Attending conferences or conventions can be a lot of work, but if you think about it, they can change the trajectory of your entire business and/or your career; especially if you are strategic before and afterward. I’m headed to Dallas soon to attend the eWomen Network (eWN) Entrepreneur conference. I’m really excited at the prospect of learning innovative things to help my business and, I’m equally excited to meet a lot of wonderful people.
I’ve been planning and mentally packing for weeks now. One of my to-dos has been to take a good look at my LinkedIn profile to make sure it’s updated and that it represents me in the best light possible. I, personally am making some bigger changes and adding some new elements, but that’s just me.
I do recommend you spend a few minutes reviewing your LinkedIn profile. Depending on your time and the status of your profile, you may want to make just a few changes or a lot.
Here are some things you can do before and during the conference that will pay off:
BEFORE THE CONFERENCE
Review and make little tweaks to your profile
If you don’t have a lot of time or energy to do a full-blown profile update, here are some quick tweaks you can make in about 15 minutes.
- Review your contact information to make sure it’s accurate and the links to your websites still work. Add your work phone number if you are open to receiving calls.
- Add a call-to-action statement to your About and Work Experience sections. A good example is “Let’s schedule a conversation at xxxxx.mycalendar or email me at xyx.”
- While you’re looking at your Experience section, make sure that it’s updated to talk about what you currently do, not what you did years ago. Think about the person meeting you for the first time and what do they need to know about you.
- Add the Organizations section to your profile and be sure to list the organization of the conference you’re attending.
- Review your skills list and “pin” the most relevant 3 as our Top 3 skills.
Larger Profile Fixes
If you have more time and/or you haven’t looked at your profile in ages, you may want to fix the following:
- Change your headline to include a few words that describe what you do and add a tagline. Example: “Marketing | Communications |PR | Writer | Helping you tell your story and grow your brand“
- Update your profile photo so people will recognize you when they meet you. Chances are, if your photo is more than 2 years old, you look different.
- Update your About section (formerly known as the Summary section) to tell an authentic story about who you are, who you serve and why.
Decide on your connection strategy
It’s very important that you think about this BEFORE you attend a conference. Will you connect with every person who you meet or hands you a business card? Are you going to target specific industries or professions? Are you going to connect with each of the presenters, speakers, vendors?
Most importantly, do these people fit into your overall connection and networking strategy?
Create an invitation to connect template
If you think you’re going to be connecting with a lot of people during or after the conference, create customized invitation wording that you can copy and paste into the invite and still personalize for each person. Here’s an example: “Hi Jerry, It was so nice to ___________ (insert where you met and how) on __________ (insert day and session or location) and _______ (insert something you said, did or heard}. I’d love to connect with you here on LinkedIn too.”
If you’re connecting with a speaker, mention a takeaway from their presentation.
Research the speakers, organizers, and key people before you go
You probably have a list of who’s who at the conference. You’ve probably decided on which sessions to attend. Why not take a few minutes and look at the speakers’ profiles BEFORE the conference. It will give you more insight into who they are and what all they do. This gives you extra things to talk about if you do have the opportunity to meet them.
Bonus tip: if they are active on LinkedIn, they will check to see who’s viewed their profiles and they may recognize your name at the conference.
Connect with attendees and key people before the conference.
If you have specific people you want to meet at the conference, send an invitation to connect before you go and try to arrange an in-person meeting.
Download the mobile LinkedIn app
Spend some time getting comfortable with the app before the conference. Here are some things you can do ahead of time:
- Set up notification alerts. Here’s the link to the help to find where to do that.
- Find the People Nearby feature and try it out ahead of time. (It’s in the network section on the app)
- Check out your LinkedIn QR code for easy connecting and viewing profiles. Here’s how
Post an update that you’re attending the conference
Right before you go post an update that you’re excited to be attending the conference. For bonus points, you could @mention the organizer or company hosting the event or people attending, or speakers, or vendors.
Bonus tip: If the event has event-specific hashtags, include them in your post.
DURING THE CONFERENCE
Turn on the Find Nearby feature on your app as soon as you arrive. I recommend you use it as a guide to see who is there. Remember though, if click “connect” from that feature, you will not be able to personalize the invite so use it cautiously.
Throughout the day, make notes about the people you met, when, where/how and something specific to that meeting. If you’ve talked with them, ask if they are interested in connecting on LinkedIn.
Set time aside at the end of each day to connect with the people you met that day using your connection template (see above).
Review who accepted your invitations from the previous day and send them a reply “thank you for accepting” message.
Post an update during the day about what you’re doing, learning or who you are with. Don’t overdo it. Your general network may not be all that interested. Bonus points for including hashtags, a photo or short video, and an @mention.
If your goal is to grow your network and/or your business, these simple but effective strategies will work whether you are going to a conference, a business trip or a half-day seminar.