For the longest time, I treated my LinkedIn profile like a resume. When I woke up this summer and realized that it was an SEO-optimized landing page for me, I significantly changed it, which resulted in a doubling of the visitors to my profile.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve always ignored LinkedIn’s “quickie” endorsements (e.g., skill endorsements) and didn’t put much weight into them. With my new focus on what a LinkedIn profile was, I realized that those quickie endorsements really said something about a person. My new profile focused on Mitchell Levy as a speaker, mentor, coach, and thought leader architect; however, the endorsements I had for “public speaking,” “publishing,” and “thought leadership” didn’t reflect those as they were 20, 10, and zero, respectively. Remember your mom telling you that you are the person that others perceive you are? How could my profile say one thing while the endorsements said something else?

The action taken is that I sent out a LinkedIn e-mail to those in my network that I know well and have seen me in those roles. I’ve attached the e-mail below, which also references a blog post one of my friends (Kurt Shaver) wrote about my LinkedIn profile update. Once “public speaking” and “publishing” went to 99+, I substituted a new skill I wanted to reinforce. Take a look at the endorsements on my page now–they truly reinforce the message in my profile of how I can help the visitor. BTW: I’ve had a number of wondering conversations with folks that I haven’t interacted with for years; they were reminded that I was around and wanted to catch up and know more about the services I now offer.

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SUBJECT: I’d like to ask for a quick favor

Mitchell
408-257-3000