Seven Action Steps to Building (Rather than Killing) Your Career with LinkedIn -- Walter Sabo

LinkedIn is the “serious” social site that lets clients, employers and financiers get a snapshot of your professional life. Use these seven action steps to make it a powerful tool for getting you more work. And remember to know your audience. Today, employers and clients don’t want cute, funny, vague or egotistical. They are looking for service, knowledge, courage and dependability.

The seven steps are as follows:

1. Never be out of work. Start a company. Have a project. Whatever is listed as your current activity, be busy.

2. Regarding past jobs, list very specific achievements, not just your job title. The achievements should indicate skills, growth, profits, ratings share and/or sponsor or client satisfaction. Use clean, sharp photos with each job position if possible.

3. Do not be cute. You are not a “guru,” a “dude,” a “master,” “a fill in” or a “substitute.” You are an executive or a creative executive.

4. Associate yourself with the biggest names and brands possible. If you managed, starred in, produced, promoted or otherwise did work on a campaign, social media activity or promotion for a company like Pepsi, Chevrolet or Walmart, say so. List every major brand you honestly helped to make into a bigger business. You tagged commercials, made social posts, conceived promotions, wrote copy, made appearances for those brands; that’s how you helped them grow. Claim credit.

5. Be sure to note if your company was run by a famous CEO. Those executives transcend your job and put you on a much larger corporate stage. Put their names in your profiles. Also, in the headline for each job, list the stock symbol if the company is publicly traded.

6. Be results oriented. Employers and clients are looking for results. They want to see how your actions improved the business. The more results you show, the more companies will find you to be an attractive candidate. Did you hire people who did a great job? Spell out the positions you filled and the goals that were met as the result of your initiatives. No one knows unless you tell them. And remember that most successful people have worked for many companies. Explain the transitions. Spell out that you moved to a larger city, a more competitive salary, a better situation for your family.

7. Pay attention to your contact information and profile photo. It is stunning how often contact information on LinkedIn is not there. If that area is blank, you can’t be trusted and you won’t get hired. Look for that tab and fill it out, including an address and a phone number, not just an email. If someone likes your profile, they may want to call you right away. Don't rely on your LinkedIn mail to get it done. Also, get rid of the bargain store clothes and the bad haircut and have a professional photographer take professional, tight head shots. Your profile photo should be focused, sharp and neat. Consider giving it to a real graphic artist and letting Photoshop do what nature did not. Use the same picture on every social site.