Author: Andrew Dryhurst, Business Associate – Intern

The Startup of You: Effective Tips & Tools to Enhance Your Online Brand

You would be hard pressed to find a more suitable location than LinkedIn Headquarters for the BABC’s most recent Young Professionals Event ‘The Startup of You: Effective Tips & Tools to Enhance Your Online Brand’. Located in Mountain View California, the offices emanate feelings of vibrancy, creativity and success, whilst there is perhaps no better company around from which to receive personal online branding advice!

The high profile speakers at ‘The Startup of You’ were Joseph Gonzalez, LinkedIn Regional Associate and Global Accounts team member, Michael Page Executive Director Nick Powell and Judson Walsh, Career Consultant at Lee Hecht Harrison.

Mr. Gonzalez’s presentation consisted of invaluable advice at getting the most out of one’s LinkedIn page and highlighting how a well curated profile will provide consistent professional improvement. Suggestions from Mr. Gonzalez included deleting all unnecessary distractions from your newsfeed, instead filling it with educational and inspirational business articles, sharing posts with the addition of thought provoking commentary, and posting the aforementioned posts into suitable LinkedIn groups in order to create higher levels of one to one engagement. It was suggested that you spend ten minutes a week developing your network on LinkedIn. The flexibility of LinkedIn to accommodate for the needs of business people regardless of sector makes it the perfect tool to enhance one’s online brand.

Michael Page’s Nick Powell spoke next and provided a warning to all potential employees regarding social media. He advised that people be careful with what they post online as it leaves a permanent footprint and can easily be traced by employers. He also put forward the notion that hard resumes are still appreciated by employers alongside effective LinkedIn profiles. Mr. Powell opined that hard resumes demonstrate further commitment to one’s career, an act which could prove decisive in the mind of a prospective employer. Furthermore Mr. Powell discussed Michael Page’s Career Center, devised to offer useful career management advice on topics such as: interview preparation, application impact maximization, career development and tips to impress interviewers.

Mr. Judson Walsh of Lee Hecht Harrison encouraged job seekers to target specific companies whilst aligning their LinkedIn profiles and personal brand stories. In his opening statement Mr. Walsh stated that “…we are no longer company people… we are loyal to our networks”, in what proved to be a fitting statement to encapsulate the evening’s proceedings. All of our speakers reiterated the benefits of keeping a goal oriented and specific network. The tailored network allows job seekers to head in their desired direction whilst opening multiple windows of opportunity along the way.

The BABC would like to thank event speakers Joseph Gonzalez, Judson Walsh and Nick Powell for their expertise and insight into online branding. Furthermore we would like to thank LinkedIn for their hospitality and sponsorship, as well as Michael Page and Lee Harrison Hecht for their sponsorship. Finally we offer our sincere gratitude to all of the audience members whose interaction and attentiveness further turned the event into a tremendous success!