Craft a standout headline - LinkedIn Tutorial

- Powerhouse Program Manager, Rock Your Profile Queen, Opportunity Connector. Guess, what? This is an actual headline for a real profile on LinkedIn. You guessed it, it's mine. Go ahead and search me on LinkedIn, and you'll see this headline front and center underneath my name. So what is a LinkedIn headline? Your headline is the short one-liner that appears under your name within your profile. It also shows up in the Home Feed, alongside your photo, every time you post and publish content on LinkedIn. Did you know if you don't update your headline, it will auto-default to the most recent position listed within your work experience? Your LinkedIn headline is an opportunity to represent your professional brand and differentiate yourself from others, right off the bat. Your headline is often the first thing, alongside your profile photo, that people will see before they click in to your profile. So you want to create something compelling, customized, and representative of you. Where do you begin? When creating a customized headline, you want to think about what I like to call, the big three. First, what are some industry keywords that will help you get discovered by your professional community across LinkedIn? These can be things like Program Manager, Software Engineer, Small Business Owner, or Coffee Barista, to name a few. Second, pinpoint exactly what you do. Are you an investor, strategy leader, or manufacturer? Maybe you started your own consulting business, you fly commercial planes, or you're a hospital doctor or a nurse. Whatever it is, use your headline as an opportunity to quickly highlight your role. For example, building the transportation of tomorrow, if you work in a car manufacturing plant, or maybe something like, transforming patient care, if you're in the medical field working as a doctor, and last but not least, highlight any skills that are unique to you, or passions that you have. Are you passionate about connecting talent with opportunity? Then add that in. Do you have a side hustle as a photographer or a DJ? Add that in too. Or maybe, you have incredible strong leadership qualities or specific coding skills, add those in. So if you're a recruiter who specializes in recruiting for the healthcare industry, this could show up as, dream maker, connecting top talent to their dream jobs in healthcare. Or, if you're a data center technician, who has a side hustle as a photographer, maybe something like this, data center technician by day, photographer by night. Now, let's pull a big three into one final example, so you can see how this shows up in a profile. Meet Jahayra, she wants to customize her headline to incorporate her big three, and differentiate herself from others in the same field as her. First, she'll click the Edit button at the top of her profile. Next, she'll locate the section that says Headline. Right now, it's auto-defaulting to her current position, because she hasn't customized it. So, she'll wipe that out, and add in a new headline. Jahayra's a rockstar, and she's already put in work to brainstorm her big three. Here's what she came up with. Connecting people to the world by piloting Boeing 757s. She'll fix that spelling error, and then she'll simply click Save to add this to her profile. Now, you can see that this shows up as the one-liner right underneath her name within her LinkedIn profile. See how she has the big three. Her industry keyword is piloting. She highlights what she does by saying, connecting people to the world, and finally, she can fly Boeing 757s, a unique skill that not every pilot has. Remember, your headline is your moment to quickly call out your big three so you stand out. Believe me, I know that creating a customized headline can be tough, but you're not alone. Lean on your professional community for help. An easy way to start getting some ideas and inspiration is by searching for key leaders or influencers in your industry or company. Take a peek at their profiles, and get some ideas. You can also check out the profiles of your colleagues, managers, friends, and mentors, to get a broad range of inspiration. Now, you have everything at your fingertips to craft a headline that will help you stand out, differentiate your brand, and represent you. I can't wait to see what you create.