Your LinkedIn Profile Isn’t Broken—It’s Just Missing This
Real tweaks from a real coaching session that turned 'meh' into magnetic
I get this all the time
I get to have a chat with someone who is smart, experienced, and they are visible online. They show up thinking their LinkedIn profile is “pretty good.” In fact, they get told all the time by friends and colleagues that they are doing a great job on LinkedIn.
Then we open it up together and…
BOOM!
The lightbulbs go off.
That’s exactly what happened in a recent coaching session.
This person isn’t new to LinkedIn. They’re a coach. A content creator. A personal brand in their own right, in fact, they even help people with LinkedIn work.
But even the best of us can’t see what’s staring us in the face. Because we are too close to what we do.
That tiny circle matters
The first this I say to people is “People buy from people who they know, like and trust. And this kicks off with an awesome profile picture.
Their profile photo was fine… on desktop.
But on mobile? Too dark. Not recognisable.
We need to remember this:
70% of LinkedIn users are on mobile.
That little profile photo? It’s the size of a baked bean.
Your photo needs to pop.
Use Canva. Use your brand colours. Or ask someone to help. And make sure you are only showing your face. No shoulders and make sure you SMILE, but not just with your mouth, let’s see some teeth and even your eyes smile.
It’ll take you 2 minutes to upgrade your photo
Your banner isn’t a billboard
Their banner had:
A job title
An email address
A nice-looking graphic… with text so small no one could read on the mobile.
Your banner should scream what you do.
Clear. Bold. Instantly obvious.
If a 10-year-old couldn’t explain your work from your banner alone?
Change it.
It’s not because we get 10-year-olds on LinkedIn. It’s because we act like 10-year-olds when we are scrolling and if we cannot make any sense of your profile, guess waht we do?
No one’s searching for your alter ego
This person had a nickname they were known for.
It’s fun. It’s become part of their brand.
But it was showing up in the NAME field.
Under the T’s & C’s of LinkedIn, this is not allowed.
Your name should be… your name.
Not your slogan. Not your persona. Not your superpower.
Put the fun bit in your headline where it belongs.
Let that headline do the work and don’t fall foul of stringent rules. Do you want to risk your account getting blocked?
And don’t overlook your headlines
Your headline is, by default, your job title. But so many of us have a preconceived idea of a job title. And if that job title is OWNER, then that tells us nothing
Their headline? A mix of job titles and keywords. You know the type.
Yes, keywords are important.
But we also want clarity. Curiosity. A Spark.
A good headline makes people stop and think:
“Ooh, that’s interesting”
“I’ve got that problem”
“I want to know more”
Not “Yet another coach / speaker / author / wizard.”
Write your headline so it makes sense out of context.
Even in a comment thread, it should tell us what you do.
Why do you think I use The 15-Minute Guy?
The little things? They’re massive
We also tackled a few overlooked tweaks:
Add your birthday (even if it’s made up!) to get those “happy birthday” notifications. But think about it. It’s not the messages you want. LinkedIn will tell your network that it’s your birthday. Basically, they are reminding your connections that you exist!
Pop your phone number on your profile so people can actually call you
Stop aiming for perfection, it’s not a grammar exam
This person? A self-confessed perfectionist.
They’d go back and edit a post from six weeks ago because of an extra space.
But real talk? That makes you look like a robot.
People want to see the human behind the profile.
Typos and all.
Your quick wins:
Zoom in on your profile photo and add a bold background colour
Rewrite your banner in 8 words or less, be big, bold, clear
Add your birthday
Ditch the perfection. Post with a typo. You’ve got this
Take a peek at your own profile.
Look at it on your phone.
Would you click on you?
If not, now’s the time to fix it.