the two-minutes it takes to read this will improve your LinkedIn headline

Learn how to write LinkedIn headline that makes your ideal prospects click on your LinkedIn profile.

One of the elements of creating an effective LinkedIn profile starts with optimizing the LinkedIn headline. Most of the LinkedIn profiles that you come across might have a generic headline that tells nothing more than the person’s designation and the organisation they work at. Maybe, this is you!

A well-crafted LinkedIn profile answers 5 questions: what do you want to be known, who do you serve, what problem do you solve, what solution do you offer and what’s your promise.

Andreas Jonsson, the Founder of Shield does this really well. Not just he puts out his designation but also markets his company product bluntly.

5 Questions That you Need to Answer in your LinkedIn Headline

Before writing a LinkedIn headline, you need to do the groundwork and answer these 5 questions in your headline.

1. What do you want to be known as?

What’s one skill that you want to be known for? You might be skilled at 4 different things but what you want to position yourself as matters.

• Are you a Content Writer, a ghostwriter, a copywriter?
• Are you a business coach, a life coach, a career coach?
• Are you an investor or founder?

Be clear about what skill you want to be positioned as. This is one of the crucial first step. Know that you can’t position yourself as an expert in 5 different fields.

For instance,

I’m a content writer & creator. I’m also a calligrapher, a designer and a poet.

When you have these distinct personalities, how would you position yourself? Decide what kind of LinkedIn profile you are trying to build up — Influencer profile or Growth Profile?

INFLUENCER PROFILE is a profile that has several achievements and audience on multiple platforms.

GROWTH PROFILE is the profile that wants to build its audience and create opportunities.

Learnings on growing from 0 to 50,000 followers on LinkedIn

If your profile is Influencer focused, include multiple positioning.

Here are a few examples of Influencer Profiles

Source: Ranveer Allahbadia’s LinkedIn Profile

Source: Jay Shetty’s LinkedIn Profile

If your profile is growth-focused, you must craft a LinkedIn headline that talks directly to your target audience.

Here is am example of Growth Profile LinkedIn headline

Source: Nidhi Kala’s LinkedIn Profile

2. Who do you serve?

Understand who do you want to sell your services to. This is where your ideal prospect knows you are the right person to reach out to.

Your headline should not just showcase your expertise but also who do you serve. You can’t serve everyone. Be specific in writing your headline.

Let’s say,

I’m a Content Writer helping startups and businesses create content

Doesn’t this appear too vague?

Now let’s tweak it for our audience.

I’m a Content Writer helping coaches and entrepreneurs build their audience on LinkedIn

How about this? Better than the first one, right?

That’s the power of being specific — you know who you are taking to and your prospect knows you are the right person for them.

3. What problem does your target audience struggle with?

Have you researched about your target audience? Have you identified what are their pain points? A clear research on your target audience’s persona will help you craft a direct and responsive headline.

If you are a Life Coach helping freelancers, identify how your services can help them.

• Can you help them in setting goals?
• Can you help them in transitioning their mindset to charge more?
• Can you help them build confidence to charge more, sell more and market themselves confidently?

Research the areas your services can help your target audience. And then craft a headline.

Here, the LinkedIn headline would say:

I help freelancers achieve financial freedom by rebooting their mindset

4. What’s the solution?

Once you are ready with your half-baked headline, you can beautify it with the perfect solution that you have to offer.

This solution could be:

• your services
• outcome of your services

You can play with any of the two options to craft the headline.

In case of the above shared example, if we inject our solution, the headline will look something like this:

Headline 1: I help freelancers achieve financial freedom by rebooting their mindset to sell confidently.

Headline 2: I help freelancers achieve financial freedom by rebooting their mindset to sell confidently with 1:1 coaching

5. What’s your Promise?

A promise is the outcome that you commit to your target audience through your headline. This promise is usually done as numbers.

For example,

3 days, 3 weeks, 3 months, 30%.

Not only this makes your headline clear but also clarifies on the expectations the target audience can have.

Having a promise or result in your headline is not mandatory but makes your headline succinct.

Let’s rework on our previous example of the life coach.

I help freelancers achieve financial freedom by rebooting their mindset to sell confidently in 90 days.

Here are a few more examples for clarity.

For Writers:

I help coaches and content creators build their influence on LinkedIn in 24 weeks.

For Artists:

I create memories for your loved ones with bespoke calligraphy gifts in 72 hours.

While numbers add a solid promise to your headline, it is not always important you have it.

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Want to learn how to grow on LinkedIn? Here’s the answer to your HOW.

Let’s breakdown a few LinkedIn headline to understand more about crafting a LinkedIn headline.

For Writers: Content Writer I help coaches and and content creators build their influence on LinkedIn in 90 days.

Breakdown

Power Word: help

Target Audience: Coaches & Content Creators

Solution: Build their influence on LinkedIn

Promise: 90 days

For Coaches: Life Coach I help freelancers achieve financial freedom by rebooting their mindset to sell confidently with 1:1 coaching.

Breakdown

Main Keyword: Life Coach

Power Word: help

Target Audience: Freelancers

Problem: Financial freedom

Solution: rebooting mindset. sell confidently, 1:1 coaching

For Artists: I create memories for your loved ones with bespoke calligraphy gifts in 72 hours.

Breakdown:

Power Word: create memories

Target Audience: People and their loved ones

Solution: Bespoke calligraphy gifts

Promise: 72 hours

If you notice the breakdown of each headline closely, you’ll notice that each headline uses the combination of at least 4 questions that make the foundation of the headline.

There is no hard rule to use every question to craft your headline.

But make sure you use the relevant questions to craft the headline.

The secret sauce to creating your LinkedIn headline..

The secret sauce to writing a headline is simple.

Here’s the sweet secret formula:

Main Keyword + I {power words} {pain point} {target audience} {action} {solution} {offer}{promise}

1. What do you want to be known as?

2. Who do you serve?

3. What problem does your target audience struggle with?

4. What’s the solution?

5. What’s your promise?

When you merge these 5 questions together, you get your secret LinkedIn headline formula which is no SECRET!

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