How to use Linkedin for business

1. Customize Your URL
Your profile information may be indexed by search engines. LinkedIn profiles receive a pretty high rank in Google. Instead of using the default URL, customize your own by using your company’s name. If you’re a small start up, it would be better if you used a really great keyword instead of your actual name. If nobody knows you, they won’t be searching for your name, so you have better chances of ranking higher with a competitive keyword. And don’t forget to select the “Full View” option.

2. Give Your Profile Greater Visibility
To strengthen the visibility of what is essentially your business profile, use your customized LinkedIn URL as a signature when you leave comments in business or industry-specific blogs.

3. Optimize Labels
Don’t forget to add your website, blog, or any other relevant URLs to your profile. LinkedIn allows up to three. In the section labeled “Websites”, most LinkedIn profiles use the labels “My Company”, “My Blog” , “My Portfolio”. You have the option to customize this and add your own text for the label, say your company’s name. Use the drop down menu to “Other” and just add the text. Why is this important? It’s just a detail. Not at all. As search engines crawl the web your name won’t be lost among all the “My Company”s. You won’t get massive amounts of traffic driven to your company’s website from this alone, but it’ll surely help. Once again, for this to work, you must set your public profile settings to “Full View”.

4. Use the Right (Key)Words to Define Yourself
Directly below your name you’ll see a headline. Now, this could be a little tricky. You should use words that clearly define you or your business, but, at the same time use keywords that are relevant to your industry and will allow others to easily find you.

5. Promote Your Blog
With applications like Blog Link and the WordPress App, LinkedIn allows you to sync your blog posts with your LinkedIn profile. This enables you to keep everyone in your network updated and provides greater exposure to your business or name.

6. Use the e-mail signature
LinkedIn offers you the possibility to create a custom e-mail signature in Outlook, Outlook Express, and Mozilla Thunderbird with a short version of your LinkedIn profile and a link to your complete profile.

7. Add a Profile Picture
This is not a SEO-specific strategy, but adding an image to your profile, whether it is your own friendly face, or company logo, will go a long way towards establishing the connections you want. It’ll make your profile look more credible, professional, and serious.