week and as of February 2019, 100 million job applications are reportedly submitted through LinkedIn every month - Bussiness of Apps.
LinkedIn’s job portal enables you to look for a job in a specific region or country. This can be done by title, skill, or company. Suggestions are also made of jobs based on your profile. Additionally, LinkedIn has a resource for best practices for using the platform in your job search.
Let recruiters know you are open to work and set your job preferences - job title, location, start date, and job type (contract, full time, part-time, internship, temporary). This feature also enables a restriction on who can see you are open to work. Most importantly, recruiters will approach you with suitable roles. Even without this feature, recruiters are constantly pursuing top talent and will message you regarding roles that could be a potential fit. Be amongst those head-hunted.
Job alerts can be set up and any job applications that are done on the platform are saved for your tracking purposes. For the jobs that you can apply for directly on the platform, it will make use of your current profile hence the need to ensure this is up to date.
A salary feature is yet to be rolled out in South Africa, but this will be useful in gauging salary ranges for job roles and setting your remuneration expectations.
Take the skill assessments available, with recommendations made based on your profile. This will cover industry knowledge and tools & technology.
Additionally, there is a resume builder and interview prep functionality within LinkedIn to ensure you adequately prepare and apply for the jobs.
Whichever way you decide to use LinkedIn, be sure to leverage it to the best of your ability as it is a beneficial resource to set you up for success and propel your career forward.
