We all know about LinkedIn, but do most of us know how to write an article on Linkedln? Perhaps not! It’s a professional networking site that connects all of us. People in our industry that we did not know before can suddenly become friends and business partners. The importance of this platform becomes more important every day. One of the ways to stand out on LinkedIn is articles. But how do you write that first article? Here are few tips to follow:
Pick a Topic that is Relevant in Your Industry
You need to understand who will be reading this article. You need to understand who will be reading this article and do you need a call to action. I think the first article is simply about getting yourself familiar with writing. Putting yourself out there is not a trivial thing.
Start with an article that you would want to read. For instance you want to write on how to do business with Federal Government, you need to consider few things. To help you identify the article, you can trigger words by finding current news or asking yourself some questions.
Find Current News
- Go to your favorite search engine. Mine is https://google.com
- In the search engine, type your topic. For this example, I will use “data science.” Start the search.
- At the top are listed several options (All, News, Images, Books, Videos). Click on “”
- Is there a topic that you could write about?
As yourself some questions
The following options come directly from https://www.linkedin.com/help/linkedin/answer/47537/tips-for-writing-articles-on-linkedin?lang=en
- What concrete advice would you give to someone hoping to enter your field?
- How it will (or should) look in 5, 10, or 15 years and how will it get there?
- The biggest problem your industry needs to solve?
- The most essential skill for your job or at your company, and why?
- How has your job, profession, or industry changed since you started?
- What else would you do if you started all over again and why?
- How did you get your start in your profession?
- What advice do you have for career advancement?
- What challenges do you see for the future of your profession?
Using the publishing menu dropdown on the upper left-hand corner to manage your articles, you can see your drafts, published articles, and statistics about who is engaging with your audience.
You can add multimedia items to your articles like images, videos, or links by clicking the “Add Multimedia” icon. You cannot copy and paste; just tap on the above said icon.
Outline the article, create a compelling title, write a couple of paragraphs, and introduce them with section headings. Put your signature information and polish off your article with multimedia links, images, and hashtags. Instructions for each of these items follows.
The Layout of the Article
Do not stress yourself out on your first article. Keep in mind you can say everything you need to say in about 300-500 words.
Title of the Article
The title should reflect an understanding of your article. You can practice with titles on this title generator I found. https://seopressor.com/blog-title-generator/
Some examples of starting Titles are with words like the following:
- The Ultimate Guide to…
- XX Number of Items you Need to know.
- The Future of …
- How to Start …
- XX Mistakes I learned while …
Section Headings
Headings should be placed to summarize the content. The headings allow the reader to navigate to a section they are interested in quickly.
Signature
This article was written by <<NAME>>, who is the founder of <<COMPANY>> (company website) For further information, please connect with <<FIRST NAME>> on <<LINKEDIN PROFILE URL>> or contact him/her at <<PHONE>>. Please reach out should you have any questions.
Create Images
Utilize Photoshop or Canva (https://www.canva.com/). Create a cover photo. Make sure the stock photo is not copyrighted. You can utilize Google to search for images that can be legally used.
Image Sizes
The image size recommended for the cover photo is 2000 px (width) x 600 px (height). The size limitation is 10 mb.
Finding Images that are Not Copyrighted.
- Using Chrome, Navigate to Google.
- Enter the SEO Focus Key Phrase and search
- Click the Images tab
- Find an image you like. Click on it. Right-click and say open image in the new tab.
- Copy the URL.
- Go Back to the article and use the URL to insert the image.
- Do this at least twice. Two Images.
Hashtags
You should add hashtags to your article to help the article be found in the sea of LinkedIn articles. The hashtags should be relevant to your industry.
What are Hashtags?
A hashtag is a combination of letters, words, numbers, or phrases preceded by the # symbol (e.g., #DataScience). Hashtags are used to categorize content into what I call buckets. Because of this categorization the article on Linkedln will be more discoverable. Hashtags can be uppercase, lowercase, or mixed case.
Hashtags are clickable. When a hashtag is clicked, a page with all the identified content in the hashtag category appears.
Rules for Hashtags
- Include the “#” symbol before the word or phrase.
- Eliminate spaces and punctuation in hashtags.
- Choose your hashtags wisely. Even though there is no limit, I find 20 hashtags distracting.
Where do I find Hashtags?
- https://hashtagify.me/
- https://www.instagram.com/
- Login, and in the search, bar enter your #hashtag. All related hashtag suggestions will come up.
- https://twitter.com/
- Login on the right-hand side of the page you will see “What’s Happening.” Utilize those hashtags if you can.
To get noticed on LinkedIn helps by being the expert in your field. An article is an excellent start on letting other people know about you and your business.
