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Creating Your Digital Brand: LinkedIn

Published on: Jan 5, 2021

ACCP Digital Brand

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Your Profile - An Introduction to Making your Profile


How to Edit

  • Log-in to LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com
  • Click “home” on the top bar of the screen
  • Click on your photo on the left hand side of the screen

Your Profile

LinkedIn has 3 big sections broken down into smaller sections

  • Background
    • Includes: Work experience, education, volunteer experience
  • Skills
    • Includes: Skills (see below)
    • When you make connections with colleagues, they can ‘endorse’ your skills
  • Accomplishments
    • Includes: publications, certifications, courses, projects, honors and awards, patents, test scores, languages, organizations

Read more

Important Items to Edit and Add to Your Profile


Customize Your URL

Make a Custom URL so you are searchable

  • In the edit-profile mode, there are three grey bars on the right side
  • Click the middle bar that says, "Edit public profile & URL”
  • On the right-hand side of the next screen, there is an option to “Edit public URL”
  • Edit the URL to contain your name

Choose Your Photo

Use these tips for choosing the most effective photo for your profile.

Education, Workplace, Skills and Publications

  • Add your school and degree
  • LinkedIn likely has your workplace programmed in. Make sure to choose the programmed workplace because it can connect you with your co-workers!
  • Many of these are already loaded into LinkedIn and are often what employers use to look for candidates
    • Start typing in the search bar and options will populate
    • You can also free text whatever words you would like to use
  • Make sure you add what electronic medical record systems you know how to use
  • Other examples: pharmacy, clinical pharmacy, evidenced based medicine, patient safety, clinical research, medical education
  • To put your skills in the order you want, click the edit pencil and then drag and drop on the right-hand side of the list
  • Links:
  • If you add a link to your publication, be sure to double check and make sure it works.
  • Add your co-authors. This can be an additional way to network!

Summary

What Not to do on LinkedIn - Avoid These Common Pitfalls to Maximize your Potential


Use old and Possibly Irrelevant Professional Experiences

  • Only include the most important internships and professional experiences from the past seven to ten years
  • Include details on your past two roles
  • Other roles may include only the job title and company name

Include Lackluster Accomplishments

Do not include so many honors, awards, and skills that they compete with each other for attention

  • Include what you really want people to see and consider removing what you would be fine with them forgetting

Forget to De-clutter Your Profile

  • Remove certifications which have expired
    • You can remove your technician and intern licenses once you have your pharmacist license
  • Test URLs to ensure they are still functional
  • Delete projects if they fizzled out before completion
  • Remove test scores from your academic history

Make Typos

  • Your LinkedIn account can be thought of as an online CV
  • Take the time to ensure that names, institutions, and other medical terminology is spelled correctly

Choose a Poor Photo for Your Profile

Use these tips for choosing the most effective photo for your profile.

Add to Many Skills to Your Profile

  • Adding skills makes you more searchable, but make sure these skills are recognized by LinkedIn (appear in the dropdown menu when you type it in the box)
  • Avoid the urge to list skills just to make your profile appear more marketable or impressive. These skills may raise more questions than interest

Have No (Credible) Recommendations

  • It is important to have recommendations on your profile
  • These recommendations should not be generic
    • The person writing should be able to speak to your abilities and should know you personally

Make a Profile and Forget About LinkedIn

  • The site makes it easy to update your community about accomplishments in your professional life
  • Suggestions for keeping active on LinkedIn include:
    • Commenting on a post
    • Posting a picture from a work-related event or conference
    • Publishing posts
  • Make it a goal to update something on LinkedIn once per week

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