The 5 Latest LinkedIn Features You Should Start Using Today

William Arruda

The folks at LinkedIn are busy. They are rolling out refinements and new features at an unprecedented rate. Staying on top of these opportunities is the key to staying on top of your online personal branding. If you want your profile to stand out, start using my five favorite LinkedIn upgrades.

3. Profile Rank. LinkedIn now shows you how you rank among your connections based on the total number of profile views. It shows you rank among “professionals like you,” people in your company” and “your 1st-level connections.” This can help you understand who in your network is generating the most interest, and it will give you a feel for how you measure up against your network connections who are your peers or competitors. It also gives you an excuse to reach out to those in your network by congratulating them on their rank. If you are looking to make LinkedIn an important part of your personal branding communications plan (and you should!), you can use this to measure the impact of your status updates, long-form blog posts (see number 5 below) and posts/comments to groups. One easy way to increase profile views is to add a LinkedIn button to your email signature. Here’s how.

5. LinkedIn Publishing Platform. The opportunity to publish your content on LinkedIn is rolling out to all members. You no longer need to be an official LinkedIn Influencer to make your content visible. Once you have been granted access to this feature, you’ll be able to create and post long-form content (in addition to your brief status updates). All you need to do is click the edit icon in the “share an update” box on your homepage. When you mouse over it, you will see “create a post,” and LinkedIn will guide you from there. Your posts will appear in your profile. High-quality, relevant posts are organically distributed through feedback such as views, likes, comments, and shares. Your post may even make it into LinkedIn Pulse, which uses an algorithm that matches the right content with the right professional. You can view stats related to all of your posts to determine their relative popularity.

See all 5 features and the complete Forbes article