Keywords and Branding
Our profile, resume and our social media presence are all key to defining who we are. One of the challenges that we have when defining who we are is defining things that set us apart from the rest of the world. We also want to be found if we are looking for our next career opportunity.
The way to stand out in the crowd is to have relevant keywords and a strong branding of who you are and what you do. Lets take a look at these two items, Keywords and Branding and how we can do this within our profiles on LinkedIn. Note: these same approaches can be used with our resume and other social media sites.
Lets first look at keywords. These are the words that are specific to who you are. For example, if you are a Project Manager: PMI, PMP, SixSigma, Green Belt, Program Manager, MS Project, Visio and any other terms or software that are specific to your expertise would be the keywords that you may have.
Another example that we could look at is a Administrative Assistant, they would have a list of software and skills that they are experienced with: Microsoft Office (MS), Excel, Word, Power Point, Outlook, FrontPage, Shorthand, Event Planning... Notice that I listed out all the pieces of Microsoft Office, I did this to cover the many ways that someone might be searching for your skills.
So why are keywords so important? Think about you being in a position where you are needing to find a person that has a specific skill set. You might search for specific software that this individual would need to have experience with in order to fill the position.
Now, do a search to find yourself, are you in the top 10 results? Take a look at the people that are higher in the ranking than you. These people may be your competition. Look at their profiles, what put them higher in the results?
You may be asking yourself, what can I do to get higher in the ranking. Here is the key... Review your profile and use your keywords as many times as you can in your Summary and Experience sections of your profile. Use the Specialties section as a place to put all of your keywords. Look at job posts or descriptions for your position and incorporate the terms and phrases that are used.
Now that we have identified keywords and looked at how we can increase the relevance of our profiles, lets talk about branding a bit more. In a recent marketing networking group, we had a lengthy discussion on branding ourselves. What can we do to set ourselves apart froom the rest of the crowd?
Work on developing a unique statement that defines who you are. It needs to be catchy and memorable. One friend of mine brands himself as "the Joe Montana of Marketing". As you might have seen with my company I am branding my company as "NosalCentral, Your Central Source for Web Solutions".
Develop a statement that you can use to brand you as... who knows, the "Stretch Armstrong of Admin Assistants". Have fun with it and you will come up with something great.
Keywords and Branding are an important aspect to having a strong presence on LinkedIn. These same tips can also be used for your resume and other social media sites.
Keywords are also a vital part of a corporate presence on the internet. Want to know what search engines see your keywords look like? Let NosalCentral help you get on top of your keywords and ultimately be at the top of the search engine results to increase your ROI on your website.
NosalCentral is your keyword for SEO, SEM and Analysis of your web presence.
Showing posts with label branding. Show all posts
Showing posts with label branding. Show all posts
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Sunday, December 27, 2009
Tips For Using LinkedIn Effectively #4
Update your status/profile regularly
We have all received that weekly LinkedIn e-mail update and seen what has changed in your network. This could be a change to someones status, updated their experience or even updated their photo. Lets not over look this as a great resource for us to keep our network active and best of all communicate with our network. Why not take advantage of this free service of LinkedIn and get a little extra exposure for yourself in these e-mails that are sent to those in your network.
First lets look at how we can use this e-mail and or our home page to keep up with our network. Don't just delete the e-mail when you see it arrive in your e-mail box. Take the time to do a quick review. Look for the opportunity where you could send a comment or congrats to a member of your network. This could be a new job, a promotion or any other information that is communicated via the status field.
The home page is also a great location to monitor the same details but can be reviewed at anytime. And best of all is constantly being updated as the members of your network make changes to their profiles.
Up to this point we have looked at how you can monitor your network. Now lets look at how you can stay on the radar of your network and become a common person on the e-mails and home pages of those in your network. It all boils down to updating your profile regularly. Make some kind of change every couple of days.
Updating your status is the easiest since it doesn't require navigating through several pages to make a change. It is also the first thing you see in the e-mail or on the home page. This update could be as easy as copying the current status and pasting in the edit field.
Other updates could be simply adding a space or other character to the end of an item in your profile. Then a couple of days later you could back and remove the change you made.
On a side note, I am regularly asked what should I say in my status. Think of the status field as a way to communicate professionally what you are doing or what you are needing help with. When I was looking for a new job, I would post that I was looking for my next great career opportunity in the internet SEO and SEM field. I would also regularly post when I was looking into a given company to see if anyone had info or knew someone.
A really powerful way to use the status field is to develop a strong branding statement and post that statement. Use it to create buzz around who and what you do. You never know when you will have some one contact you based on your status. It worked for me when a clients spouse saw my status and contacted me to do work for them.
Make use of the weekly e-mail and home page updates on LinkedIn to stay visible and communicate with your network. Take the time to review the e-mail or your home page to keep your network active. After all networking is a lifetime activity and LinkedIn is a great tool to help this process.
Next time we will be looking at personalizing your Public Profile URL on LinkedIn.
As always remember NosalCentral, LLC. is your central source for web solutions in SEO, SEM and Social Media.
We have all received that weekly LinkedIn e-mail update and seen what has changed in your network. This could be a change to someones status, updated their experience or even updated their photo. Lets not over look this as a great resource for us to keep our network active and best of all communicate with our network. Why not take advantage of this free service of LinkedIn and get a little extra exposure for yourself in these e-mails that are sent to those in your network.
First lets look at how we can use this e-mail and or our home page to keep up with our network. Don't just delete the e-mail when you see it arrive in your e-mail box. Take the time to do a quick review. Look for the opportunity where you could send a comment or congrats to a member of your network. This could be a new job, a promotion or any other information that is communicated via the status field.
The home page is also a great location to monitor the same details but can be reviewed at anytime. And best of all is constantly being updated as the members of your network make changes to their profiles.
Up to this point we have looked at how you can monitor your network. Now lets look at how you can stay on the radar of your network and become a common person on the e-mails and home pages of those in your network. It all boils down to updating your profile regularly. Make some kind of change every couple of days.
Updating your status is the easiest since it doesn't require navigating through several pages to make a change. It is also the first thing you see in the e-mail or on the home page. This update could be as easy as copying the current status and pasting in the edit field.
Other updates could be simply adding a space or other character to the end of an item in your profile. Then a couple of days later you could back and remove the change you made.
On a side note, I am regularly asked what should I say in my status. Think of the status field as a way to communicate professionally what you are doing or what you are needing help with. When I was looking for a new job, I would post that I was looking for my next great career opportunity in the internet SEO and SEM field. I would also regularly post when I was looking into a given company to see if anyone had info or knew someone.
A really powerful way to use the status field is to develop a strong branding statement and post that statement. Use it to create buzz around who and what you do. You never know when you will have some one contact you based on your status. It worked for me when a clients spouse saw my status and contacted me to do work for them.
Make use of the weekly e-mail and home page updates on LinkedIn to stay visible and communicate with your network. Take the time to review the e-mail or your home page to keep your network active. After all networking is a lifetime activity and LinkedIn is a great tool to help this process.
Next time we will be looking at personalizing your Public Profile URL on LinkedIn.
As always remember NosalCentral, LLC. is your central source for web solutions in SEO, SEM and Social Media.
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