hands-typing-2[1]A colleague ventured into making her first LinkedIn Post the other day. It was a good one, with original, valuable material for all of us.

She asked if I had any other tips to give her for later Posts.

I sent her 6 new things to consider:

  1. Use a great banner photo that commands attention, when coupled with a great headline, makes people stop to read what you have to say. Think newspapers on a newsstand and what makes them sell.
  2. Attribute the photo you used. You can find a place to do this very well hidden in the top most margin on the photo in light font and you simply click there and type in the source. That’s just good housekeeping.
  3. Add a bio of yourself at the end of the Post including embedded links to your website, LinkedIn short URL and twitter pages. To do so, just copy and paste to the end of the Post after a long horizontal line to visually separate the Post body from the bio. That’s just another small idea. I looked at the power Posters’ habits and saw their bios were in first person so I did that too and got comments on one of my posts that I sounded very friendly and more memorable that way. Ya nevah know…
  4. Announce your new Post has just been “posted” on LinkedIn and add the URL for it: on your Facebook page, blog about it, twitter, and definitely as a shared update on LinkedIn in case your connections missed it.
  5. Quietly ask for comments from your entourage if you think that is appropriate. I don’t do that often but I know other power Posters who do and get many more eyes on their work that way. If you have colleagues who are experts in the field you are Posting about, that makes for a valuable conversation for the reading public.
  6. Add SEO keywords at the bottom of your Post from the (very limited) list LinkedIn allows you to use. You can only choose 3 (why?) so find the right ones to optimize your search-ability and find-ability. It’s a crowded field in LinkedIn Posts so be judicious.

Most important of all, get in the mix and Post your first or next original observation, critique, or valuable insight to 347+ million readers.

It’s rewarding to know your material helped someone else in a way you did not expect.