One More Tip for MBA Students LinkedIn Profiles

A few weeks ago I was interviewed by the Financial Times asking for me to share some advice on how MBA's can leverage LinkedIn to get a job. There is some great advice in the article, not just from me. I recommend you check out the article here.

There is one piece of advice that they did not publish from me or anyone else they interviewed. If you can, make sure that you share examples of your work on your profile. 

This can come in a lot for forms. Here are a few examples.

-Link in your profile to a news article about a product you worked on
-Post a YouTube video of something you have recorded that's work related
-Post something you've written for work. It could be a blog post, writing sample or anything in-between.

Look at how my friend and former classmate Nathan Tanner does it on his profile.

People will be able to see what you can really do and get a much deeper understanding of your skills and abilities.

You might be saying, "What I do can't be put on my LinkedIn profile...". To that I say, dig deep. There is always something.

LinkedIn Summary Examples for MBA Students

I've been asked by several MBA students for advice on what to put in their LinkedIn summary. First, if you're thinking about your summary you're on the right track. There are a lot of different ways that you could tackle it, but I wanted to share three examples of profiles that I think have a great summary. As always, this is my personal opinion and not the opinion of LinkedIn.

Also, check out these two articles for more advice on how to write a great LinkedIn summary.

Three Steps To Writing The Perfect LinkedIn Summary

4 Tips for Writing a Compelling LinkedIn Summary

Check out Abby Stern's summary below. She's a a MBA student at Stanford. A quick read of her profile and you have a great sense of what she's passionate about. After her reading her summary it's very clear the sort of companies and roles she is interested in.

Check out Joung Park's profile below.  He's an MBA student at UT. His summary is really tailored to his finance/consulting audience, it pulls out the highlights from his entire profile with plenty of data points to back it up. 

Check out Tori Dumke's profile. She is a MBA student at BYU. She does a great job of telling her story. She moved from PR to technology marketing, but quickly connects the dots in her summary. In a lot of ways her summary is her elevator pitch. 

No matter what angle you take, the best way to improve your LinkedIn summary is to have a few people read it quickly, then tell you what they got out of it. This will help you know if what you'd like to convey to colleagues, recruiters and other professionals is coming through in your summary. If you'd like to learn more about how MBA students can improve their LinkedIn profiles, check out Advanced LinkedIn Tips For MBA Students.

Advanced LinkedIn Tips For MBA Students

*While I'm writing this from the perspective of an MBA student, all these LinkedIn tips work for any sort of student.

You've mastered the basics of LinkedIn. Your profile is filled out. You've stopped connecting with strangers. You always send a personalized message when you connect. What's next? Below are my advanced tips for students who want LinkedIn to be a competitive advantage for them in finding a job and managing their career.

1. Embed work that you've done. It's your reputation, not your resume. Show everyone what you can do. If you have any examples of your work that you're proud of, put them under the job where you created it. LinkedIn lets you embed videos, Slideshare and links to webpages.

2. Create profiles in other languages you speak. I wrote another post about why you should do this. You can read it here. It's easy to create a profile in another language in LinkedIn.

3. Optimize your profile for the right keywords. Make sure the key words you want to be found for are in your profile. LinkedIn works a lot like a search engine. If the words or job titles you want to be found for are not in your profile, you'll be hard to find.

4. Join groups strategically and participate. Join groups that are the watering holes of the people you want to be associated with. Jump in on the conversations that are interesting. Groups are a great way to show expertise and build new relationships.

5. Automate some of your sharing. I've found that it is a lot easier to share content on LinkedIn if you use a tool like Buffer. Consistent sharing of relevant content about your industry will keep you top of mind in your network. Buffer queues up articles so they are shared in the future. For example, you can have a post go out every Monday at 3:00 pm. If you find 7 articles you'd like to share one morning, you can have them easily scheduled to go out over the next 7 days. The advanced scheduling helps you be consistent and saves you the hassle of trying to find a new article to share everyday. Check out this article from Buffer on how it works.

6. Sign up for advanced contacts functionality. Go to contacts.linkedin.com, hit the "get started" button. As you go through the sign up process, don't forget to sync LinkedIn with your email and calendar. For more details on what these features can do, check out this article from Hubspot on how to use LinkedIn contacts. As an MBA student, these features will save you countless hours as you use LinkedIn to build your network and find a job or internship.

7. Get recommendations- I recommend getting one or two for each major role. While it's tempting to get them from a fellow MBA student, try to get recommendations from professionals you worked with in your jobs.

8. Manage your endorsements- If you are getting endorsed for something you don't want to be endorsed for, take it down. Check out this article to learn how to do it. If there is something you'd like to be endorsed for, send an email to a bunch of fellow MBA students or a small trusted group of friends/colleagues asking them to endorse you. Definitely do not SPAM everyone you know asking for an endorsement. Also, only ask to be endorsed for skills that you legitimately feel you have some expertise in.

I hope you've enjoyed these advanced LinkedIn tips for MBA students. If you have done all these things, you are well on your way to becoming an LinkedIn expert. If you missed my first post on this topic LinkedIn Basics For MBA Students, click the link to get the basics down before you try all the steps I've outlined above. If you're looking for more tips on how to write your LinkedIn summary check out LinkedIn Summary Examples for MBA Students. If you have any other questions, please comment below. Also, if you have some advanced LinkedIn tips I'm missing, I'd love to hear about them.

3 Reasons Why You Should Have a LinkedIn Profile In All The Languages You Speak

I read a few months ago that 64% of LinkedIn members are international. I'm fluent in English, Spanish and conversational in Portuguese, but up until recently I only had a profile in English. After realizing that most people on LinkedIn are not in the U.S., I finally caught the vision on why creating LinkedIn profiles in all the languages you speak is important. Here are my top three reasons.

1. Opportunities, opportunities, opportunities- If you're interested in doing business in another language, creating a profile makes it easier for opportunities to find you. Don't limit your international exposure on LinkedIn to people who speak just English. Within a few weeks of adding a profile in Spanish, I saw a noticeable increase in views to my profile from Spanish speaking countries.

2. It's easy- Check out this article about the steps to set it up, it's not complicated. It could be time consuming to translate your entire profile, so as a first step, I recommend translating your headline and a quick summary. Here are examples below.

3. Actions speak louder that words- It's easy to say you speak another language, but having a profile in that language goes a long way to show that you are serious about doing business in that language. Also, it proves that you can actually write in that language.

I learned Spanish in non-business context, so while I’m fluent and comfortable, my business vocabulary is not that strong. Make sure to have someone proofread what you write in another language, especially if you're not a native speaker. Hope this helps you get motivated to create a profile in another language.

LinkedIn Basics For MBA Students

I often get asked what tips I have for students just starting to use LinkedIn or wanting to leverage it more effectively to help them find a job. The first thing I always say is to remember that the majority of the time employers will Google you when they are evaluating you as a candidate. Not only that, but professionals are very likely to look you up on LinkedIn before they meet with you. This has become so frequent that LinkedIn has really transformed into your reputation, not just a online resume. It is a one stop shop for someone that wants to find professional information about you. I strongly recommend that you at least follow these basic guidelines for your LinkedIn profile.

1. Use a professional picture- A picture of just you, that clearly shows your face, in attire that represents the dress standards of your industry, or the industry you'd like to be in.

2. Put your work experience up your profile- Add any work experience that is relevant to your goals and make sure their is enough information that people can easily understand what it was you actually did.

3. Create a custom URL- This creates a shorter URL for your profile that will be easier to share and will improve the ranking of your profile in Google search results. Click here to learn how to set it up.

4. Do not connect with people you do not know- LinkedIn should be a online reflection of real relationships, do not connect with people that you do not know.

5. When you add a connection, send them a personal message- When you add someone as a connection, it gives you the option to send them a personal message. Take the chance to reconnect.

Below I've embedded a 10 minute long video that goes into more detail. My classmate Elizabeth Hilton interviewed me for the Marriott MBA Today show, which is a student run program where BYU MBA students do interviews with different people about topics relevant to our MBA students.

If you're ready for some advanced tips check out this post, Advanced LinkedIn Tips For MBA Students