The Summary is one of the most overlooked areas of most lawyers’ LinkedIn Profiles, but it can be a great way to add value to your Profile and convey important information to your audience. LinkedIn calls the Summary “your media-enhanced elevator pitch.”
Here are five ways to improve your LinkedIn Summary:
Write in a conversational tone
LinkedIn is a professional networking site. What you do on LinkedIn is an extension of what you do and how you network in real life. Your LinkedIn Profile stands in for you to connect with others – colleagues, potential clients, referral sources, the media, etc. It represents you.
When you introduce yourself to people in real life and talk about what you do and who you do it for, you introduce yourself in the first person: “Hi, I’m Jim. I represent entrepreneurs and small business owners who want to protect their brands.” You wouldn’t say, “Jim is an intellectual property lawyer representing small business.”
Although your firm bio is usually written in the third person and much of the information from your law firm website bio can be used in your LinkedIn Profile, you’ll want to change it and make it more conversational for LinkedIn.
In my view, on your firm website, the bio is written in the third person as if the law firm were introducing you to web visitors, while on LinkedIn you’re introducing yourself. (Although solo lawyers may choose to write their website bio in the first person on occasion).
Don’t use legal jargon unless you are sure that your audience (clients, potential clients, referral sources) understands and expects it. Use the language your clients use to describe their needs and the services you provide.
Create a blockbuster first sentence
The Summary can be found in the bottom-most portion of what LinkedIn calls your “introduction card” at the top of your Profile.
As you can see from the image above, when LinkedIn users look at your Profile within LinkedIn, they’ll see only the first 3 lines, usually about one or two sentences. To see the entire Summary, users have to click the “Show more” link. As a result, those introductory lines are extremely important. They should contain the information that is most significant to your audience.
The beginning of your Summary should serve to entice readers to click on the “Show more” link to see the rest of your Summary.
Tell your story
While the first sentence of your Summary should pack a punch, the rest of your Summary is also important. You have plenty of room, since the current character limit for the Summary is 2000 characters.
Although only the first portion of your Summary initially appears to LinkedIn users, when users who are not logged on to LinkedIn click on your Profile, they will see what LinkedIn calls your public profile.
On your public profile, if you choose to show your Summary, viewers will see your entire Summary without any extra clicks required. (Although the public profile does not show any media you’ve added to your Profile.)
When I talk to lawyers about LinkedIn, I equate the Summary to the cover letter that accompanies your resume. The rest of LinkedIn is in a format which is similar to a resume, with categories for your work experience, education, honors and awards, recommendations, etc. In those sections, you don’t have much opportunity to control the format. But the Summary is unique. It is a free-form field that is less constraining than the rest of your Profile. You have much more flexibility here.
Take advantage of the opportunity within the Summary to tell your story – tie all of your experience together. Let your audience know why you became a lawyer, what your professional goals are, who you help, and why your experience and the rest of the information contained in your Profile is important to them.
Break it up
LinkedIn is an online platform, and more and more users are engaging with LinkedIn on a mobile device rather than a desktop or laptop computer. Even relatively short paragraphs can look like huge, intimidating blocks of text online, and especially on a mobile device.
Keep paragraphs short in your Summary to make them easy to read and skim, even on a small screen. Use bullet points to break up the text.
You can copy and paste bullets from another program (like MS Word), or you can use your keyboard to create them right in LinkedIn (get instructions here).
Add media
The Summary, Experience, and Education sections are the only places on your LinkedIn Profile where you can add what LinkedIn calls “rich media.” This includes images, video, articles, presentations, links, and more. When you add rich media to your Summary, it will display below the Summary text, but above the “show more” link.
In today’s visual world, adding media to your Summary can help you stand out from others in your field. When a user clicks on rich media content in your Summary, they can view the content without leaving your LinkedIn Profile. For example, if you add a PowerPoint presentation or video, LinkedIn will open a window on top of your Profile that allows the LinkedIn user to view the complete presentation or video without taking them away from your Profile.
Bonus tip
Here’s one bonus tip that is especially important for lawyers. LinkedIn doesn’t always have an obvious place to include information that might be required by your jurisdiction’s ethical rules, like disclaimers, “Attorney Advertising” notices, or your office address. Your Summary is a place you can include that information. Your Summary could also include information such as the jurisdictions and courts where you are admitted to practice law.
Do you have questions about how to get more out of LinkedIn? Let me know in the comments below!
For more tips on your LinkedIn Summary, see my post, LinkedIn Tip #4: Supercharge Your Summary.
Want more LinkedIn info? Check out my post, Power Up Your LinkedIn Headline (includes my FREE downloadable headline worksheet).