MEMORANDUM
To: Pencil Pack, ENGL 301 Writing Team
From: Janice Pang, Student, ENGL 301, 
Date: October 13, 2019
Subject: Best Practices on LinkedIn
As we begin to create our LinkedIn profiles, I prepared a summary of best practices on LinkedIn that will help in creating an appropriate profile for professional networking.
The following is a list of ten best practices on LinkedIn:
- Write a short informative profile headline with a specific audience in mind. The headline will reveal your uniqueness and interests.
- Use a high-quality professional profile photo, where you are facing forward and appropriately dressed.
- Be concise about experiences, qualifications and goals when writing a summary. Treat the summary as the first paragraphs of a cover letter.
- List all work experiences. Experiences should include a brief description of responsibilities and accomplishments. Use accomplishment statements to uniquely reflect skills, abilities and potential.
- Showcase your work by including relevant examples of your writing, design work or other accomplishments on your profile.
- Show your connectedness by following relevant companies and joining professional groups. Active participation on LinkedIn allows for greater visibility to recruiters on the platform.
- Regularly update status to stay active within your network. Mention about projects, professional books and articles or events.
- Set profile to ‘public’ and create a unique URL (e.g. linkedin.com/in/JaneSmith) to increase the professional results appearing on other people’s searches on LinkedIn.
- If seeking for job opportunities, utilize the ‘Open to New Opportunities’ feature to alert recruiters that you are a potential candidate.
- Introduce your connections to each other. Often, connections will also introduce you to some of their connections. This allows you to expand your network.
LinkedIn is one of the most powerful social networking tools for professionals and allows people to tell their professional stories, find work and develop careers online. For more best practices, please visit the websites in the list of sources below.
Works Cited
Dodaro, Melonie. “LinkedIn Etiquette: 20 Do’s & Don’ts.” LinkedIn, 17 Apr. 2014,
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20140417174121-34888774-linkedin-etiquette-guide-20-do-s-don-ts/.
Garriott, Omar. “10 LinkedIn Tips for Students & New Grads.” LinkedIn, 6 Feb. 2015, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/10-tips-
students-new-grads-linkedin-omar-garriott/.
“How to Effectively Use LinkedIn.” UBC Student Services, 18 July 2019, https://students.ubc.ca/career/career-
resources/effectively-use-linkedin.
“Insider LinkedIn Best Practices.” Career & Internship Center | University of Washington, 3 Aug. 2017,
https://careers.uw.edu/blog/2017/02/02/insider-linkedin-best-practices/.
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