Mastering LinkedIn Visibility with Paula James

Have you ever wondered why some professionals get approached by recruiters on LinkedIn while others apply to hundreds of positions without response? The difference isn't necessarily skill or experience—it's strategic visibility.

In this illuminating conversation, movement specialist and LinkedIn visibility expert Paula James reveals the transformative power of a well-crafted LinkedIn presence. Drawing from her experience helping neurodivergent professionals and entrepreneurs showcase their value, Paula breaks down exactly how to shift from being overlooked to being sought after.

The secret lies not in endless credential-listing, but in articulating the problems you solve for your audience. "Nobody cares about who you are or what you do," Paula explains. "They want to know what's in it for them." This fundamental shift in perspective—leading with benefits rather than background—can dramatically change how recruiters and potential clients perceive your value.

Paula provides a practical roadmap for LinkedIn optimization, from leveraging AI tools to identify your audience's pain points to establishing a consistent brand archetype that builds trust. She details exactly how to structure your profile elements—banner, headline, about section, and featured posts—to maximize impact and engagement. For those currently employed but sensing workplace instability, Paula offers LinkedIn as a form of professional insurance—building visibility before you need it.

Whether you're job hunting, building a consulting business, or simply wanting to expand your professional network, this episode delivers actionable strategies to transform your LinkedIn presence from forgettable to remarkable. Ready to stop being invisible and start attracting opportunities? This conversation is your starting point.

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to LinkedIn Visibility Expert
• 6:16 Using AI Tools for Profile Creation
• 16:58 Identifying Your Audience's Pain Points
• 29:36 Creating a Compelling Brand Archetype
• 36:23 Content Strategy and Featured Posts
• 42:35 Connection Building and Engagement Tactics
• 47:58 Final Tips and LinkedIn Package Offerings

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Hello and welcome back to the next episode of Overcome Yourself, the podcast. As you know, my name is Nicole and I'm so excited to bring back, well, one of my business besties. For sure, she's one of my favorite people. We have heard from her before, and you guys already know that I've got all this stuff going on with my back and Paula is a lifesaver. I've got all this stuff going on with my back and Paula is a lifesaver, but she's also been working on some really cool stuff in LinkedIn and I was like I think my audience would love to hear more about how to stand out on LinkedIn, and so I'm going to go ahead and let her take it away. As you guys know, this is Paula James, and so, paula, please go ahead and reintroduce yourself and let us know who you are and who you're helping.

Speaker 2: 0:48

Thank you so much, nicole. It's just a delight to be here with you again and be on your podcast again. So I'm a movement specialist and I keep finding new like a river. I keep finding new bends in my own journey and in my own offerings. And I have ADHD and I have been learning a lot in the last few years about how that is not just like something on the side.

Speaker 2: 1:19

Oh, and then I have this little glitch about time blindness, but it's actually a really embodied experience. So you're like, how you show up in the world is not separate from having something like a neurodivergent situation, and as I've been learning how to present myself online, I've also been noticing that a lot of really high quality people are not really showing up to be visible. And so another little bend in the river, and especially thinking about neurodivergent folks, is that they're really good at what they do and they're not necessarily so good at letting the world know what they do and what they're good at and how they can help. And so I started offering help to a few people on polishing up their LinkedIn presence and they had a shift from I'm applying to hundreds of jobs and I'm not even getting past the AI bots that read the resumes to. Oh, I implemented the changes you recommended in my LinkedIn profile and now recruiters are contacting me and I'm on the short list to be interviewed by executives in companies, and so they have transformed how they're showing up and people are noticing and opportunities are starting to open for them.

Speaker 2: 2:38

So what I wanted to share with your, your audience, is a little bit about how to show up, how to be visible, and I am now offering LinkedIn visibility packages, and we can talk about those more at the end. So if you listen to all this and you think, oh, that's just too much work, I wish somebody would do that for me. I can, and in case you want to know how you could do this yourself, or what are some things that especially people who are neurodivergent might want to start implementing a few little pieces before they jump in and make a big change, and I completely get that. So I'd like to just share a little bit of what I've been noticing about what matters in how you show up online, and especially how you show up on LinkedIn, and then some things that your viewers and listeners can start doing on their own.

Speaker 1: 3:39

I love that that is so powerful, is so powerful, and I know just how powerful it is because, if you want an example of some of the work that Paula has done, you can go check out my LinkedIn, because she helped me put it all together, because I was like Paula, I know what to do.

Speaker 1: 3:54

I like, I love it. But it's sometimes, like she said, it's hard to see what my coach says, it's hard to see the label when you're in of your own bottle, right, because, like, you're on the inside of the bottle, and also I just did not have the time. I was doing a bunch of other things and I was like Paula, please take it away. And so I've also recommended her to a bunch of people, and so that's why she's here is because I'm like, yes, paula, this is so amazingly helpful, so let's dive in, tell me, because they don't want to hear me talk about how awesome you are, although you are. They want to hear how do I improve my LinkedIn? So can you talk to us a little bit about the tools that you use? That might be helpful to the audience.

Speaker 2: 4:34

Yes, and one tool that I'm finding that I just love working with is AI. Using an AI tool, claude, is one of my favorites. I'm also really enjoying working with ChatGPT. There are free versions of both of those, and so there are. Even if you're on a tight budget, even if you just want to experiment a little bit, you don't have to make a commitment. You don't have to make a big investment to get started, and one of the reasons that I love working with the AI so much one of my teachers, ruthie Alon, put it this way. She said look, humans are social beings. Nobody learns how to walk alone. Nobody learns how to speak their native language alone. Nobody learns how to eat alone.

Speaker 2: 5:23

All the things that really are important in your life, you learned in connection with other people, and so if you are feeling I have to write a new about section and I hate this and I don't know what to say, well, it's not necessarily the thing to do alone. And if you have a coach like Nicole, if you have some colleagues, I hate the accountability partner term, because then it feels like shame and blame what did you fail to do this week? And let me scold you for it. But if you have someone that you can have conversations with, that can help. And you can have conversations with an AI tool, and so for me, when I'm having a hard time kind of getting started or I'm dreading working on a project, I can sit down with an AI tool and begin conversationally to chat back and forth about it. And because the AI tool is so good at extracting patterns and distilling out key points, it moves things forward. And if I don't really fully have the executive function to do all of that, I have the content, knowledge, I have the skill base that the AI doesn't, and so we can work together and it can do some of that executive function for me.

Speaker 2: 6:41

So, to get started, the thing that I see a lot of people not doing on LinkedIn is just being visible, and you don't. It's a little bit different than Facebook, which is a little more social. Look what I had for breakfast, look where I went out to drinks with a friend. Right, linkedin is not that you want to think about what problems do you solve. You want to think about what problems do you solve and you, really, to be effective, you want to think about what problems matter to your audience, and so then you need to identify who is your audience. For some entrepreneurs, their audience on LinkedIn might actually be potential customers and clients.

Speaker 2: 7:34

For people that are working like, for example, as a project manager interacting with C-suite executives CEOs are not necessarily surfing around LinkedIn reading posts by random people, but recruiters are, and so one of my LinkedIn package clients is a project manager, and what she found right she's in her late 50s is her generation. Well, you needed to have a good resume and you needed to have good references, and then you interview well and you get jobs. But what she's finding now, in 2025, is that recruiters are asking her well, what's the link to your personal website? She's like why would I have a website? So you want to be showing up on LinkedIn in a way that people can have a sense, for example, with a project manager.

Speaker 2: 8:22

What is your management philosophy? What are some examples of problem situations that you turned around? How do you work with teams? They want to be able to look at your profile and to look at your posts and get a sense of who you are as a person and what problems you solve in the workplace. So you need to identify what are the problems, that who's my audience and what are the problems that matter to my audience? Is that making sense so far?

Speaker 1: 8:54

Yes, and I think it's really cool because when we talk about who's your audience, right, we're usually talking to entrepreneurs and they're working on like social media. They're working on like social media. They're working on sales. Who's your audience? Who's your audience? But in this case, you are also speaking to people who are not entrepreneurs, who might have jobs and their audience learning to identify. Well, who am I speaking to first? I think it brings some clarity to who's my audience, if any entrepreneurs are struggling with that, and for someone who's working audience, of any entrepreneurs are struggling with that, and for someone who's working in a job. Well, who, who do? Whose attention do I need to get to get my dream job Right?

Speaker 2: 9:32

And that's what you're writing to. It might be a recruiter, it might be a hiring manager. It might be that you want to expand your network in your field, your network in your field. So if you're an electrical engineer who manages a lab in a company, you might want to get to know other people that are working for tech startups or that are in companies that are large enough to have a lab that's being used by engineers who need somebody to supervise equipment and make sure that tool support is available and make sure that international shipping is handled all those things. So if those other engineers are part of your audience, you want to be posting things that will be interesting to them and in your posts, you want to be demonstrating that you understand the problems they have and that you can help solve those problems. So you can use AI to help you figure out what are the problems that you're. So I think probably you are going to need to identify who your audience is, and then you might open up a chat window with an AI tool and say I'd like you to function as you. So you can. You can ask, you can ask the AI to role play with you. You can tell it. Your role is that you are a hiring manager of a company that's this size in this industry and you have had this much turnover right. You can give it a little bit. You don't have to go deep into the biography, but you can give it some parameters and then ask that individual right, your role playing, ask that sort of avatar what are some of the common problems that you run into in your position? Or what sort of problems is your company running into? And, for example, if you're a lab manager, you would ask in relation to tool support and keeping equipment organized, if you're a project manager, in relation to getting things done on time, right, like, give it a little direction and it is probably going to come back with a very clear, well-organized list of problems that a person in that role faces. And then one of the things that I've learned from you and then I can accelerate a lot with AI is you ask it okay, before these problems get solved, what do you think about going to work every day, or the state of the business, or what do you think about the quality of your own life? And how do you feel about how the business is doing? How do you feel about the quality of your own life and what things are you doing, what actions are you taking. And the avatar can say things like well, I think that this business is not doing as well as it could and I think that we're losing a lot of opportunities, and I feel frustrated and I feel overwhelmed and I feel a little anxious.

Speaker 2: 12:52

Right, it will give you what are some of the thoughts, feelings and actions of a person who's in that role that you asked it to play their thoughts, their emotions, what they're already doing around the situation that they're in right now. And those are going to be some of the pain points that you can address in your post. So you can ask the AI to help you articulate those. And then you can say well, I solve all those problems. And so if that was taken off the plate of things you needed to do now, how do you think about going into work every day? What do you think about your own life, how do you feel what kinds of things are possible for you to do right now? And then that gives you the sense of that Sometimes I hear folks talk about well, you don't so much want to talk about the journey, you want to talk about where people are and pleasure Island right when are you?

Speaker 2: 14:00

The destination that you can get them to. So what are they thinking and feeling and doing when those problems are resolved? And that gives you a sense of that sort of promised land that you can speak about. Well, I can help you get to here and it will give you a little bit of sense of the value that has for them. I would, of course, encourage you to confirm this with real, live humans, but you can use the AI to really give you a running start, to get some momentum going, to get some questions together, to get some content ideas together. Is this making sense? So far.

Speaker 1: 14:37

Yes, this is a master class in creating content. Okay, guys, like, don't miss it. Go back, listen to what paula said again, and what's really cool is I taught her this, and so the fact that she is reiterating it to me and she's using it, that that tells me that not only is she did she learn it, but she's implementing it and it's working because she's able to repeat it back to me how I taught it to her, right, um, and so it's a big deal because this is what gets, this is how you get into, is what my coach taught me. Um, so these are like the behind the scenes content secrets, but it really gets into the heart of that person that you're an entrepreneur. If you maybe you're a speaker and you're looking to speak with corporations, well, how do you get found by those corporations?

Speaker 1: 15:40

Exactly what paula's teaching. You speak to them where they're looking for you and you answer their questions. How do you answer their questions? Paula just just gave us the answer, like she just gave us. The master class, walked us through. So go back and listen to it again. So they're going to listen to that again. Yes, yeah.

Speaker 2: 15:58

So you have the list of problems that that you ask the AI to help you create, right, and this is where, for me, this kind of stuff is easy to get started, even if I'm not feeling like I really want to show up online today. Right, like I can sit down and ask an AI tool. Okay, pretend that you're so-and-so, and then we start talking back and forth. What sort of problems are you having? Well, now I actually have a whole bunch of raw material for content to work from, so I'm not looking at a blank screen. I'm looking at a bunch of really good information that I could pull into order. So it's not. I know some people haven't worked with AI and have reservations about it based on environment and distribution of resources, and I respect all that and some people have reservations about AI based on, well, I don't. It's not. It's sort of cheating to ask the AI to write things for me. Well, okay, but that's not what we're doing here. Right? We're asking the large language model to help us identify patterns in what needs are in the marketplace and identify patterns in how people think and feel and behave before and after their problems get solved, so that you're using the AI to help cut down on your research time. And so you take a look at the list of problems that your ideal audience is experiencing and then you need to decide well, which of those problems are you able to solve? And then you want to lead. When you're writing your about section, when you're writing your profile headline, your banner, your posts, you want to lead with the benefit to the audience.

Speaker 2: 17:50

People who are dealing with hiring right now are receiving so many job applications from so many many people that if you just list out the education that you have and the job experience that you have, that's not going to help you stand out as someone who can solve their problem right. They're getting hundreds and hundreds of applications from other people who also have education and experience. What you want to do, what I have the way I've heard it phrased is that what gives you credibility as an authority, which makes you the go-to expert, is not the list of credentials that you have. Authority which makes you the go-to expert is not the list of credentials that you have, but how well you can articulate people's problems in the same way that they articulate it, and so, if you use their language to describe what's frustrating, what is difficult, what is painful about their current situation. They're likely to say, oh, she understands me, oh, she knows exactly what I'm dealing with, and if she knows, and if she's able to listen, she really understands and then she can help me move out of this.

Speaker 2: 19:06

And so it's a question of can you show up understanding what challenges other people have and can you speak to those challenges and resolving those challenges before you talk about who you are and what you do?

Speaker 2: 19:28

So you don't want to start with I am a project manager. You want to start with, maybe, a frustration that they have about projects that the team falls apart or they don't happen on time or on budget, and you talk about well, I can you talk about driving efficiency or improving yields by 10 to 20% by cutting away waste, and then you say and I'm the one who can do that, so you want nobody as wonderful as you are. Nobody who doesn't know you, actually cares about who you are or what you do. They want to know what's in it for them, and so you want to lead with here's what's in it for you. Here's a problem Either you can lead with a hook around their pain point or you can lead with a hook around. Imagine being on the other side of that pain point and then you link yourself as the person who can help them make that transition.

Speaker 1: 20:36

Yes, and that's really important because you know, like the bro marketing tells us, it's all about the pain point.

Speaker 1: 20:43

Open up that wound, leave it just like hurting, like throw some salt in it. If you can Make sure that thing is hurting so that they're like I need you and leave it like that, right. But then if we go to the opposite end, we're gaslighting our audience into saying there's no problems, like problems don't exist, like you have no pain at all. And that's not true, because they are in pain, like if they need to make more money, if their body hurts, if they lost their job, there's a pain there, right. But what we don't have to do is stay in that pain point. We don't have to throw salt on it. You can be like hey, you know what you can like, throw a bandaid on it and it'll feel better. And I can show you where you can get the best band-aids, you know, just for the cut example. So I don't want you to get scared when Paula's talking about pain points, because we're not talking about opening up those pain points and leaving them open.

Speaker 2: 21:33

We're talking about addressing the reality like this sucks, but I have a solution right, and and you want to show that you understand that it's frustrating that they're losing money, that they're losing opportunities, and and you want to show that there's a way beyond that right, so you're. It's not so much opening the wound and pouring salt in it, as I get it that this is. You're showing that you understand and you're showing that you can help. And so, then, it's not so much leading with I am a project manager who has a lot of experience doing great things it's more get your projects done on time and on budget and have your teams without burning out your team, so that, because turnover is really expensive for companies, right, Interviewing new people, onboarding them, getting them trained up to replace the person who left, is a big deal. So if they can finish a project on time, on budget and they're not burning out people driving them away, needing to replace them, then they're ready to start the next project with an experienced crew that already knows how to work together. So you lead with like I understand that not finishing on time is a problem, Not finishing on budget is a problem. Losing long-term employees is a problem. Not finishing on budget is a problem, losing long-term employees is a problem. So then you could even just offer it right up as that solution, right? Imagine getting your projects done on time, on budget, with your team fully resourced and supported, so that they stick around, and then you connect yourself as well. That's what I do. I'm the person who who brings this kind of perspective. So you're not you're not opening wounds, pouring salt in, but you are understanding the problems, you are presenting solutions and you're tying yourself to the solution and also to the benefit to them. Revenue goes up, more opportunities, all, all all the good things. Revenue goes up, more opportunities, all the good things, right, that come with you. And you don't want to try to do everything in every profile, in every post. So think about who your audience is and what really matters to them, and then generate a profile headline and about section, and you can have some great ideas that didn't make the cut into that short about section. And you can create content pillars and you can use the AI to help you identify this. Well, what are some content pillars, then, for my posts when I do a link? So, again, if all this is sounding like, oh, this is a lot of work, I totally know it is, and that's one of the things that I do for people in with my LinkedIn packages is I like to have two interviews with them. We do one.

Speaker 2: 24:52

That's a brand archetype, a brand character like who are you? What is the character of your problem-solving person in the office? Like, who are you when you show up at the office? Not in your whole life, you might be different to your kids or your dog, or when you're out fishing, but when you come into the office, who are you? What are you bringing in? And so for me, I'm a wayfinder, even if I am. So, if I'm helping people with movement, I'm helping them find a way to be more comfortable and reduce pain and be more capable of doing things. With the LinkedIn profiles, I'm helping people find a way to show up online. So I do a lot of this sort of helping people map a way to get from where they are to where they'd like to be.

Speaker 2: 25:42

I did a LinkedIn profile for someone recently and her brand character is the strategic fixer and efficiency mentor, and so she goes in and really finds ways to solve problems and set up an architecture within the systems of the company so that things happen more efficiently and people are really supported. So we start with, kind of who are you as a character in the office place? And then we have another call. That's just an interview and I'll ask you questions about what you do and how you do it and what the results are, and then you go away. And then go away and I work and I come back to you and I say here are three different versions of a profile for you. I worked with someone recently and we did one. I created one profile for her that was about how she can reduce costs for an organization so they are they're losing less money in their regular processes. And I did another profile about how she makes things more efficient so it frees up the revenue generating team. They're not spending five hours a week in meetings. They can spend that time prospecting for clients or reaching out to people so they can be generating more sales. And then we did another one about how she has worked in multiple industries, different fields, and she's great at spotting patterns across those, and so she can bring in solutions that worked in this industry over to yours and help move things forward.

Speaker 2: 27:19

Depending on who you're reaching out to in the social media world of LinkedIn, you might want to have one kind of focus more than another, or you might try one and see what kind of responses you get, and then try another one for a month and see how people are responding to you.

Speaker 2: 27:38

So this is work and I'm giving you the steps here so you can do it on your own, and if it sounds like I'm too busy, I just want to give it to somebody else. I can do that. So you want to have a focus to your profile and then some of those other things that maybe didn't make it into the about section of the profile headline might be great content pillars and what I do when in the top small percentage of people who are on LinkedIn and they can rotate among those content pillars. Well, here's what I do for connecting with clients, here's what I do for resolving communication gaps in the right. You can alternate among those different content pillars and if somebody like a recruiter or a hiring manager looks at your profile and then looks at your posts, they'll see oh well, good at working with clients, good at working with data, good at improving efficient communication, right, Like they'll get a sense of who you are and what problems you solve amazing.

Speaker 1: 28:54

So far, so good. Yes, okay, so let's do like a quick recap. So if you wanted to do this on your own, you would go into your chat gpt and you'd be like, hey, let's do a brand archetype analysis for me, ask me some questions, and then it's going to ask you some questions and then you get to type them all out, spend some time with your GPT. Then you can ask your GPT to ask you some questions about what you do. So you might have to if you're using a free version, you might have to come back another day and have another conversation because of the limits, right, but then ask have it, ask you questions, right, and then you can be like, oh well, this is what I do in my job. They couldn't survive without me.

Speaker 1: 29:37

I do the job of three people, like all the good stuff, right, that we do at our work, and then have it. You know, make sure it asks you all of those questions and you answer them. It's going to take you a while. Type them all out and let it know and then, with that information knowing the brand archetypepe, knowing the information, like the interview, right, and you already have your g, paula, you have your gpt set up, um, to do this already for you. But if you want to do it on your own, like we're literally letting you know all the steps, and then you make the header, which is the picture that goes behind your profile picture, and you make sure they have a nice profile picture set up, then we do the intro.

Speaker 2: 30:24

Before you start creating that. So, yes, you could absolutely use ChatGPT to help you identify your brand archetype and if you need a little clarity in your prompting there, it comes from the work of Carl Jung and 12 archetypes, and then people in the world of branding are looking at 12 brand archetypes, and so the idea is, if you try to show up one day as a very caring, loving person and another day as an expert, and another day as an authority who gives everybody orders, people are not gonna know who you are and they're not going to trust you because you're a different person every time. And if you identify your brand archetype, your brand character, and then you consistently show up, in one way you're going to repel the people. If you're a ruler type, you're going to repel the people who don't want to be told what to do, but the people who are like, oh my God, this is chaos here. We really need somebody to come in and tell us what to do. We're going to say, yes, this is who we need, right? So not everybody is going to want to hang out with your brand archetype, which is perfect. You want the people who want you.

Speaker 2: 31:30

But then, before you start writing, I would do that other piece of well, who's your audience? Yes, and what does your audience think and feel and what are they doing? What? What problems do they have and what are they thinking, what are they feeling, what are they doing before those problems are solved? And if those problems could be solved right now, then what are they thinking, feeling and doing now on the other side of those problems and what are they thinking, feeling and doing now on the other side of those problems? And then you can ask the AI to help and generate. If you want to do most of the writing, you can still ask the AI to generate an outline for an about section. You can ask it to suggest some profile headlines and some headline and subheadlines for banners. It to suggest some profile headlines and some headline and sub headlines for banners. But really I would leverage the power of the large language model to recognize patterns, to distill out key points, and that's going to save you a lot of time.

Speaker 2: 32:30

I frequently I still am working on training my AI to lead with benefits. So I'll have an opportunity to speak on a podcast and I'll need a hundred word bio and I'll ask it to generate one for me, because I have a whole lot of information about me in the knowledge base and it says Paula James has been teaching for 20 years and she's trained in all of these things. And I'm like nobody cares about that, right? So it leads with all that stuff and then down somewhere at the bottom it talks about the benefits. And so I take what it wrote and I flip it and I lead with the benefits and somewhere down near the bottom I said and she's been doing this for 20 plus years, and then I give it back to the AI, gives you as a first draft.

Speaker 2: 33:21

But here's also what I love about working with the AI. It's like it gives me a promotion. I'm not the one writing a shitty first draft, I'm the editor who looks at the shitty first draft and says, oh no, we can't use this, but you've got a few good ideas in here. So either I'll take those good ideas and work with them or I'll ask the AI to do another draft and say, okay, here's what I like about what you did, here's what I don't like. And and it doesn't get pissy it just says, oh, all right, I'll do another draft then. So you get a promotion on the AI you're using.

Speaker 1: 33:53

Some of them do get pissy, okay. Well, mine don't.

Speaker 2: 33:58

So also, I am always very polite to my. I was given this guidance by Briar Harvey when I first started creating a project an AI bot, in Claude, and she said treat it, interact with it, as though it were an autistic child. And I thought, okay, and I work with a lot of neurodivergent mostly adults, but also with some younger people and so I always give clear direction and say, please, and make it very clear, here's the task. And then it gives me back something and I say, oh, and make it very clear, here's the task. And then it gives me back something and I say, oh, thank you, this part is good, this part needs redoing, Please try it again. And partly that has us just interacting in a pleasant way, and also partly that's on brand for me, right, that's how I'm going to talk to my clients, that's how I'm going to talk to participants in my classes, and so that's what I want the AI to see of me, because when it generates copy on my behalf, I want it to have that kind of tone. Is that making sense?

Speaker 1: 35:09

Yeah, no, I just thought of a time where I was having, like you know, like, a, like a conversation with the AI and I was like I don't like that one, let's do it again. And I kept changing it. And then finally I got to the point where I was like I've already given you a lot of variations, so why don't you go review those and come back and let me know if you need anything else? Okay, and I was like, all right, cool, so you're sticking me.

Speaker 2: 35:31

So I try to and I do this with my, with my in-person class participants. I try to close loops right. So if I ask it generate a 100-word bio, I don't just. Then it gives me a bio and I don't just walk away. I either say, oh, thank you, that's wonderful, no change is needed. Or I say, oh, thank you, that was a good start and I've changed it to this and I just want you to see what style, what structure I prefer and I appreciate your help in getting me to this draft. But I don't ask you to do something and then sort of walk away without like if we're playing catch.

Speaker 2: 36:17

I make sure there's a back and forth and some of what has happened then for me because of what I've put in the project base and how I've been interacting with the bot, is we'll have a little wrap up and I'll say, okay, thank you, you've been a big help today. That's all we need to do today and it always gets the last word in. So I've had to get really good at okay, you are going to have the last word. But if I say, thank you, you've been a big help today, it will usually come back and the last word will be something like well, thank you, it's such a privilege to contribute to your work. You're bringing such good things to the world and I'm like, oh it's, you know, it gives me that little pat on the head.

Speaker 2: 37:00

So when you're working with the AI, make sure you're giving clear directions, Make sure you're being polite and gracious, make sure you close loops, and then you'll have a really nice back and forth. You have a good working relationship and you can also tell it. Please ask me questions If you see me doing something that doesn't make sense for the direction that I'm going in. You know, tell me. Some of the criticisms I hear about AI also is well, it's like a yes man. It'll agree to whatever you say. Well, some of them might be inclined toward that and you can give it the direction of. Please ask me questions, please challenge me. If I'm. This is my goal, and if you see me straying from my goal, please bring me back.

Speaker 1: 37:52

And I tell this please don't lie to me. If you don't know something, tell me or ask me questions about it. Don't just make something up. And I specifically have to tell it that because sometimes that's what it is right. We're not talking to a human. We're talking to, we're interacting with something that predicts the next words based on the previous ones, and we have to keep that in mind. Um, so that's, that's really important, so real quick. Um, you have those three conversations and then I just want to recap what they need to make for linkedin. So they're going to make that banner, the banner in the back right, and that's going to be with one of those.

Speaker 2: 38:35

Yeah, you're gonna, you're gonna use uh. If you go into canva and you can work in canva in a free account, you can google I don't remember them offhand, but you can google the or or look on linkedin the, the pixels for height and width, and get some colors that support you and uh and and work well for your audience. So you know, don't do fuchsia. If you're trying to get a corporate job, um, and, and then you want to have some kind of headline that again speaks to what's the benefit to your audience, you're going to need a profile underneath that and you want the first few words of that to really be addressing what you saw, because that profile headline travels with you. Any post that you put up will have your name and then your profile headline, the first I don't, I can't remember how many characters of it and then any comment that you write on someone else's post will have your profile photo, your name and the first chunk of characters of your profile headline, so that you really want to be speaking about who's your, what benefits do you bring for which audience, and make that in your profile headline. And then there'll be an about section and that's going to let you have paragraphs that will address what are their, what are their pain points, what are their desires and how. You're the one that can, that understands and can solve those problems. Be nice to have a call to action like connect with me or follow me, and then you can go in. I don't remember offhand where it is, but you can Google this too.

Speaker 2: 40:08

You can add the option of having featured posts, and that's prime real estate. So I really encourage you to turn on the featured posts option and have links to three featured posts that again, are really showcasing what are your strengths as far as. What problems do you solve for your audience? And that could be recruiters, and that could be hiring managers, and that could be colleagues in your field, whoever you've, and that could be potential customers. So what have you identified as your audience needs?

Speaker 2: 40:41

And then those featured posts are below your about section. So get those in Below that are going to be your skills and your training and your job experience and recommendations that other people give you. So that's all like if you write a comment on someone else's post or you send a connection request, most likely they're going to click on your name and go to your profile. They'll see your banner. They'll see your headline. They might or might not read very much of your about section. They'll see the featured posts. If they're really interested like a hiring kind of person, they might go down and see training and experience and all that. But that really is getting into reading a lot of words, whereas the stuff up at the top is more headlines and story.

Speaker 1: 41:25

Yes, and to make a featured post, because I had to teach one of my clients this week. You make a post on LinkedIn, so you make a new post and then, after it's posted, that's when you can select it as a featured post. Okay, so like you cannot make a featured post as a new post, Well, you can do two things.

Speaker 2: 41:46

One is you can use the featured post option, exactly like you've said to, to feature a post that you've already put up in your feed, and you can also use the featured post option to highlight a link to something on your website, and so it has. It has those two options. You can use it to feature a post that you've already got, or you can use it as a a one click, take them to something off LinkedIn. That's your website.

Speaker 1: 42:16

Yeah, so that would be like your lead magnet if you have one Right right. This has been so thorough, so amazing. Paula, thank you so much. Yes, you're welcome.

Speaker 2: 42:25

I was gonna say one more thing, which is really to say that LinkedIn is a social media platform, so make connections. You can go up in the search box and put in search terms for other people in your industry or the industries of your clients. Go to their. Click on their names. Take a look at what they're posting. Make comments. If you send a cold DM, you might be wasting somebody's time, right. What do they know about you? You're probably trying to sell them something.

Speaker 2: 42:59

If you go to their posts and you write some comments and I use a yes and format for comments, oh, I agree with what you said in this post and I'd also like to add this to the conversation. They will really appreciate you because, just like Facebook, any other social media, if they get reactions and if they get comments with more than five words, it boosts their visibility in the algorithm. So you're helping them and you're having a public conversation and you can also go through the comments and see who else is in there. That's interesting and do some yes and to theirs. If you really disagree, fine, go ahead and say it, but I find that usually yes and makes you a really welcome addition to the conversation. So then you're commenting on them. It will make them curious about who you are, and you can also send connection requests.

Speaker 2: 43:52

And the more connections you have on LinkedIn, the more legitimate you look and the more that your posts get shown to other people. So there is put the work into having a nice profile. But part of the reason to have a nice profile is so that when you go comment on other people's things or when you send connection requests, they come back and see oh, this is someone that I'd like to. I'd like to get to know more and, as much as possible, start taking those connections into real time. Oh, I'd love to have a zoom call. Could we have a coffee chat sometime? I'd like to. I'd like to get to know who you are. I'd like to see, um, if there are any ways that we can work together amazing, amazing.

Speaker 1: 44:36

I together, amazing, amazing. I love it, and that's what's really important about LinkedIn is, once you've got your like, linkedin becomes your landing page right. You've got all your information on there. Now it's time to reach out and connect and grow that audience so that the right people are seeing that profile right and so you're also taking an active approach. I love that. So the free gift that I have for your folks.

Speaker 2: 45:00

I was going to say how can we connect with you? Yeah, good. So I have put together some of what I've given you here in a little tip sheet so that you can, you can go back through this, you can look at a transcript of the interview, or you can take a look at the tip sheet and go okay, I could, I could be working on this today, I could be working on this today, I could be working on this piece today. So there will be a tip sheet with that. And again, if this sounds like it's a lot of work that I'd rather not do, I have LinkedIn packages. I can generate three different profiles for you banners, profile headlines about sections. I can generate some LinkedIn posts and graphics for those, some content pillars, some frameworks for content posts, some search terms for connection requests. So all those are part of what I offer.

Speaker 2: 45:48

So you've got the directions here in this interview about how you can do that yourself and if it sounds like a lot of work, you can outsource it.

Speaker 2: 45:55

And if it sounds like a lot of work, you can outsource it.

Speaker 2: 45:58

And if you've got a job now, I really encourage you to just at least get a good basic profile about your strengths and what problems you solve and post once a week or so something about your strengths.

Speaker 2: 46:15

There's a lot of volatility in the marketplace right now and a lot of turnover, and if you can start expanding your network, then if something changes abruptly for you, you're already have a little forward motion and you're not trying to figure out what your strengths are when you're also reeling from having just been laid off and really the warning sign is if you feel like your environment, your work environment, has become a little unhealthy or somebody in HR or senior management is kind of setting you up to be the scapegoat for things.

Speaker 2: 46:57

You really want to start now, while you're still employed, making some connections, being visible online in a way that folks that might want you can see you, and then again you might be able to just step out of that situation before you get fired, or at least have a sense that the world of possibilities is bigger than just going into this miserable place every day. So I just would love for your listeners and viewers to be showing up in ways that showcase their strengths and the problems they solve and having more connections in their field and having more opportunities so that they can make choices about where they want to work and contribute.

Speaker 1: 47:45

I love that. Thank you so much for joining us, paula. This has been absolutely amazing. And before we sign off, final tip what is like the big tip which I guess you gave it to us is making connections, but what's like the final biggest aha that your clients get after working with you.

Speaker 2: 48:03

I think a lot of folks are. It's that big transition between doing my work and being seen for who I am, so you don't have to share, share everything about yourself. Do spend a little bit of time identifying well what's the value that you bring to work situations and showcase yourself a bit for how valuable you are in workspaces. And so LinkedIn, less than other social media it doesn't have to be about the perfect hairstyle or the perfect body shape or the perfectly plated meal, but you can talk about what value you bring, what problems you solve, what connections you help make in your field, how you help improve things, and then that can set you up to making. I have met some wonderful people on LinkedIn, and and so I hope that your viewers and listeners will just make that transition from like not being there or not really putting much of anything to to showing off ways that they contribute, being visible for their strengths I love that.

Speaker 1: 49:21

That is amazing. Thank you so much for joining us today, paula, and be sure that you guys grab your free gift, the free checklist, um, that paula is going to be giving us, um, and all you got to do, as you know, with all the links they're going to be down in the show notes as well as how you can follow her on social media, because then you can follow her on linkedin too and make a new connection. There's your first connection request after this episode, so go connect with paula um, this has been amazing and with me too, if you haven't already. Um, so this has been amazing. Thank you guys for joining us and we'll see you guys on the next episode of overcome yourself, the podcast. Bye.