People are becoming extremely skeptical about everything online. Several factors such as the rise of fake news and online frauds have contributed to this.
Hence, if you want to use social media to drive engagement, traffic, and sales, you need to take steps to boost your profile’s credibility.
One social network in particular where you should pay attention to your credibility is Linkedin, as many people use it for generating leads. If people who check out your profile quickly trust you, they will want to work with you.
Therefore, today I am going to show you all the steps you can take boost your Linkedin profile’s credibility.
Mention all your achievements on your profile
The quickest way to boost the trustworthiness of your Linkedin profile is by including details of all your achievements, certifications and experience.
This should include information about the clients you have worked with, the jobs you have held in the past, courses you have taken and certifications you have received for them, the sites you have been featured in and any other achievements.
An example of a Linkedin profile that has been well optimized to boost credibility is Melonie Dodaro’s.
In her Linkedin bio, Melonie informs us of all the top influencer lists she has been mentioned in, credible publications she has been mentioned in, a bestselling book she’s written and some of the work she has done.
On her profile, she has also added all the job positions she has held and describes the work she has done and her accomplishments.
Melonie also lists the certifications she has received and publications she has written for on her profile.
Adding all of these details to your LinkedIn profile can boost your credibility.
You can also add details about the sites you have been mentioned in on your Linkedin header image like Chelsea Krost does:
As soon as you visit Chelsea’s profile you can see the header and learn that she has been mentioned on sites like Forbes, Bloomberg, and Entrepreneur. This can quickly increase credibility.
Get recommendations
Writing about your accomplishments will help, but what works even better is recommendations from people you have worked with. This is because people will trust what others write about you more than what you write about yourself. Recommendations are just like testimonials and case studies. And the best part is that everyone can check out the profile of the person who gave you the recommendations to make sure they are real. That way they won’t be skeptical about reading dubious testimonials.
You should work on getting as many recommendations as you can. So, begin contacting people you have worked with and ask them to recommend you.
Neal Schaffer understands the importance of recommendations on Linkedin. His profile has more than 70. This adds a massive amount of social proof.
Therefore, contact all the people you have worked for (who are active on Linkedin) and send them an invitation to recommend you. And don’t forget to send new invitations to clients you work with in the future.
For best results ask the recommenders to write testimonials in case study style where they include statistics of how their business fared before they hired you and the improvement they saw after hiring you. Including statistics like these will not only make the testimonials better, but they will also show that you get results.
Display testimonials
If you want testimonials that are even better than recommendations, you should try out video testimonials. In the experience section, Linkedin lets you link videos for each job position.
Hence, you can ask your clients to create video testimonials for you, then upload them onto a video platform like YouTube or Vimeo and attach the video’s URL to the job position.
For inspiration check out Sam Ovens’ Linkedin profile. Here he displays video testimonials from successful clients like Dave Rogenmosser who is the founder of Proof and Brittany Brown who is the founder of Beating Binge Eating.
Creating and displaying similar videos on your Linkedin profile can help a lot. Here’s a guide to creating video testimonials.
Publish and share helpful content
As aforementioned, the amount of fake content that is being created to force social media shares and traffic has been rising. Therefore, if you can create some content that provides real and useful information people will begin to trust you.
A great place to start is by using Linkedin’s very own publishing platform. As Linkedin displays the links to the articles directly published on Linkedin on your profile, people can click on them and check them out. If you create great content they will trust you immediately.
Bryan Kramer understands the importance of creating credible content.
He has published 68 articles on Linkedin. Reading his work will get people to trust him more.
Another option is to share content from your own blog and other’s blogs not only on your profile but also in groups. Make sure that this is only the best content because people will attach it to your personal brand.
Go ahead and boost your Linkedin profile’s credibility…
These are the methods you can use to increase your Linkedin profile’s credibility. As you can see they are very easy to implement. Start off by optimizing your profile by mentioning the publications you have been featured in, clients you have worked with and all your other achievements. Next, contact people you have worked with and ask them to leave recommendations.
After that, publish and share useful and credible content on a regular basis. Content will not only help you build stronger bonds with the connections you already have but will also help you attract more connections.
What steps do you take to boost your Linkedin profile’s credibility? Have you tried any of the above techniques? Please leave your comments below.
Guest Author: Mitt Ray is the founder of Social Marketing Writing, where you can download 100 Free Social Media Background Images.