So far in this series about the LinkedInTM basics, we’ve learned more about using LinkedIn to draw others to our profile with information on the banner, the picture, and the headline.
Now comes the real “meat” of any profile: the About section (sometimes called the Summary) that allows us to meet prospective clients where their pain points are by sharing ways we can help them.
While there are no absolute rules for creating this section, I’ve learned over time that a thoughtfully filled out section gets us what we’re usually looking for: connections and/or clients.
What you’ll see below are ideas I’ve gleaned from others and from my own experience on LI, which has given me 95% of my clients in the last 10 or so years. It took me a while, but once I “got it,” I GOT IT!
So, let’s see if what I’ve suggested — strongly — below will help you here.
- Remember that the About section is about YOU helping others, not some mythical person with your name. You get to use your own language, tell your own story, woo your own clients.
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Use a “hook” to grab a scroller’s attention quickly, like starting with a question about pain points you could help with.
Think about those who already work with you. What did they say when you asked them how you could help? What pain points did they instantly mention? If those pain points align with your strengths, mention them to pull in more clients!
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Always write in the first-person (using “I”), never in the third person (using your name). That does not
encourage anyone to want to be part of your world! Even worse is using your name and then using “we” or some other pronoun that doesn’t seem to fit. Don’t give the reader an excuse to move on to the next profile; you may never get that person back to yours.
I know that many of us think that using “I” is too much like shining a bright light on ourselves and bragging, but we are talking about what we do, right? It’s not bragging when we stick to the facts of how we have helped others with the same issues. We just shouldn’t embellish those facts with strong adjectives about
ourselves.
- Tell a story about your success in your primary field. Show what you did, how you helped, etc. Be real. Use humor if you want to. Let others see who you are in a professional sense, as someone they’d feel comfortable working with!
- Use this section to fully cover WHY you do what you do. What makes it important to you? Why is helping others succeed important to you?
- Feel free to highlight your achievements, but base them all on how they helped others — the kind of others you’re hoping to land as clients / mentors / connections.
Mechanical things to know about:
- You can always edit your sections; no one is forced to always use their first version. Life changes. Your profile can and likely should change occasionally, too!
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First go to the LI homepage by clicking the “home” icon on top of any page you’re on. On the homepage, look at the top again and see your picture where you see mine outlined in blue. Click on it to go to your own home page.
When you’re on your page, you’ll see a pencil at the top right side. Click on it to edit/make changes. Remember to click “save” at the bottom when you’re done!
The pencil shows up in each section on your page, so you can always make changes to individual sections.
- As of 2024, we have 2,600 “characters” to use in telling our story, and that includes spaces between words and paragraphs.
- Please break your big paragraphs into smaller ones; it’s really hard to read a paragraph that’s more than about 8 or 9 lines of type. Huge paragraphs often have a reader decide to just move on to another profile.
- Be sure to use past tense verbs for all work you show that ended. Many times that’s overlooked and could confuse a reader.
Next month, we’ll explore other less-critical sections that you might want to fill in.
And remember: I’m open to any questions you may have.
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Remember: It’s well worth the time you can spend looking closely at others’ profiles, especially their About section. You never know where and when you’ll see something you could use on your own!
Here’s a worthwhile article that shows 15 other very decent examples of what they call a Summary.
