LinkedIn Profile Optimization Best Practices  

Last updated: March 9, 2026

Why Profile Optimization Matters

The goal of LinkedIn content is to drive your ICP to your profile. Profile visits are great conversation starters for warm outbound - if someone visits, make sure they get a message from you (“saw you stopped by my profile…”).

The goal of your LinkedIn profile is to create:

  • A great impression (authority, professionalism, relevance)

  • A feeling of resonance between you and your ICP visitor

  • An easy way to get in touch with you, or enter your sales funnel

Setting Best Practice

Setting

Action Item

Reasoning

Public profile visibility

Turn On

Makes your profile indexable and visible outside LinkedIn. LinkedIn recommends public visibility if you want your profile surfaced in search engines.

Public profile sections

Show all professionally relevant sections publicly

The more relevant sections exposed publicly, the more searchable and legible your profile becomes. LinkedIn explicitly ties public profile completeness to search visibility.

Off-LinkedIn profile discovery

Turn On for profile discovery and visibility off LinkedIn

Expands where your profile information can be surfaced outside LinkedIn’s own environment.

Who can follow you

Set to Everyone on LinkedIn & set Follow as the primary action

Lets anyone follow your updates and enables your posts to be shared off LinkedIn. This is one of the biggest distribution levers. Reduces friction for audience growth. People can subscribe to your content without committing to a connection request.

Profile photo visibility

Make visible to Anyone / Public

LinkedIn says members with a profile photo get up to 2x more profile views and 3x more connection requests. Hiding it weakens conversion.

Post audience

Publish posts to Anyone

Gives posts the widest possible distribution. LinkedIn says this makes them visible on and off LinkedIn; you also can’t change post visibility after publishing.

Profile viewing mode

Use public mode rather than private browsing

Helps preserve the reciprocity loop of profile visits and keeps viewer insights available. LinkedIn notes public mode is needed to access certain viewer insights.

Verification

Complete identity, workplace, and education verification where available

LinkedIn says verified members see 60% more profile views and 50% more engagement on average. Easy win.

Custom public URL

Clean, name-based profile URL

Improves professionalism, shareability, and search presentation.

The Elements that Make a Great LinkedIn Profile

Surface

Best Practices to Include:

Headshot

  • A recent professional headshot

  • No full body pictures 

  • No blur

Banner

  • A company branded asset with your value proposition

  • A professional photo of you speaking (high authority)

  • Impressive statistics about your product 

  • Easily legible and understandable in less than 2 seconds

Headline

  • Your title (ie “CEO”)

  • Your company and what it does (ie “Virio - Content that drives pipeline”)

  • Optional: Impressive stats about your company / product (“$1M ARR in 30 days”)

  • Optional: a touch of personality (ie “Dad”)

About Section

  • An easily legible description of your career / expertise 

  • Concrete achievements and statistics (don’t be afraid to brag)

  • A highly legible format (bullets, less is more approach)

Featured Section

  • A link to your company website 

  • A link into your sales funnel 

  • A link to a post that gives context on you / your comp