LinkedIn Profile Best Practices for 2025

What is the biggest problem that you're trying to solve for these users or the biggest value you want to provide them with your content? And you could just answer, you know, the most interesting kind of COVID picture are the ones where people have just like added a newsletter, like a newsletter link typed in on the COVID picture so that people can go out and search for it.

I'm here with Tanika. Tanika, why don't you tell us a bit more about, you know, what you're working on right now.

I am a conversion copywriter and a LinkedIn ghostwriter for a lot of B2B SaaS founders and I recently just completed these live profile boost audits inside Exit five. We started off, I think it was an idea that I kind of pitched to you and I was like, okay, let's do this. You know, this is just a random idea because I felt like a lot of landing page audits had already been done. I felt like, this is my area, let's do it. And I saw a lot of other past events and I felt like, okay, the maximum participation we're going to get is like, maybe, you know, 30, 40, that's going to be it. You know, I was already with my notepad and everything and then, oh my God, we crossed 100 plus profiles. Oh. Some people submitted multiple profiles from their companies and their executives. And I feel like, and I feel like, yeah, this was, this was a great, great event that we pulled off. So thanks to you for believing that idea. And yeah, it was amazing. It was amazing just going through all of that. It was like a ton of data and insights right there.

Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah. Just for context for everyone listening, once a month in the community we do these asynchronous type teardowns. So, you know, we've done like a website teardown in the past where people will submit the link to their website and then a website expert goes in and gives some pointers on how to improve it. And yeah, for this one we did the LinkedIn one and it was, I think it was the most popular one we've done all the time, which is amazing. You know, everyone's got a LinkedIn profile and you know, I think myself included, like, I, I even know my profile probably could use some work. Even though my engagement on content is good, I'm sure there's a lot I could even do on my end. So everyone has areas they, they can improve and. Yeah, yeah, today, you know, I think we'll just take some time going through some of your biggest learnings from the teardown. How's that sound?

Awesome. Yeah. Okay, let's get to it. Thanks for handing the pod. Ok, let's get started with this. I just want to mention, like, two quick insights. We kind of covered 34 hours of the total. Like the total audit time was 34 hours, including each one of these audits. And that was absolutely crazy because my loom kept crashing all the time. It could just hand. It couldn't handle. It was not sure what I was up to. So it couldn't handle all of that. And I feel like it was absolutely crazy because even if I, if I would have done a paid event somewhere else, I don't think I would have kind of, you know, gone into this much depth that I did for this event because we just had these diversity of profiles that kind of gave me, I mean, every single profile I opened up was so different from each other. Of course, some of the mistakes they were making were like the same, but they were so different from each other that I felt like, oh my God, I, I just, like I'm getting this new idea by just looking at that. So, yeah, just wanted to mention that and get it off. Okay, so to start with, everyone who's listening here today, you could be literally anyone. You could be a fresher just looking out for jobs. You could be a popular creator like Matt mentioned. I think Matt has some great engagement on LinkedIn. So you could be someone with like some crazy engagement on LinkedIn and you might feel like, you know, this, this is not something that would really help you, but just stay tuned and we'll discuss that. Or you could be a founder who doesn't post that actively, but you have like, you do, you do think that according to you, you have this updated profile or you could be like a sales leader who was running Sales Navigator campaigns. All of you all need LinkedIn profile optimization. And why is that? So we'll talk about that later. Okay, so I'm going to start off with a super interesting story. So I have this landing page for my profile audit since the very beginning. I think I had it like even before we did this live event. But after the event, I kind of optimized that landing page and I kind of shared it across different communities. And I had this line in my message that said something around, you know how people are running Sales Navigator campaigns and they're posting around on LinkedIn with a profile that's not updated since 2002. And there was this particular comment that said, okay, how do you really think, you really think that people who are running sales navigate campaigns haven't updated their profile since 2002. I mean, like, okay, is that even true? And I was like, okay, that, I mean, something just, just clicked. That I felt like the meaning of literally updating your LinkedIn profile is actually not really clear. I mean, people are following the textbook definition there. They are following the rules that are like, you know, okay, about section supposed to be about you. The headline is supposed to be, you know, what is it? What your profile says cover picture needs to be perfectly designed. So maybe this is what they think is the meaning of updating your profile. So I felt like, okay, this is something that there needs to be some education done around this particular topic. So I feel like we should start the episode by talking about what updating a LinkedIn profile really means. And I feel like this is very important for literally anyone who's just starting to post on LinkedIn or maybe starting to run some cold email campaigns, doing some paid campaigns, because literally every single person is going to check out your profile no matter what. I mean, even if you're doing like, if you're running paid ads, these thought leader ads are very popular on LinkedIn right now. Even if you're doing that people and you're not directly taking them to your profile, your CTA is your landing page or something, people are still going to check out your profile. That's going to happen. If they see your name there. Yeah, they're going to search for it. They're going to make sure this is just like a website.

So I feel like the actual just to like jump in super quick. Like the LinkedIn profile is almost like a landing page itself. You know, like the posts and content are what you're using to generate attention and, you know, generate interest and then drive that interest to your profile. And then the profile is where, you know, if it's designed properly, it's like a landing page where you ideally want someone to convert. It could be to your services, but it also could be to something like your DMs. Like, let's say you are a experienced marketer and you're trying to find a new job. Well, they're going to look at your profile and at that moment think, oh, like, maybe I should hit this person up to work for me. They seem like they'd be a good option. So it's good framing for the profile. It's almost like a landing page.

100%. That's spot on. I feel like that was my opening line for every single audit I told them that I'm going to treat your profile like a landing page. It's spot on, 100%, whatever you said. So I feel like this is. And I feel like this is exactly the problem because people are a lot of, even a lot of popular creators. I've checked some of the profiles and I feel like, because they are treating their profiles like these, you can say passive listings out there wherein it's just like nice to have thing where everything is like just shiny and updated and not exactly like a conversion landing page. Like they treat their website or something, which is why the actual gaps begin. So here we go. Here's the actual meaning of updating your profile. It means updating every single section of your profile where you're talking such that you're talking directly to your ICP and their pain points. So let's, let's talk about the COVID picture. Is your cover picture just like you can see a plain picture with like a solid background color and then there's a logo or a tagline in front of it and there's a headline that says founder at so and so. And then there's like an ABOUTS section and then there's like an experience section. Then you have posts and like featured section. Everything that you're doing according to the textbook definition is not really going to work versus something that's being done towards like a particular goal. And like you said, when you treat it like a conversion landing page, the goal could literally be anything. It doesn't necessarily need to be, you know, taking users to a particular link to a particular landing page. It could literally be just taking them to a DM or just like having them book a call with you. The conversion could literally be anything. But is your about section really talking to icp? Is your cover picture really talking to your icp? I think that is the most important thing. And I feel like this is something I do to quickly test how optimized a profile is. Just go out and remove every single link from your profile. I mean, yeah, it's a controversial thing to say, but just remove every single link. If you have like a landing page link, you have a book, a call link, just remove it. And if your profile is completely optimized, your cover picture sees what it needs to, your headline sees what it needs to. Users are actually going to reach out to you via dms. They don't need a link. They are actually going to reach out to you. You don't really need like a link for them to go to a separate landing page. And then ultimately Convert. And this is exactly how it happens. So you start off with a cover picture and this is something I've seen. I feel like a lot of marketing leaders, especially in B2B SaaS as well, I've seen them having like these on point branded cover pictures. Everything looks like design wise, super aesthetic. It goes with the brand. Everything is according to how it's supposed to be in terms of the design. But the moment you read the message on the COVID picture, it would just be something like a very cliche tagline that has nothing to do with the problem that's solving, nothing to do with the product. It just looks like it's like a nice to have thing that I look at and I'm like, oh my God. Yeah, it's amazing. I'm under that illusion that it's working for me, but it's really not. So I feel like when you look at a cover picture, look at it in a way that it's like the hero section. It's like the hero of a landing page. So just like the hero of a landing page answers the question, what is the biggest problem you're solving for users? Your cover picture needs to answer the question, what is the biggest problem that your product is solving for users? And trust me, there's enough space for that. Plus there's enough space to add some quick logos for some social proofs. It becomes like the complete hero experience. So I feel like you have just like, just like on a landing page, you have these first few seconds to convince a user to stay back, otherwise they're just going to leave. They don't have the time. It's even trickier on a LinkedIn profile because yes, you have a few seconds, but you also have a lot of distractions. You have notifications, then there's messaging, then there are notifications on the sales Navigator bar, then there's my network and then there's a feed. So it's very tricky. You just have those few seconds when they're checking out your cover picture, your headline, your links and everything like the upper fold. Does that make sense? Do you have something to add on here?

No, no. I think that's great advice. I think I like the idea of, you know, what should be in the COVID image should be speaking to the pain points of the customer. I think you're right in a sense where it's typically just like a generic company tagline that doesn't really make a lot of sense. Or it'll just be, you know, the color of your brand and your logo. I Think mine actually may be that. So maybe I need to go change it. But no, I think that's great advice. I think, you know, things like that, too, are really easy to create in Canva too. Like, you can easily go create one of those yourself and just add that to your profile. It's not that difficult. And, you know, I like the idea of adding some social proof in there too, because, you know, within the first couple of seconds somebody lands in your profile, it legitimizes you. Right? You don't really have a place to put. To add logos like that. It's not like a. It's not like a landing page in the sense where you could add image anywhere. There's only a couple different places. So to add a recognizable logo that somebody sees right out of the gate kind of legitimizes what you're doing. So I definitely like that tip. And, and even to add on that, like, if you're somebody who maybe doesn't want to. Because not everyone wants to, like, push their company super hard, whether it's their own company, the company they work for, maybe they're more interested in their own personal brand and building that up, then maybe use that space to highlight some of the work you've done or who you are or your accomplishments. Now, obviously you don't want like a bullet list like in the about section, but is there a tagline that you have for yourself that could catch the interest of somebody who wants to hire you? So maybe it's like, you know, B2B marketing generalist with a passion for content and, you know, something, you know, some kind of tagline or something that's, you know, kind of highlights who you are. So that's. That's my thoughts about the. That picture.

Awesome. Yeah, amazing. And I feel like that's so much that's spot on. I mean, you don't necessarily need to promote like a product or like a brand on the COVID picture. You could just be answering the question that, for example, you're posting content even once a while, not consistently. Answer the question, what is the biggest problem that you're trying to solve for these users or the biggest value you want to provide them with your content. And you could just answer, you know, the most interesting kind of COVID picture. Cover pictures are the ones where people have just like added a newsletter. Like a newsletter link. Like URL is just typed in on the COVID picture so that people can go out and search for it. There's no link added anywhere on the profile. And.