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LinkedIn Profile Optimization For Dummies Free Chapters

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Everyone gets on LinkedIn with a purpose in mind. Some use LinkedIn for job search, others use it for reputation management and branding, while others want to enhance their prospecting and sales. In order to use LinkedIn successfully, you must have a profile that clearly articulates who you are and what you do. The problem is: It’s hard to write about yourself!

Working with Wiley Publishing, I wrote LinkedIn Profile Optimization for Dummies to help simplify this difficult task and make it easy for you to create a profile that gets results!

Part 1. The Strategy before the Siege

Targeting Your Profile
- Job Search Profile
- Reputation Management and Branding Profile
- Sales and Prospecting Profile
- Figuring Out Your Target Audience
- Writing Your Profile in a Compelling Manner

Determining Your LinkedIn Strategy
- Getting Found On LinkedIn
- Using LinkedIn as a Search Engine
- Ensuring a Compelling and Attractive Search Result
- Understanding the Importance of Keywords
- Using Online Keyword Tools
- Ranking Higher with Profile SEO Aiming for Keyword Density
- Building Off profile SEO
- Keyword Ideas

Skills and Endorsements Are Important
- Adding Skills
- Rearranging Skills & Endorsements
- Hiding an Endorsement on your profile
- Opting Out of Endorsements
- How to Endorse a Connection
- Removing your Endorsement from a Connection’s profile
- Getting more Endorsements of your skills

Part 2. Getting Started Building Your LinkedIn Profile

- Cloaking Profile Changes (4 pages)
- Turning Off Update Notifications
- Creating a High Ranking Profile
- Turning on Your Public Profile
- Controlling and Previewing What People See
- Creating a Personalized URL
- Marketing Your public Profile URL
- Improving Your Profile’s Strength
- Dealing with a Lack of a Current Experience
- Adding a School without a Degree
- Expanding Your NetworkOptimizing the “Behind the Scene” Sections  I ended up just having a paragraph where I talk about this

Establishing Your Calling Card
- Keeping Your Name Confidential
- How Location Helps You Get Found
- How Recruiters Search for Talent On LinkedIn
- Making Sure People Can Reach Out to You
- Identity Theft and Who Can See Your Info

Impressing with the Right Profile Photo
- The Do’s and Don’ts of Profile Pictures
- Taking Your Own Profile Picture
- Finding the Right Background
- How to Pose, the Art of the Genuine Smile
- Finding the Right Outfit
- Working with a Photographer
- Choosing and Uploading Your Profile Picture
- Where your Profile Picture Shows Up On LinkedIn

Developing a Compelling Headline
- Grabbing Your Reader
- Getting Found and Increasing Click Through
- Headline Examples, Tweak to Own

Part 3. Detailing Your Career Trajectory and Creating a Compelling Summary

Optimizing Your Experiences
- Referencing Your Resume
- Determining Which Experiences to Keep and Which to Merge
- Turning Employment Gaps into a Positive
- Creating a Work History for Students
- Reordering Concurrent Experiences

Creating a Powerful Experience
- Adding A New Experience
- Optimizing Your Job Title with Keywords
- Dealing with Age Discrimination
- Getting the Company Logo to Appear
- Linking to the Company Page
- Crafting an Impactful Achievement
- Examples of Great Experiences

A Digital Introduction and Ultimate First Impression
- Writing in First Person or Third?
- Avoiding Resume Speak
- Attention Getting Opening Statements
- Creating Your Professional Manifesto
- Show, Don’t Tell
- Explaining Your Benefits
- Highlighting Your Top Achievements
- Using Bullets to Catch Your Reader’s Eye
- Examples of Compelling and Engaging Summaries

Part 4. Rounding Out Your Profile and Finishing Touches

There’s More to You Than Your Jobs
- Showcasing Organizations
- Uncovering Your Honors & Awards
- The Three P’s: Projects, Publications, and Patents
- The Two C’s: Certifications & Courses
- Education for the Educated
- Divulging the Year You Graduated
- Education for the Uneducated
- Volunteer Experiences

Making Your Profile Personal and Unique
- Building Your Brand
- Adding Interests
- Advice for Contacting You
- Adding Multimedia to Make Your Profile POP!
- Reinforcing Your Brand with a Background Image
- The Importance of Recommendations
- Secrets to Getting Lots of Recommendations
- Following Groups, Companies, and Influencers
- Listing the Companies You Follow On Your Profile
- Showcasing Influencers On Your Profile
- Publishing On LinkedIn
- Showcasing Yourself as a Thought Leader
- Creating Your First Blog
- Marketing Your Blog Post

The Final Review and Reveal
- Rearranging Profile Sections
- The Perfect Profile Order
- Your LinkedIn Profile Checklist
- To Pay or Not Pay for LinkedIn
- Benchmarking Your Profile’s Success
- Marketing Your LinkedIn Profile
- Make it Easy for People to Connect to You
- Getting Views to Your LinkedIn Profile