Often overlooked, LinkedIn Banner is an area of a professional profile where a lot of potential lies, which can, when harnessed, revolutionize your career path. Your LinkedIn profile is your online handshake and your banner image at the top of your profile is the first thing that recruiters and prospective employers see in your profile. Your LinkedIn Banner makes the first impression you make as a professional, and can make a strong statement about you that words can’t. A Great LinkedIn Banner Can Help You Get Great Career Opportunities.
Understanding the Power of Visual First Impressions
The human is a visual animal, one that can ingest information 60,000 time more efficiently than reading text. Your LinkedIn Banner is the largest image on your profile, viewed by a recruiter or hiring manager immediately upon clicking into your profile. This is the first impression that they’ll have of you. A generic or substandard banner may leave an impression that you care nothing or that you don’t care about the detail, but a well thought and professional banner will give a message that you’re serious about your job and you know that you need to be well known. This is literally the first impression a recruiter has of your CV, and this may be that difference between them continuing to look at your CV or scroll on to the next one.
Creating Your Brand Using Graphic Communication
Your LinkedIn Banner is a unique opportunity to communicate your professional story without saying a word. Can express your industry, your values and your career aspirations at a single glance. A graphic designer, for example, can have a banner displaying their greatest creations, and a marketing person may have a collage of the metrics of their successful marketing campaign. One option for a financial advisor would be to use a picture of a plant that is growing, to represent wealth and growth. This visual story can help set you apart from the competition and your profile will stick in people’s minds.
The Psychology Behind Effective Banner Design
The knowledge of psychology of color, composition and images can really make a difference in the effectiveness of your LinkedIn Banner. Green is a color of growth and stability, perfect for the financial sector, as well as the health and wellness realm. Red is the colour of energy and passion, apt for the creative and sales job. The balance of the mix should draw the viewer’s attention to your profile picture and the headline. You can establish a brand in the community by adjusting your company logo, tag line and logos that best suit your industry.
Establishing Authority and Expertise
So a funny-picture LinkedIn banner is perfect for your first contact with the ones who might follow you on LinkedIn. You will include pictures of you speaking at conferences, being awarded and/or working with industry leaders, showcasing your engagement in your professional community. People regard the logos of established companies that you have worked with and publications in which you’ve appeared as credible and as social proof. It’s a way of showing a recruiter or potential collaborator that you have a certain skill, and this is a way of demonstrating that you have that skill.
Creating a Careers Banner to fit your career objectives
Your LinkedIn Banner should not only be an indication of your current position, it should be a representation of where you’re going. For those looking to make a career move, your banner might be able to visually convey this information. If you’re in the process of changing your career from a teacher to an Instructional Design, your banner may include some educational, and some technology-related, images. If you’re looking to get a leadership position in your life, a banner that depicts you in a leadership situation or with motivational imagery can mean that you’re ready for a leadership position.
Integrating Keywords and Call to Action
While you want the majority of your LinkedIn Banner to be visual, text can help improve searchability & engagement. A call-to-action is the ideal follow-up detail to ask your audience to either Lets Connect, View My Portfolio or Schedule A Consultation. This phrase thus helps you become a participant in the network you’re looking to watch and it will easily help get more people into your network as well as career.
Real World Examples and Success Stories
Many experts have seen their career take a turn for the better after they’re able to upgrade their LinkedIn Banner. One marketer who transitioned from a standard landscape photo to a photo of her talking at a significant industry event was offered three job offers in the last two months, and called attention to her profile by 40%. One software developer received a call from a tech company for an opportunity to fill a senior position after creating a banner to highlight his personal projects and GitHub contributions.A software developer developed a banner to promote his own projects and contributions to GitHub, and the tech company called him to fill a senior position. As these examples illustrate, it’s a wise use of time to think carefully about your banner, rather than it being a small detail. You can visually share your work, goals and some successes you had to create opportunities that may not come otherwise.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
Now, before we get into the important things you must avoid while creating a quality LinkedIn Banner. The low resolution of them makes them look pixelated, which doesn’t give an impression of professionalism. Overcrowded banners with too much text and/or graphics are distracting and distract from your message. Using an irrelevant image of your brand/your career to the audience makes your audience confused and makes you less credible. If you don’t change your banner from time to time, your profile will seem dull and boring.
Conclusion
The world of today’s job market is cutthroat and each detail of your professional image counts, and your LinkedIn Banner is a valuable, but overlooked tool that can boost your career. Your profile is essentially your personal brand face and will likely be the first thing recruiters, hiring managers and potential partners see. From designing a banner that showcases your career story, to establishing credibility and connecting with your target audience when done right you can make a huge impact on the types of opportunities that will come your way.