The Ultimate Clubhouse Playbook

Make Powerful Connections to Secure Your Next Promotion or Get More Clients and Customers

Adriane Simpson

• Publisher: The LinkedIn Pros
• Year: 2021
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781736843314
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Digital Marketing

BUT FIRST, A NECESSARY DETOUR TO LINKEDIN

When a recruiter from Amazon Web Services scheduled a room on Clubhouse, she posted the following on LinkedIn: “Join us today to meet and ask questions of recruiters from across Amazon – we are HIRING!!” For the prepared candidate, this kind of Q&A session provides the perfect opportunity to show up and get inside information or even talk yourself one step closer to a new job. This user collaboration between LinkedIn and Clubhouse is a complete disruption of the conventional recruiting and hiring process. As more companies recognize the ability to connect directly and start a conversation with the talent pool on Clubhouse, I expect to see similar rooms started every day by companies small and large.

The Amazon recruiter wisely promoted her Clubhouse room on LinkedIn, where many people actively seek work and took the conversation to Clubhouse where she could have a dynamic discussion with potential candidates. In a later chapter, I’ll more specifically describe why LinkedIn and Clubhouse are perfect complements to each other. For now, know this. When you’re actively looking for employment, many hiring managers and recruiters will check out your LinkedIn profile. If you don’t have one or its incomplete or underwhelming, they won’t take you seriously as a candidate. Instead, they’ll focus on the person who has a robust and relevant LinkedIn presence because that presence allows them to get to know the candidate better. The same applies to entrepreneurs looking to secure contracts, attract more clients, and start strategic partnerships. Many of those people will check you out on LinkedIn to get a feel for how serious you are about your business. If they can’t find much about you, they’re likely to move on to someone else.

If you follow the process I lay out in this book, in the way I lay it out, you can expect to get results on Clubhouse. However, you can’t implement these strategies fully without tapping into another resource you’ve got right at your fingertips. Whatever you feel about LinkedIn, stick with me and know this detour is integral to creating the kind of success you want to have on Clubhouse—not just getting more followers or speaking on more stages, but achieving your specific and measurable professional goals.

I suggest you implement as much of this chapter as you possibly can while you’re reading through it. That way, you won’t miss any details or have a chance to procrastinate. Don’t worry. I promise you we’re coming back to Clubhouse in the very next chapter.

If you happen to think LinkedIn is boring or you rarely use it because you never know what to post there, you’re not alone in your opinion or your experience. I’ve heard people liken LinkedIn to “church” or “a black hole.” Their point is that it feels stuffy, overly formal, and not very social to them. Their expectations have been set by platforms like Facebook and Instagram, where personal posts tend to outweigh business posts. They’re accustomed to cat videos and family pictures mixed in with business posts and ads. LinkedIn, on the other hand, is designed to be a professional social networking site, but I have good news. Professional doesn’t have to equal boring, and you don’t have to spend hours every day on LinkedIn to get results.

With over 720 million users worldwide and more than 170 million in the United States, there’s absolutely someone, or more likely many people, on LinkedIn who can help you achieve your professional goals. If you think this site is just for older people, think again. Millennials comprise thirty-eight percent of users. This site is for anyone who’s serious about advancing their career or growing their business regardless of age, gender, or geography.2

Eighty-seven percent of recruiters looking to fill roles regularly use LinkedIn.3 If you’re looking for a new job opportunity, you absolutely need to be active on this platform. And for those of us who own our own businesses, the opportunities available on LinkedIn are just as impressive. Event planners search the site to book speakers for conferences and seminars. Business owners shop for professional service providers and look for suppliers and employees, and investors research business owners on the site. As an entrepreneur, LinkedIn can help you find team members, strategic partners, customers and clients, and more.

If you’re already present and active on LinkedIn, this chapter will give you a chance to review some basic best practices to make sure you’re set up to make the most of your LinkedIn presence. And if you’ve avoided LinkedIn or you created your profile years ago and left it to gather dust, don’t worry. I’ll walk you through some simple steps to get started, set up or refresh your LinkedIn presence, and prepare to use the site as your secret weapon to maximize your time on Clubhouse. Trust the process. You’ve got nothing to lose and everything to gain.

GET ON LINKEDIN

Don’t let the site’s reputation intimidate you. LinkedIn is a social media platform open to anyone who wants to join. It’s accessible regardless of whether you’re on a Mac or PC, an Android tablet, Windows tablet, iPad, or any smartphone. To create your account, download the app on your phone or tablet, or visit LinkedIn.com on your computer. Tap “Join Now,” and follow the simple prompts to create your account. It’s that simple.

YOUR LINKEDIN PROFILE

Before you start connecting with people on LinkedIn, it’s important to create a profile with elements that will appeal to the people already in your professional network and those you want to connect with in the future. This is a place to show your authentic self, of course, but always in a professional manner. Users visit this site to conduct business of various kinds, and it’s important to project an image of yourself as someone who understands the purpose of the site. Don’t skimp or get lazy on this essential step. It shouldn’t take you more than a few hours to create a comprehensive and appealing profile. Going forward, periodic updates will only take you a few minutes.

Before you update your profile take the time to do a little research. If you’re looking for job opportunities, search for other people in your industry, in similar positions, and in positions you might want. If you’re a small business owner, look for people who own similar businesses or offer similar services. Choose people who have large networks and comprehensive profiles. If you know who the top players are in your field, include them in your search. Make a list of the keywords they have in common, and when they apply, use these words in your profile.

Use all the available real estate LinkedIn gives you including:

1. Your name
2. Profile picture
3. Headline
4. Current position
5. Education
6. Geographic location
7. Branded URL
8. Contact information
9. About (Your positioning statement)
10. Skills and endorsements
11. Recommendations
12. Accomplishments

YOUR NAME

To start, use your real name for your LinkedIn profile. This isn’t the place for nicknames or even your business name. (You can create a business page for your business.) People on LinkedIn want to know exactly who they’re interacting with, considering doing business with, and considering for job placements. Besides your name, you should also include the abbreviations for specific certificates or degrees, like CPA, MD, JD, PMP, MBA, or the like. My LinkedIn username is Adriane Simpson, PMP, MBA, LSSGB. At a glance, recruiters, business owners, and potential clients can see some of the qualifications that separate me from other people in my field. (Note: If you don’t yet have any letters to drop behind your name, don’t let that stop you from using LinkedIn. They’re not a requirement for success on this platform.)

On the mobile app, you can also record the correct pronunciation of your name. If your name has an unusual spelling or people often mispronounce it, consider taking advantage of this function. Some people will be more comfortable reaching out to you if they know how to say your name, so make it easy for them.

PROFILE PICTURE

When choosing your profile picture, make sure it represents you as a professional. Even if your industry is a more creative or casual one, your picture should reflect a level of seriousness about what you do. If you’re a professional clown, then you may want to appear in your clown makeup, but for most of us, a friendly-looking headshot with a professional appearance is the best choice. Make sure the photo is bright, crisp, and clear with a solid, uncluttered background.

HEADLINE

Your headline should include the roles you want to be associated with in searches. As a job seeker, you can list your current role and roles you’ve held in the past. As a small business owner, you can list the work you do and for which people are likely to be searching. Rather than call herself CEO in her headline, an entrepreneur might have a headline that reads: Cyber Security | Remediation Services | Security Testing. She’s CEO of her company, but she doesn’t want to be found in searches for CEOs. She wants potential customers who need help with cyber security to find her.

LinkedIn is a huge search engine, and like all search engines, it has its own set of rules. For instance, it doesn’t recognize commas between words in your headline. Rather than use commas, li...

Table of contents

• THIS BOOK IS FOR PEOPLE WHO WANT MORE OUT OF WORK AND BUSINESS
• WORKING THE SYSTEM
• CLUBHOUSE, IT’S MORE THAN A HANGOUT SPOT
• GET COMFORTABLE ON CLUBHOUSE
• BUT FIRST, A NECESSARY DETOUR TO LINKEDIN
• CREATE YOUR CLUBHOUSE STRATEGY
• Share Your Expertise & Stand Out
• The Secret to Maximizing CLUBHOUSE
• RESOURCES