Boost Sales With LinkedIn Prospecting by Adding a LinkedIn Portfolio

Whether you are a sales rep, a consultant or a professional on the lookout for your next venture, LinkedIn is the place to connect with the right people. A comprehensive and regularly updated LinkedIn portfolio goes a long way in attracting future employers or clients.

When scouting for fresh talent, advisors, coaches, consultants and sales reps scan countless profiles to shortlist leads.

While uploading a clean and professional resumé is important, ensuring your LinkedIn profile is active and updated is equally vital. After all, active LinkedIn profiles receive five times more page views than inactive ones!

LinkedIn lets you post professional updates and samples of your work to its “Featured” section. You can use this section to update your followers about what you’re working on and upload a portfolio of relevant work samples & previous accomplishments to show off your skills and experience. This is invaluable if you are trying to find potential clients for your business. 

In this article, we will look at why you should consider using LinkedIn to showcase your portfolio and how to add a portfolio to LinkedIn to increase sales!

Why You Should Use LinkedIn as a Portfolio

First, let’s understand what a LinkedIn portfolio is and how it differs from a resumé and how the core part of a LinkedIn profile functions as a resumé.

Essentially, if a resumé tells people about your professional life, a portfolio shows them. For example, if you create content to demonstrate your expertise in your field, your portfolio will feature on your LinkedIn profile in a thumbnail-carousel format as articles you’ve written that prospective leads can find to learn about your reputation.

A resumé simply mentions any publications or companies that have published your content in a line-item format, with optional, secondary messaging to describe or reference the content itself.

Using LinkedIn to create a profile that hosts all the relevant information a potential client might find valuable can have several advantages. For example, you won’t have to attach a separate link for prospects to check out content that shows off your work. LinkedIn becomes the one-stop shop for leads to find out all about you. 

There are many advantages to using LinkedIn to show off all your skills and achievements. Here are benefits of using LinkedIn as an online portfolio:

Why Add a Portfolio to LinkedIn

1. Show Off What You Do
2. Make Your Resumé Visually Appealing
3. Introduce Multi-Format Options
4. Display Social Proof

• Shows what you do: Resumés do not allow you to demonstrate your skills. They simply create a timeline of your work history and achievements. A portfolio is essentially a collection of your work that you want potential clients to see. This makes it easier for them to believe that you have the skills you claim to have.

• Visually appealing: Reading through a resumé can be routine and boring. They can be particularly off-putting if formatted incorrectly. Recruiters spend an average of only 6–7 seconds reading through a resumé! This means there is a lot you can do to draw more attention to your expertise, which is vital since leads will evaluate your LinkedIn profile as prospective customers the same way hiring managers will as potential employers. Portfolios, because of their visual and demonstrative nature, can appeal to prospects.
• Multi-format options: Portfolios allow you to upload content in a variety of different formats such as images, videos, audio, presentations and documents like Word docs, Excel files, PowerPoint presentations, screenshots, GIFs and more! This makes your profile far more interesting and readable.
• Social proof: Adding a portfolio or items to your Featured section enables you to optimize your LinkedIn profile for more views and engagement. Much like other social platforms, LinkedIn’s algorithm pushes content that is engaged with more actively. Every time you post an article or upload a graphic artwork that gathers likes and comments, your profile becomes more likely to generate views. 

What Is Featured Content on LinkedIn?

Featured content also helps generate social proof for your profile so you can show off your reputation and generate more leads from a strong LinkedIn brand.

Featured content on LinkedIn is a section on LinkedIn profiles to showcase posts and media content in a carousel-like format.

LinkedIn Portfolio vs. LinkedIn Featured Content

Let’s clear the air: a LinkedIn portfolio refers to the Featured section on LinkedIn profiles. Portfolio items are essentially the content you add to the Featured section.

The Featured section displays above your profile’s Activity section.

What type of featured content or portfolio items can you add? You can feature LinkedIn posts or articles you’ve written or shared, plus third-party media like images, documents and webpage links.

Media formats can include .jpg/.jpeg, .png and GIF.

Let’s look at some professional portfolio examples from LinkedIn influencers.

Sam Dunning created his LinkedIn portfolio by adding three external links to his Featured section to promote his business activities: his agency’s website, his podcast and his ebook for download.

And Morgan J. Ingram exhibits as his LinkedIn portfolio two high-performing LinkedIn posts with thumbnail images included plus a subscription link for his newsletter.

Use Social Proof on LinkedIn Portfolios

Social proof is anything that proves to people you are credible and competent at what you do. Adding samples of your work, achievements, recommendations, testimonials and certifications will add to your advantage by lending your voice an edge of integrity and trustworthiness.

By displaying social proof on your LinkedIn profile, you can leverage social selling.

Those looking to network with prospects will find that LinkedIn presents several opportunities to convert personalized interactions into sales. This is called social selling.

By adding relevant portfolio content to your Featured section on LinkedIn, you can attract your target audience to convert into sales. 

Now that we know that using LinkedIn for your portfolio creates invaluable advantages for your professional life, let’s look at how you can build your portfolio on LinkedIn.

How to Turn Your LinkedIn Profile into a Professional Portfolio

Here are the steps on how to add a portfolio to LinkedIn: 

• Log into your LinkedIn profile.
• On your profile, click on “Add Profile Section” and choose “Featured.”

• Here you can choose to add new posts, articles, links, videos and other media.

That’s it, that’s all you have to do to create an online portfolio on LinkedIn! Pretty simple, right? 

What to Add to Your LinkedIn Portfolio to Attract More Prospects

How do you choose what content to add to your portfolio? We can help you curate the right content for your LinkedIn portfolio. Broadly, you should focus on highlighting these three categories:

• Skills: Add any links or documents that highlight your skills. Whether they are design samples, writing samples, presentations or even research and reports, such content can help you stand out from the pack and complement your LinkedIn summary on your portfolio. 
• Achievements: If you have received awards or recommendations, upload relevant certificates or pictures to demonstrate your accreditation and thus your expertise. This shows that you’re a thorough professional.
• Interpersonal relationships: Photographs and videos with your clients or colleagues in your field go a long way in demonstrating your reputation with your target market, your soft skills and your ability to work with others. Testimonials on your LinkedIn profile also show leads that you’re trustworthy.

Types of Things to Show as Part of Your LinkedIn Portfolio

1. Share flattering letters of recommendation that speak to your skills and overall professionalism.
2. Add samples of your very best work to show leads what they can expect from you.
3. Sharing success stories on LinkedIn works! It creates interest in your work and keeps followers engaged in your professional journey—and works great for social selling!
4. Add a video introducing yourself or your brand. Adding a face and voice to a profile can win you brownie points with potential employers or customers.
5. Share parts of a presentation you’ve made or adapt it to share on LinkedIn via SlideShare.
6. Create a new/mock project report, research paper or flowchart to demonstrate your research skills.
7. Share a mind map around a concept to show how your mind works. It can be a great opportunity to demonstrate logical thinking and organizational skills.
8. Showcase your personal website or blog where you share your thoughts and ideas about the field you are in.
9. Create an infographic with all your achievements or awards you’ve won. Engaging with visual content is always easier than textual content.
10. If you’ve created viral content or posts with huge engagement, add them to your Featured section so when you add new people to your network they can see your content is well-read and liked.

Use Portfolios to Get More LinkedIn Leads

Getting your profile in front of the right audience is not always easy. Luckily, with LinkedIn marketing software, you can leverage an intelligent prospecting dashboard with artificial intelligence to optimize your lead generation on LinkedIn.

Updating your LinkedIn portfolio helps with social selling so you can develop a great online reputation and boost your LinkedIn-prospecting success rates to win more sales!