Lessons

Lesson Info

Tool #3: Your LinkedIn Profile

In this segment is, uh the other three top marketing tools right? So this is part two of five top marketing tools we have already talked about the first two which were uh your network and your elevator pitch and now we're going to talk about the other three so the next three are the linked in profile, your marketing smart website and your email newsletter so let's talk first about your linked in profile so uh as I said before, um, linked in was not designed for creatives, so there are sometimes some work arounds that we need to do, and the main thing to think about actually is that there are so many different ways to use linked in and you're linked in profile and we want to focus in on the specific elements that are going to be the most effective for you. So on your actual profile yes it's important to you answer all the questions and feel everything in, but I want to identify the three essential elements ofyour linked in profile that's what we're going to do right here and then we can...

talk a little bit also about how you use lengthen so first we have your title all right now I'm going to show you some examples, but I want to give you a little overview of what your title is your title is essentially the thing that is right underneath your name and it's the thing that follows you everywhere and because you're a creative and you may not have a job then your title maybe a little bit mysterious and I see all different types of titles out there most not very effective so keep in mind that traditional titles are not the most effective four creatives and we'll look at some examples and I encourage you to be creative with your title so I want to show you some examples these are examples of clients of mine joann who is an illustrator the title is what's right underneath her name so sure says playful illustration serious collaboration right that's a very creative title but it also speaks to her prospects and it talks about how she works so one way you can use your title is to talk about the quality of your work and she's talking here about the quality of her actual illustration plus serious collaboration is the way she works her process so a very creative way to use a title it doesn't say illustrator right but it's clear that that's what she is playful illustration serious collaboration I love that one I have another one here for karen mackel moyle who is a designer in charlotte, north carolina and hers a little bit longer because you can really use the space here hers is branding and marketing for law firm's financial services companies and designed for add inches ad agencies and in house marketing departments right so it's a bit of a mouthful but it's very specific also in the way of including the people she is looking to attract and alienating or not speaking to the others so branding and marketing is what she does and then she has to markets for whom she does it law firms and financial services companies plus she also works with ad agencies and in house marketing services now the reason this is effective is because when I said your title follows you everywhere you may have noticed that when someone is not on your profile all they see is your name and your title right and so when you're in a group when you are in a listing all they see is your name and your title and they may or may not go to your actual profile one of the things that will attempt them tease them into going to your profile is if you have an effective title right so the other way actually that linked in uses the titles is this is part of the search engine remember I said that lengthen is a professional search engine and so if you put the key words into your title that someone would put looking for someone like you then you are more likely to come up and actually karen has been found by law firms looking for someone to do branding and marketing because of her title all right, so think about that that's one other example and then of course we have our case study jill anderson and she has her elevator pitch in her title right? So I make websites for creatives and their clients right? And you can adapt this because it's a public environment obviously so the elevator pitch is what you say one on one to another person that you're talking to this is a little bit different so it may be need to be a little bit broader in the way that karen's waas so she says here I make websites for creatives and their clients all right, you know one of the things about linked in that a lot of people don't understand is that there's no reason to say no to someone who wants to connect frankly, the way that you are able to access maur people arlington is because you have more connection and we talked a little bit earlier as I remember j k o about the competitive aspect of lengthen right and it's not about quantity it's not about how many connections you have, but the fact that you have more connections actually allows you to access more people that's part of my understanding of how linked in works so it's not a competition but the more you have, the better, the more access you'll have, so keep that in mind all right essential element number two for lengthen is your summary which, like most of the other marketing tools we've talked about so far is not about you you're linked in summary is very important but it's not about you in the same way that your marketing smart website will not be about you and your elevator pitch will not be about you it's about your client's needs right and the summary is the summary essentially of what you do and for home and that is often what people also read they're not goingto scroll all the way down this is close to the top so it should speak to your prospects as everything we're talking about should and it should also show that you understand their needs so I will use mine as an example and I'll read it to you this is just the beginning of the summary but it says if you are serious about growing your creative business whether that means getting maur clients or strengthening your foundation and need practical guidance, accountability and a sounding board I can help I'm the founder of marketing mentor, a business coaching program for creative business owners sola preneurs and independent professionals I work one on one blah blah blah I goes on right? So the first paragraph is if you has the word you then me right? That is a formula you can use so think about that and then actually there's a little uh image for a video which you can go and cook on all right. And the third essential element of your linked in profile is your photo because that is the other thing that follows you everywhere and I think, you know, you have a lot of latitude when it comes to your photo because you're a creative there's a lot you can do, but I think there are also some parameters and one of them is that your photo should be professional right? Because you're trying to present your yourself here in a professional manner and so you know, the image of me and my puppy is probably not going to be the most applicability uh or appropriate here, so you want to make sure it's professional and really more and more people are getting professional headshot it's because now you need your head shot to be everywhere it's not just for actors anymore, right? It's not just for speakers, so I highly encourage you to get a professional headshot done and that makes it professional also make it current. You don't want to put on image up there of you ten years ago because that's not right right it's deceitful so you want to make sure that it's current and then of course you want to make it friendly you want your photo to be a friendly one approachable for people to be able to reach out to you so now we have another one of these what would you do if situations? So the question is what would you do if you still have a job so you can't yet change your linked in profile to reflect your self employment what would you do? I get this question a lot because people who are freelancing on the side or want to go out on their own but they don't want their employer to see that they're doing that and so because linked in is this public environment basically what is the solution to that problem and not like there's a right answer but what would you do what what have you done in that situation? Justin raina use it before her husband so long for me, zane and he thought I was working for a company. Uh well what I do um I haven't been in that situation for the past five years. So all right, maybe we have some people in the chat room her in that situation again there's no right answer here it's a little tricky but I get this question a lot so I want to be able to answer it it's an interesting I know this isn't something that's happened to me that a soon as you said I was thinking yes, that would be a challenge I mean, anything you put out there not just on any network your social media is is viewable for for other people to see. Yeah, and you do have to be careful, but I do think there's a way maybe, for example, in a linked in profile, you could have in the summary a little paragraph that says and on the side, I do this right? So maybe your title, uh, can also reflect what you do and for whom, and it can be applicable to both an employer and a free let situation. But again, you have to think creatively about it rather than say, oh, no, I have to keep that secret because I don't want anyone to know, right this kind of this black and white perspective that we're trying to avoid here. All right? Now, before we get to the exercise for this lesson, I just want to talk a little bit more about how else to use linked in because there is your profile and that's what we've been focused on as a marketing tool, but there are also marketing activities you can use linked in four and again, you know, part of the problem with a lot of these social networks is that there is too much you can do with it, and therefore people don't know what exactly to dio so my recommendations when it comes to linked in are you use it for research and connecting with people so when we talk about research, essentially, we are using it as a search engine. And when we get in the next session to talking about who you want to work with and who you're going to pursue, lengthen is one of the main tools you you'll use. In fact, ed gandhi is going to share with us some techniques he has for using linked in to search for your prospects. But essentially that is ah, very valuable place and tool for finding your actual prospects. Because you can search by title, you can search by industry you khun search by need. There are lots of different ways that they allow you to use it right and back to the question before about should you say yes to everyone who invites you to connect, I will say yes to anyone, right there's. No reason not to, really, because it just expands your network so there's no reason to be nervous or careful. I know a lot of people use lengthen like I only say yes to people I know. I think that will limit you in terms of how you can grow your business so two schools of thought there but think about it justin how they try to connect if I just get somebody I don't know anything important to say hello like this is why I want to connect with you because I'm I would connect with somebody I don't know but just random people may is it spam? I don't know right? And so one thing that's interesting actually about linked and they keep changing it like all these social platforms they keep changing things but there is an automatic generic message that comes up please add me to your linked in a network um and now in order to customize that right to say hello you have tto click on a special a special link that says customized the invitation and it's not obvious where that is so it's very easy and almost automatic to send that kind of message and not even know you did so on the other side of it I would be careful don't assume people are not, um addressing you personally because they may not know how okay, so again, you know, a lot of this kind of takes time and you just get this message I can't deal with that and move on to the next, but it could be someone who could be very valuable to you can I have a stupid question? But I was I have that happen a lot that I've got these generic requests and I always thought, well, if I allow these people into my network, will that reflect on me? Because I don't know them, I don't know, you know what somebody else might look at my network and then say that's, a person that's connected to her so there's a level of trust there something, but I don't know them and also you don't think that's a tribute concerned? I don't think it should be a concern again, I think when they first started linked in the intention was different, the whole thing about, you know, different degrees of separation, and you could say, would you please connect me with this person who, you know, but it does not seem to be used that way anymore? And if someone says, and this happens to me too, can you connect me with this person that, you know, I'll say I'm sorry, I don't actually know them, they're just in my network, so that's not going to really do any good? My name isn't gonna help, right? So but I do think there is this unnecessary caution about what it means to let people into your network, but it's turning into really something much larger where you can't be held responsible for who's into your network that's great, you know, I think that's fine I think it's not just people you don't know, but if they if you look at what they actually do if it's something that's within your field and I think it's something well this could be a valuable has I don't know them, but it could be valuable I think for me it's when I see that I have no when this person is in a politically different field, I don't understand this connection it all right and linked in actually because I do get a lot of, um, invitations I guess I shouldn't be so black and white about it either because there are some people I don't say yes too because it's completely out of the field I don't see any connection at all and so I think that you know, you're trying to build a community around yourself of people who have something in common with you and I think one of the ways to do that is by being a little bit selective but not scared essentially now one thing that people are very nervous about melissa glad you two you've talked about this is about photographs now but my boy's saying I'm in my late fifties if I put a photo of up off of me does that limit my potential for being hired? Who who wants simply want to hire younger people? Yes, but you know they're going to find out your actual age at some point and I think, you know, there's a difference also between I don't know if this person is talking about being hired for a job, as opposed to being hired as a service provider, a creative service provider, those in my mind are two extremely different situations, and lincoln is used very differently in both of the situations, and I'm really just talking about as a self employed person, because, again, that's, where your marketing comes in and essentially what you're trying to convey is I can help you, and I have all of this experience, you know, on the other side of it, I'm fifty plus, and I have all of this experience that I bring to the table, and you might want people to know that I think that's very for somebody who's olders I am, I think that's really good advice now, carla, sam is saying, what do you think they're about? Using a logo instead of a head shot of your insecure, about the way you look, um, it's not very common, and I think it's, probably not. The best thing to do because linkedin is about people and profiles are about people. They do have those company pages, which I don't see being used very often and that's where the logo belongs, but I mean, if you are self conscious about how you look, maybe there are other problems and, you know, the idea of a logo solving that problem may be, but it wouldn't be my advice, in fact, actually, maybe better tohave an illustrator do on illustration of you that is professional right, more work for illustrators also rather than ah logo, which really doesn't tell you much about my treat, so that is a good stand still. Now I know how to this before elise, but maybe in torture it it's someone of our views of saying lincoln actually will block you if you are connecting with people who you don't know and they report, okay, so, yes, they can be a little tricky and my advice, because they do give you a choice to say, how do you know this person? And my recommendation is, say, it's a colleague, right? Because that's a very general term and again, you know, it's growing into this network where people who don't personally know each other can actually connect. So we're not talking about spamming we're not talking about, you know, connecting with hundreds and thousands of people, but carefully selecting the people you actually want to reach out to, and you may need to email them first before you link in with them or you lincoln with them, and then you email them that's part of the warm email prospecting process, which we will also talk about later on and tomorrow, one of things that I've discovered a swell pine over you're just saying that justin people get frustrated when all they get is I want to connect with your lengthen the neck, the generic. But when you use the app that's, the only option you have. Really, yes, and that's a big fault of link teo so you can only send a message if you're on the full website. Interesting. I didn't know that it's frustrating well, and you say I like to connect, click and it's gone, so I'm not just I used to be judgmental about these things. Why is that the best you could do it when I really worked it out? I think you have to be a little bit more patient, but john apathy is saying, should you connect with competitors in your field? I think so yes absolutely I mean my whole philosophy on competition is mostly about the fact that I don't think there is much competition yes, there are people who do what you do and offer similar services but if you know what your unique gift is and how you're different from other people and you find people who complement your services and maybe you can refer work back and fourth I don't see any reason with it all right? So we did have this question that I want to see if there any answers in the chat room, what would you do if you still have a job and you can't yet change your linked in profile to reflect yourself employment? Are there any other ideas they do actually set up too separately because they say sometimes what they're trying to get into is completely separate to wander doing others say they perhaps will not use their full name on dh other people were saying they create their full logo with there sorry not know their full page with their current position but they might try something with a business name for what they're trying to north right? So again creative work arounds to make it possible to do what you need to do to kind of set yourself up okay, so now we're going to go to the exercise not that so in the workbook um there are links to the models three examples that I used so you can connect with them and connect with me plus the notes from this section and the exercise is I'll just go through it first we want you to take a look at your own lengthen profile we want youto tell us, does your title say what you wanted to say? And if not come up with a new one that you contest so let's? See if anyone in our studio audience knows what their title is on their linked in profile, it would be very interesting, right? If you don't know my super lame, what is his owner at arena be designed? Okay, I didn't even know that it's basically a tagline and not a title, right? Or it can be used that one? Yes, alright, so let's not call it lame let's just say you haven't given it that much thought and now you're going to change it and do you have something better in mind? No, I need to work on that. Okay, excellent. And maybe actually can we asked people in the chat room for a title suggestion titles for arena, right? Why not let's help each other let's do collaboration here online and offline justine, what about you? What does your say? Well, I will contemplate your creative okay that's my title, yes and what will it evolve into have to think about that I'm still working on my business plan so I think that comes before the title but perhaps yeah, but I really like the idea of like, positioning it towards the audience and about you or your past experiences about how you're going to help so exactly so of the three that we looked at is there one that resonates most with you the first one around so playful illustration serious collaboration yeah, because that kind of speaks to teo it's simple and it's easy to kind of imagine how that could help me so so that's like she really did she did the jobs he nailed it. Yeah, yeah, I do love that one too. So if if anyone can come up with their version of that two words and two words that would be very beautiful. Okay, let and let's see, I want to hear some of those in the chat room j k let's see if they can come up with some scene I try to keep my title very general because I wanted me to be able to say yes to a lot of different opportunities so uh they could probably improve on it but the current title is, uh designer developer entrepreneur mmm mmm mmm mmm yes, I think that is very general yeah how would you improve on it could you be more specific type of opportunities that I'm looking for uh and one thing that's interesting will come to you the second you know, maybe you want a tailor it to a specific part of your business that you're trying to build that you think people on linked in would be more apt apt to find you for as opposed to something where building aps might be something separate does that make sense? Because again we're talking about strategically using each of these tools and knowing who we're tryingto you know ray rain in with it essentially justin the one thing I'm curious about is the industry because it has a limited choices on what industry you're in like from in my example it's like um there's I think I'm learning on my profile but also it could easily be media production or there's some curious your take on kind of how to choose the industry the only thing I can say is from your prospects perspective right? What industry do they think they're in that's your industry and again that's very it's tricky it's simple but tricky like what industry I am I n I'm in my prospects industry not my industry so you wouldn't be under consultants you know oh under creative service exactly anything in the tack room there lots of answers yes indeed laddie was saying there's his owner president of even milk and honey designs amy johar said independent market research professional risha research strategist and analyst wendy carey like this when he says some storyteller and content strategist at custom fit online and coastal kathleen says, uh, I shall not, says the edit headline. The headline is creative communications, branding, advertising, corporate identity, packaging, print web, an interactive designs for something called a shopping list of which is on the one hand, you know, those air keywords that prospects might be looking for, but also anyone could say it. So what is it that's different about you, it's this balance between what people are looking for and what's different about? You and I guess I just want to challenge everyone to beat more creative with their title because it can only help you. And savage says there's is designed for corporate, professional and non nonprofit businesses, and I shed a great answer for rainer. Janet was saying branding and design for growing food companies to increase shelf space and failed love it, it is a and as I said, there should be a link between your elevator pitch and your title, right? And all of these I mean, there should be consistency across so that no matter where anyone is, they see a variation on a theme it doesn't have to be exactly the same, but it should be consistent because they're going to find you in all these places now, coast has already changed there's. Your advice. The old one was graphic artist and bold brush script and finn low, but now they've changed it to motivated to move you artists and creative mutineer that is creative, but he's worried that mutiny gives off a bad vibe. I wouldn't worry about it. The upside is more than the downside, I would say, and nicky ellis, sharing her zits book and coarse content designer for authors, teachers and entrepreneurs. So, again, what's important is to say, who would you do it for? And that's a little anti intuitive, right, because it's your title, but again, it's, not about you, it's about them and who they are, and what they need is just really embarrassed, really. Oh, come fix it before it just doesn't really say anything, it just says broadcaster, author, producer, and I actually stopped producing a while ago. You got