Your LinkedIn About is prime real estate for telling your story, advancing your career, and building pivotal relationships that will help you reach your goals. This important LinkedIn feature replaces the outdated Summary section. They’ve nixed that boring “summary” word, so be sure to revamp your approach. If you stop summarizing and start humanizing, your About is the perfect 24/7 tool for showcasing your personal brand when you can’t be there in person.
In fact, it’s the most powerful tool for introducing yourself to others—along with your elevator pitch, of course. In our digital world, first impressions happen online. People google and LinkedIn-stalk you (in a non-threatening way) before meeting you. When something sparks their interest, like seeing your name on a meeting invite, they start their search.
Your LinkedIn profile is replete with features that help you build your personal brand, but none is more important than your About. This is the ultimate place to engage with people who want to learn about you. It will be the most read version of your bio. To reap the rewards of this opportunity, you must be able to express your personal brand in 3,000 characters or less (that’s a thousand more characters than before) and create a truly riveting picture of the real you. Here’s the 6-step process:
1. Establish Your Goals
Consider why you’re writing this About. How will your About help you achieve your aspirations? Get clear on your purpose. That’s the key to creating a compelling narrative.
2. Define Your Target Audience
Unlike a resume, your About can’t be customized for each opportunity. You need one version that appeals to your whole brand community—the decision-makers you want to impress. But the good news is that it only needs to be relevant to that community, not to all the millions of professionals who are on LinkedIn. Personal branding is not about being famous; it’s about being selectively famous.
Take the time to understand what motivates your audience. What can you offer each other? How can you make a positive difference in each other’s lives? Then ask yourself:
- What do I want them to know about me?
- What do I want them to do after reading this?
- How do I want them to feel?
With your audience clearly defined, it’s time to gather content.
3. Collect Your Raw Materials
Cull info that hits the sweet spot between credibility and likability.
Include those experiences and acknowledgements that prove you are relevant, capable and accomplished.
- Accomplishments—share what you do and what you have done, and don’t forget to quantify achievements.
- Accolades—showcase external validation including awards, mentions in the media, etc.
- Relevant education—highlight your degrees along with other lifelong learning that makes you relevant for what’s next.
This content helps create an authentic human connection. People want to work with people they know, like and trust. Don’t make the mistake of focusing only on the credibility aspects of who you are. Today, as tech enters the workforce at light speed, being human is a valuable asset that needs to be highlighted. Focus on the six drivers of your personal brand. These are questions that ChatGPT cannot correctly answer for you.
- Passions: what energizes you?
- Values: what are your operating principles or non-negotiables?
- Differentiators: what makes you unique and sets you apart from your peers?
- Purpose: why do you do what you do?
- Goals: what are your aspirations?
- Superpowers: what do you do better than anyone else?
4. Craft Your Draft
Before you put pen to paper or finger to key, here are some tips to consider:
- Use first-person pronouns for intimacy and to create a conversation between you and the reader. And besides, everyone knows you wrote your own LinkedIn About; there’s no need to refer to yourself in the third person.
- Start with a magnetic hook of 2 to 3 enticing sentences. There was a time when the purpose of your first sentence was to tell people what you do, but the new LinkedIn format requires something different. And besides, you have told people what you do in your LinkedIn headline. Only the first two to three lines of your About are visible to readers. To get them to click “see more,” make those initial sentences intriguing.
- Connect the hook to your current role. After you draw them in with your scintillating start, you need to let the reader know to what you do.
- Repeat key keywords. You want to make sure you’re associated with key words and phrases that will help you reach your goals.
- Be real yet aspirational. It’s important for your About to be authentic and current, but it must also position you for what you want to do more of, or what you want to do next.
- End with a clear call to action. What do you want the reader to do next?
Let the story unfold by weaving elements from the various likability and credibility categories above. This is a writing exercise, so it’s normal to go through several drafts. Don’t give yourself a time limit, just keep refining as you go.
5. Get Feedback
Ask trusted colleagues, managers, clients and friends/family to review it and provide constructive feedback.
6. Refine and Post
Use the feedback to refine your About into its best, truest and most compelling version. Then upload it and start engaging with the people who can help your career success soar.
William Arruda is a keynote speaker, co-founder of CareerBlast.TV and co-creator of BrandBoost – a fun, online self-awareness learning experience that helps you get clear on the six drivers of your personal brand.