Assignment 2.2: Memo for Best LinkedIn Practices

To:                   Team The Empirical Pen, Technical Writing 301 Team

From:              Coco Chen

Date:               October 22, 2021

Subject:          Best Practices for Professional Networking on Linked In

LinkedIn is a social networking service designed to allow registered users to maintain the contacts they know and trust in their business dealings. Users can invite people they know to become their own connections or use the platform to find and expand their connections. Job seekers can update their resumes on LinkedIn, and companies or employers can post jobs on it. By connecting and exchanging contacts, job seekers can find suitable jobs or better job opportunities through LinkedIn. I have summarized 10 practical tips for LinkedIn based on the function description for job seekers, hope these can help you!

Create your Personal Profile

1. A photo is an effective way to influence your audience’s first impression of a profile. It is recommended to choose an engaging, professional and authentic photo.
2. Identify the audience for your profile so that you can build a LinkedIn profile with relevant experience and qualifications that appeal to your target audience.
3. The title and summaries play an important part in the LinkedIn algorithm and appear on every page. Therefore, it is recommended to use keywords that can quickly grab the attention of the target audience as headlines.
4. In the summary, clearly state who you are, your strengths, and why you are in this industry.
5. It is suggested to briefly describe all work and volunteer experience in the summary in the form of an accomplishment statement, thus illustrating your knowledge, skills, and abilities to the employer.

Building your Connections 

1. Use personalized requests when requesting to connect with other users, including familiar people, employees of relevant industry organizations, and people who view your profile, to emphasize your reasons for wanting to connect and thus express your sincerity.
2. Join the LinkedIn groups in your field of expertise and discuss industry-related topics with them.
3. Seek recognition of skills from former employers and colleagues to create the social proof of professional competence, and can also write letters of recommendation for people who’s work you can vouch for.
4. While increasing your contacts with people in your industry, stay in touch with people from diverse backgrounds to gain creative insights from different perspectives.
5. Use the advanced search feature to filter by characteristics such as location and industry to efficiently identify target companies and organizations.

I hope these 10 tips will help you advance in your career by using LinkedIn.  Thank you for reading this memo, please let me know if you have any questions. My email: mengxichen1997@gmail.com.

Citation

Borsellino, Regina. “The 31 Best LinkedIn Profile Tips for Job Seekers.” The Muse, September 2021. <https://www.themuse.com/advice/linkedin-profile-tips>.

Deehan, Jane. “20 steps to a better LinkedIn profile in 2020.” LinkedIn, 20 February 2020. <https://www.linkedin.com/business/sales/blog/profile-best-practices/17-steps-to-a-better-linkedin-profile-in-2017>.

Liou, Emily. “How To Create A LinkedIn Profile (Optimized For Job Searching).” LinkedIn, 12 September 2019. <https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-create-linkedin-profile-optimized-job-searching-emily>.

UBC Student Service. “How to make the most of LinkedIn.“UBC, October 2021. <https://students.ubc.ca/career/career-resources/make-most-linkedin>.