A previous blog I wrote, has received a lot of comments and shares on the social media scene, and I love the fact that it has. The whole idea of spending my time writing these blogs is to inform and provoke conversation and in some small way, make a contribution to your business for the better.

I am a member of several online groups and forums that I regularly pop into and join in the conversation, or occasionally I will add a post if I feel it is important enough. As a result of a conversation that was had in one of these networks, a group member mentioned something that sparked the idea for this blog post. Bobbi Jo Woods said, “I figure it’s really dependent upon your past work experience, and frankly, mine shows quite a lot of actual hands-on administrative/clerical work done in real offices, so that’s highly relevant and speaks toward my abilities.” Bobbi Jo was referring to this post ‘Don’t hire me, partner with me!‘ and in particular, Virtual Assistants supplying prospective clients’ with a resume.

This got me thinking, here I am telling Virtual Assistants that they should NOT be handing over a resume, and I didn’t provide a solution for that.  Well, thanks to Bobbi Jo, here is my solution to the Virtual Assistant resume issue that it seems I and many of us have.

For me, the solution stares me right in the face and it is so obvious, but then again, the obvious is not often seen until it’s too late.

When you start any home based business, until you get your first client, how can you show your professionalism, your abilities and your overall experience? You use Linkedin and you have a website, but for the purpose of this post, we are going to look at Linkedin, we will have a blog on websites later.

When you want to find out more about a person, where is the first place you look? For me, it’s Linkedin. I conduct a search and check out their profile, their recommendations and their testimonials. Linkedin is a Business networking site and if you’re serious about your business, in my view, you should have a ‘complete’ profile. If you don’t have a complete profile, I won’t pay you the time of day, harsh, but it’s true.

Here is what I look for in a Linkedin Profile and it doesn’t matter who I am looking for, a Virtual Assistant, a small business, or a corporate person. I expect to find:

  1. A photo of you not your business logo
  2. Your business details
  3. Your summary should be about your business and how you can help clients
  4. Links to your website, blog, or specific pages you want to share
  5. Your past employers and recommendations
  6. Any publications you may have written, Books, eBooks, white papers
  7. I want to see what skills you have to offer. Keep them updated, remove endorsements from people whom you don’t know
  8. Links to your social media platforms
  9. The human you; I’m looking to see any volunteer / causes
  10. An active profile is a must, this lets me know you are serious about your business

A profile created and forgotten about is useless, it only serves to harm your business. If I had a dollar for every time someone said to me, ‘I created a profile years ago but have done nothing with it, and I’m struggling for clients’. ‘Shoot me now’ … but they will spend hours on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Google + and many of the other platforms. To be honest I think it scares some people; LinkedIn makes you accountable to you, your business and your brand. For me, Linkedin is my primary. It’s the platform that my client’s hang out on, it’s the one they value for connecting, it’s where I need to be to build my business, my brand and forge relationships. Everyone loves a referral.

Do you have a Linkedin profile? Is it complete? If you don’t have a profile, click here to create one.

I’d love to read your thoughts. Please leave a comment below.