LinkedIn and Keywords
Whenever you’re posting on LinkedIn, establishing your credibility in your field, you must include your strong keywords in your article or video.
Quick reminder on keywords:
Keywords are nothing but search terms. The two are just named differently when in different environments.
So say you’re looking for a “LinkedIn Trainer.” Those are the words you type into a search engine, like LinkedIn’s or Google’s, making that a search term.
Now if I want to be seen in the results of that search (and I do), I need to have the term “LinkedIn Trainer” in my profile in all the right places (called optimization) so that the little search engine spiders can match my profile with your search.
But now, within the realm of the profile, the term “LinkedIn Trainer” is called a keyword.
By the way, that exact same search is also called searching by keyword.
➡ Okay, back to Keywords and Hashtags:
Your keywords are the terms within your profile that will help the search engine spiders match your profile to a specific search.
Hashtags, on the other hand, are what I call topic titles, meaning that you can search hashtags to find all the posts and profiles that have used that hashtag.
You can recognize them because they’re always preceded by “#” and don’t use spaces, punctuation or symbols within them and only spaces between them.
They can and should be listed at the end of your About and Current Experience (meaning your current job) sections and be very relevant to what you’ve referenced in your profile.
Here are some good guidelines for using and creating hashtags, aided by a comprehensive article over at Hootsuite (https://blog.hootsuite.com/how-to-use-hashtags/).
a) Use hashtags that are very relevant and specific to your post or profile.
For instance, my hashtags for this article might be #hashtagsbasics #hashtagsandkeywords. See how there is just a space between them, no comma? They won’t work with commas.
If we’re talking about my profile, I use #linkedintrainer #linkedinexpert and quite a few more– all referring to my current career.
b) The best hashtags are fairly short.
c) The number of hashtags you should use depends on what they’re attached to.
A profile can handle 10-20 at the bottom of your About and current Experience sections. (Remember, they’re counted in the character count, so if you have to trim and you’re using 20 hashtags, you can usually trim there.)
Refer to my profile (LinkedIn.com/in/DebbieMcCormick) or Cathy Alessandra’s (LinkedIn.com/in/CathyAlessandra).
In an article or post, use only up to four to prevent overwhelming your post and a feeling of spamminess (yes, that’s a word. Now.)
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Debbie will answer your LinkedIn questions every week here in YES I CAN Living Magazine. Write to her at info@LinkedInBossLady.com, subject LINKEDIN QUESTION.
For further help or support from her, you can schedule a one-on-one Profile Review right on her calendar at https://LinkedInBossLady.as.me.
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