LinkedIn Rolls Out New Profile Design

 
LinkedIn has rolled out a new profile for members.  If you haven’t received an email from the social network yet, you will.  This is what I received this morning in my inbox; however changes were not noticed until later in the day.  Read below:

“On December 11, 2012, you’ll be getting the new LinkedIn profile, which has a simplified design, provides deeper insights, and surfaces new ways to connect and build relationships. You’ll also be one of the first to preview a new way to showcase rich content on your profile — like presentations, videos, documents, and more.

Now there are more ways than ever to tell your professional story on LinkedIn, and we’re excited for you to try them out. As we roll out these changes, we’ll also be streamlining our app offerings, so the following LinkedIn apps will no longer be supported on the homepage or profile as of December 11:

• SlideShare Presentations
• WordPress
• LinkedIn Events

Please note, if you use SlideShare Presentations or Creative Portfolio Display your content will still be available on your LinkedIn profile. You can find out more about these changes on our Help Center.

We hope you like your new LinkedIn profile!

Thanks,

The LinkedIn Team”

The very first thing for me to note was that I was obviously getting a new profile design from LinkedIn.  The second thing was that some of my apps were no longer going to be available.  I actually found the email quite confusing because it stated these apps (SlideShare Presentations, WordPress, and LinkedIn Events) would no longer be supported on the homepage or profile.  However, later in the email, it states the content from SlideShare Presentations would still be available on my LinkedIn profile.  The Help Center wasn’t much help there.  However, I believe this is because all of my features are not working correctly… yet.  Time will tell.

Here is what LinkedIn has to say about the app changes:

“LinkedIn Applications are being replaced with a new feature that lets you add media links to images, presentations, videos, and documents on your profile. You may click below to see how to access content for some of those applications:

We cannot automatically move content from the remaining applications to your profile. You can re-add that content to your profile using our new rich media feature.“

It seems as though we are going to have to re-add content using a new LinkedIn feature.  I’m not too crazy about losing LinkedIn content:  SlideShare, WordPress, Events, all of which I was using.  I know LinkedIn cancelled their events feature, which I still think is a crying shame.  I used it a lot to search events in my area and promote my own events as well.  As a business-oriented social network, listing seminars, courses, conferences, webinars, etc. was a crucial aspect – in my opinion anyway.  My blog is on WordPress, which I am sure many of you also have your blog set up on WordPress as well.  It doesn’t seem it will be too difficult to re-add this.  My question is once I re-add it, will all my posts show up or just posts from this day forward?  I am eager to see and hoping not to be disappointed.

I clicked on the “new rich media feature” link and was taken to a page where LinkedIn states:

“If you have the newly redesigned profile, you may now add examples of your work with media links to a video, image, document or presentation.

The media links may be added to the Summary, Education and Experience sections:

1. Click Profile at the top of your homepage.
2. Click Edit in the top section of your profile.
3. Scroll down to the section where you want to add content and click the add media link (it looks like a square with a plus sign). Move your cursor over the link and you will see, “Add a link to a video, image, document, presentation…”.
4. Type or paste the link to your content into the Add a link field that appears. A picture of your content will then display with pre-filled Title and Description fields.Note: It may take several seconds for this to happen. You can edit the content in these fields if you wish.
5. Click Save.“

Later today, when my profile seemed to have finally updated, I did click the square with the plus sign as well as hovered over it, but to no avail.  I was not provided with a place to add a link to a video, image, document, presentation, etc.  There are large plus signs next to each section, but upon hovering over them, nothing happens.  When I click the plus signs, a section of the page opens up for me to add new information:  new job, new school, new award, etc., but no place to add any sort of media.  I’ll have to see if this changes by tomorrow.

Here’s a preview of the new LinkedIn profile layout:

The design is much cleaner.  Sections are segmented much neater.  My activity actually wasn’t showing on my new profile until I clicked it.  Once clicked, it opened up my latest update.  If you click “See More”, all updates will load on the profile page.

Here’s a view of the Experience section after clicking “Edit Profile” at the top of the LinkedIn page:

Here you see a blue pencil icon that allows you to edit the section.  You can easily move sections up and down as well as content with a section by clicking the black arrow and simply dragging the content you wish to rearrange.  Recommendations show up nicely with profile photos.  If you click on more recommendations, you are taken to the bottom of the profile page where the recommendation section is located.  Company logos are also located on the right side.

Here’s a preview of the newer Skills section recently added to LinkedIn and how it appears on the new profile design:

Sneak peek at the new Education section:

Additional Info and Awards Section:

The last sections are closed on the bottom and have to be clicked in order to see the content:

If you click on recommendations, your recommendations appear neatly organized.  As you can see from the photo below, you can easily rearrange your recommendations as well, placing your best ones on top.  You can also hover over the “Received” section on the right side and a drop down menu will appear.  Here, you can select to see recommendations from only certain companies/positions.  I think the new look of recommendations is great.

Another great new look is the groups section.  Instead of groups being listed all down your page, they are neatly tucked away in the Groups section and also appear more neatly organized as well.  This was a much needed improvement.  Group logos are also larger which should make group owners happy.  On another note, you can now also add a group you manage to your LinkedIn company page.  Back to the new profile:  At first glance, you see seven groups.  By clicking “See More”, the section populates to list all groups in the same appearance as seen below:

On the right hand side of your page, next to your main profile information, LinkedIn provides recommendations for you to add to your existing profile.  See screenshot:

Overall, the new LinkedIn profile design looks terrific.  I give it a big thumbs up!  It is visually appealing, more user friendly, and more easily managed.  With features more prominently visible now, besides having to figure content and apps out, we should all be giving our LinkedIn profiles an update.

Have you received the new LinkedIn profile yet?  How do you like it?   Thumbs Up or Thumbs Down?

Tags: social media