LinkedIn for Personal Branding: The Ultimate Guide

LinkedIn means to networking what the invention of the wheel meant to our cave-dwelling forefathers and foremothers. With the wheel, whole new ways of moving ourselves and our goods became possible—the wheelbarrow! The pony cart! The automobile!. With networking, LinkedIn has boosted our capacity to network with other people by a moon shot. And Sandra Long is the apostle of personal branding on LinkedIn. To continue the analogy of our cave-dwelling ancestors, Sandra would be one of the first to build and successfully test-drive a vehicle with four wheels on it. Her book, LinkedIn for Personal Branding, makes that much of a contribution to the networkers of the world.I don’t believe this championing of LinkedIn and Sandra’s book is an overstatement or hyperbole. Consider the number of people you might get to know in a lifetime of work, worship and play. With how many might you build a relationship strong enough that you could ask a favor of them? 1,000? 5,000? If you make one new Level One connection per month on LinkedIn, with a person who has 500 Connections, you arrive at 600 Level Two’s per year. If each of them has 500 connections, the total of Level Ones, Twos and Threes is 300,000. Sandra makes the case that we are all buyers and sellers. Think of the hiring manager, the restaurant owner, the contractor as sellers. Consider the job prospector, the guy looking to take his friend to a good restaurant and the homeowner with the plumbing problem as buyers. Does extending your reach from 1,000 persons to 300,000 persons make a difference when you are looking to buy or looking to sell? Does it matter that you only know each other on line? Sandra quotes a 2016 LinkedIn poll that 65% of people polled agree that the impression you make online is just as important as the one you make in person.Our personal ‘brand’ is everything in ‘real life’. Who am I? What do I look like, think like and dress like? Do I have a sense of humor? All of these matter contribute to the impression I make when I am first introduced to someone at school or at a networking event. And they matter online, where they express my personal brand. LinkedIn expresses my personal brand most powerfully, Sandra says, in the headline I use, the photo of myself attached and the ‘About Section’, where I summarize what I want people to know about me.I spent hours building my LinkedIn profile before I read this book. I wrote my ‘About’ Section in the manner Sandra describes as ‘The Historian’, listing chronologically the events of my career. But LinkedIn for Personal Branding said this most commonly used way of presenting oneself may also be the most boring. Sandra lists five alternate ways to The Historian: The Storyteller, The Weaver, The Themer, The Personality and the Business Leader. I immediately clicked with The Storyteller and rewrote my About Section as a story—the story of how I became who I am today. It’s much more engaging and, I believe, gives people who meet me a much more memorable first impression. Perhaps for you, one of the other ways of writing About fits better. But don’t just routinely describe yourself with a chronological list up of your life events.LinkedIn for Personal Branding became an Amazon #1 Bestseller in 2021. Sandra writes concisely and clearly, with many examples to help the person working on his/her personal brand.I recommend this book as highly as my ancestor did as he shouted to the guy across the campfire from him: ‘I call it a ‘wheel’ . . . It works like this!’

Thank you, Sandra Long! As a small business owner, my work depends on LinkedIn. I'm always looking to improve my presence on LinkedIn, but have found much of the advice I've read before simply explains the different parts of a LI profile, etc. Long goes further! She shares not only the how-to, but the why. I learned from real-life examples and got new strategies to apply to both my personal and business profiles.

This book is a must-read for anyone looking to elevate their brand on LinkedIn and unlock new opportunities. Sandra Long's expert guidance and practical strategies make it relevant for professionals at any career stage. Every chapter is filled with invaluable tips for optimizing one's profile, engaging with your audience, strategically positioning oneself as a thought leader, and so much more. A true gem!

There are a lot of ways you can help further your influence and your exposure in the 21st century, and one of the best ways is through the use of social media. However, some social media sites are harder to figure out than others. This book is dedicated to helping you not only navigate LinkedIn, which is a site that is often misunderstood; it also tells you exactly how to grow your brand through it. This includes things that are easy to do, like how to determine what people can see about you on your page, how to set it up, and even how to make sure that you appear first in search engine results. It shows you how to follow these steps in an easy to read format and even runs you through the basics, like how to take a great picture, with real examples. In fact, there are charts and pictures to show you many of the things that are being discussed, so you won’t get lost. I think this book would be great for anyone that wants to use LinkedIn for what it’s designed to be used for, or has an account and wants to make their page look better or more professional.

“LinkedIn for Personal Branding” is precisely what Sandra Long succeeds at in connecting with all of us who are fortunate to have this road map on our desks. The key word is right there in the book’s title. Personal. It may sound simple but it’s not. Just because we know who we are doesn’t mean we know how to best present ourselves to our respective business communities. Sandra Long takes a macro approach to understanding one’s personal brand. It’s no secret that while it is uniqueness that differentiates us, it is the way we choose to “sell” that specific quality (or qualities) that can create a winning brand. It will only win if it’s real, if it is honest. And this is where Sandra Long becomes a world-class mentor. Her writing is so honest and so intelligent it’s like reading a popular page-turner….except that it’s a LinkedIn manual? No way. It’s exactly what we all needed. Sandra Long helped me to re-approach my personal brand as a voiceover actor. I now have a deeper respect for my accomplishments and can see, of course, that I’m the only one who could have known it. My brand doesn’t feel like something cool that anyone could have chosen from a catalog; instead, it’s an honest reflection of what I’ve accomplished because, well, I’m me. I highly encourage everyone to take a seat in Professor Long’s classroom.

What a powerful book to bump your "digital charisma" in our digital-first world. And where do people receive your first impression? Most likely on LinkedIn, and Sandra does a fantastic job digging into the details for how to make your first impression last (as opposed to being the last impression:-)) Please grab a copy of this book. I'm using it to overhaul my profile top to bottom. I hope you do too!

I did get a few good tips on using LinkedIn that were helpful in personal branding. There is some good information on company branding using LinkedIn that many organizations should get their marketing departments looking into. A easy, quick read.

Sandra Long has written the definitive guide to personal branding on LinkedIn. The author provides an A to Z overview of how to establish and amplify your “best you” persona (what you want to be known for--knowledge, skill and personality) on the world’s biggest professional online community. In her thorough review of all LinkedIn sections, she offers both strategic advice and practical tips to help the reader create their winning profile and establish their presence through content creation and relationship-building. I learned so much about the foundations of branding and networking on LinkedIn. Another highlight is the author’s guidance on the different brand-communicating activities, including posting articles, making mentions, and recommending and endorsing others. My biggest change is to spend more time liking and commenting on the other’s posts, something I only sporadically did because I didn’t see it as a way to express my personal brand. It is. Sandra Long provides fresh perspectives on many new LinkedIn features, including the about essay, featured section and professional portfolio. The author shares and demonstrates how you can communicate your personal brand using this new functionality. Examples of profiles, including the author’s, illustrate the key points and helped me redesign my profile. There is value for everyone in this book, from people looking to create a personal brand, extend the value they provide to their community, build awareness for their services, seek a job or find sales leads. It is a must-have resource if you want to create a professional, consistent, interesting and compelling personal brand on the largest professional online platform. Every chapter will give you ways to communicate your “best you” to achieve your goals. Why not invest in your future now?

good value book about LinkedIn factors to consider and lots of good information good read.

Branding on LinkedIn can be tough! but not so much after you read this book by Sandra Long, its structured very well and has already helped me see positive results in a very short time.

Before read this book, LinkedIn was a black box to me... but with many examples and visual presentations Sandra was able to explain all opportunities and tips of the platform. Superb book.

Ho avuto il piacere di leggere la 1° edizione di questo libro alcuni anni fa. Decisi di seguire Sandra su LinkedIn perchè dalla lettura di questo libro avevo tratto molti insegnamenti e vantaggi. Anche io mi occupo di formazione e consulenza su LinkedIn e cito spesso concetti e insegnamenti durante i miei corsi.5 ragioni Perché dovresti leggere questo libro:1) non è solo un Manuale su come ottimizzare il tuo Profilo LinkedIn, ma è molto di più; è una guida che ti aiuta a capire chi sei, qual è la tua reale essenza e come comunicarla al meglio, senza camuffamenti o manipolazioni di sorta2) il libro segue un approccio analitico, scientifico, accurato, meticoloso; prende in considerazione una casistica molto ampia, non è generico ma accurato3) il libro tratta con attenzione un tema strategico: come farsi trovare ed essere contattato su LinkedIn (in ottica Inbound),ti aiuta a capire come trovare il tuo linguaggio, la tua personal brand voice, il tuo stile narrativo realmente autentico4) Non solo Profilo e Personal branding; nel libro troverai utili suggerimenti per gestire al meglio la tua Pagina LinkedIn.5) nella nuova edizione troverai una sezione molto più espansa su come scrivere su LinkedIn, da dove attingere i contenuti, come scrivere post ingaggianti, come promuoverli etc. Troverai anche suggerimenti per affermare la tua leadership di pensiero.Mi fermo qui, il libro merita davvero di essere letto e di ricevere una bella recensione.