Everyone knows that LinkedIn is essential to the job search if you’re in the market to make a move.

Updating your profile, sharing the news publicly that you’re open to opportunities, and chatting it up with recruiters about new roles represent common ways that people use the platform. But outside of finding career opportunities, what other ways have you ‘worked on’ moving your career forward? Perhaps you realize the only time you’ve actively taken action towards something like that is when you are looking for a new job. Many experts in the hiring world would likely suggest that you need to take action right away, especially on a platform like LinkedIn as it serves as a very powerful medium to share your personal brand with industry peers and influencers.  

Developing your personal brand

Some equate the idea of personal brand with predictable activities of what it takes to maintain a professional identity. Examples include ensuring your resume and profile show a complete record of your recent achievements to asking colleagues to provide recommendations or endorsements of your abilities after you’ve worked on a project with them. 

Sure, while these things contribute to the idea of a personal brand, we could be doing much more in this department. By a personal brand, we create the identity by which we want to be known. Building off this concept in a professional sense, we utilize personal brands to elevate our profiles and reputations in the field. When done right, a personal brand extends beyond these basic tasks and focuses on ways that build your credibility as a practitioner in your industry. 

Be an active participant, not an anonymous lurker

One of the easiest ways to do this is to participate on the platform actively.  

Does this mean ‘liking’ articles you read? Forwarding posts that you find interesting? To some degree, the answer is yes. After all, these mere actions do lend a bit more insight into what you’re all about beyond the quick review of facts and details stated on a resume or profile.  

However, LinkedIn provides the space to do more. It allows you to contribute powerfully to your personal brand by expressing your perspective in meaningful ways. As the site highlights industry and professional topics, you are able to share your opinions and point of view about events and trends that are relevant to your field, as well as freely comment on others. Not only does it provide the ability for people to author and curate their own articles and presentations, but LinkedIn also gives professionals the chance to create pathways that encourage dialogue within specific cohorts. For example, people can create groups within the platform that promote a specific interest in an industry or company, introduce professional contacts that should meet, as well as build a following of readers by microblogging posts easily to their network. 

Bringing more dimension to who you are professionally, serves as a way to add to your reputation. And, the actions and tactics you share with others contribute to defining your personal brand. LinkedIn is a fantastic tool that you can use to share your expertise and personality in ways beyond a quick look at your profile.

In what ways do you use LinkedIn? Have you used the platform to move your career forward beyond looking for a job? Share your thoughts below. Sign up for our free online workshop Level Up With LinkedIn on May 16th to get tips on how you can enhance your personal brand and advance your career forward.