LinkedIn's images make up about 25% of your overall profile and dominate the feed. Not optimizing your images is giving up valuable real estate you could be using to tell your story.
Whether you're a freelancer building a client base, a sales professional driving lead generation, a leader establishing their expertise in their field, or an individual contributer searching for their next job, LinkedIn images are critical to making a good first, second, and third impression.
There are many kinds of images you need to optimize to make your LinkedIn profile stand out amongs the 950+ million LinkedIn users, but we'll start with the basics: cover photos and headshots.
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Cover Photos
Your cover photo is the biggest slice of real estate on your profile before someone has to scroll. And yet, most LinkedIn users are stuck with the same default images offered by LinkedIn.
Not only is that boring and uninspired, but it gives off an unfinished feeling to anyone who might visit your profile.
Updating your LinkedIn cover photo
LinkedIn has certain requirements for cover photos you'll have to manage. And you also want your cover photo to tell a story for your visitors. That means you can't just slap something in that spot all willy-nilly.
You need to give some thought to the kind of story you want your photo to tell about you.
Lots of bold, vibrant colors give the impression that a person is fun and energetic. Minimalist photos can convey feelings of professionalism or simplicity. Adding text to your photos is also a great way to immediately share your greatest hits or specialty.
This can be overwhelming to someone who has never built graphics before. But with the right tools and tutorials (below), it will take less than 30 minutes for even the newbie-est of newbies to build their perfect profile image.
LinkedIn's cover photo requirements
LinkedIn has a few requirements for it's cover photos, specifically on size and format. If you're building your own graphic in Canva, Adobe Suite, or another design platform, you need to make sure your final file meets LinkedIn's criteria:
Recommended cover photo size: 1584 by 396 pixels (4:1 aspect ratio)
Maximum file size: 8MB
Acceptable formats: JPG, PNG, GIF
If you're using a template, like the ones Canva provides, you shouldn't have to worry about any of these requirements.
Design your own LinkedIn cover photo
If you're a sales professional or leader in your organization, check to see if your marketing department already has branded cover photos you can add to your profile!
If you don't have access to a pre-built image, you can build from scratch or use any number of templates available online to create your LinkedIn cover photo.
Watch: Step by step process to using a Canva template for your LinkedIn cover photo
Once you've found or made your LinkedIn cover photo, it's time to update your LinkedIn profile!
How to change your LinkedIn cover photo on your profile
Once you have your new cover photo, it's time to update it in LinkedIn! Updating is easy, and takes less than 60 seconds:
Navigate to your LinkedIn profile.
Click the edit icon on your cover photo.
Scroll down and click Change Photo.
Find your custom image and click Open.
When the dialog box reloads, scroll down and click Apply.
If the new photo doesn't auto-update, simply reload the page.
Now that you have your cover photo updated, it's time to move on to your profile picture!
Profile Photos & Headshots
Your profile picture follows you everywhere on LinkedIn. It's how users identify your posts, articles, and comments as yours. As such, there are some rules:
Your photo should clearly show your face
You should be the only one in the photo
Your photo should not be a bitmoji, emoji, cartoon,* or avatar
Updating your Profile Photo
While many people use their professional headshots from their office (or that they paid for themselves) for their profile photos, it's not necessary for all industries or markets. It can be okay to dress down, show more character, and put your personality out there.
An Accountant may have a very different profile picture than a Creative Director because of the nature of their business and the expectations of their customers, colleagues, and partners.
Don't have a profile picture, there are great tutorials that show you how to shoot one from home using just your smartphone!
LinkedIn's profile photo requirements
Like with cover photos, LinkedIn has a few requirements for profile photos:
Recommended cover photo size: 400 x 400 pixels or larger (1:1 aspect ratio)
Maximum file size: 8MB
Acceptable formats: JPG, PNG, GIF
If you have a headshot that's the wrong size, you can use your phone's editing tools or a third-party application like Canva to resize your image. If you're taking your photo on an iPhone, you may need to adjust the format. Most iPhone images are .HEIC images. Cloud Converter has a great .HEIC to .PNG converter you can use if LinkedIn gives you trouble.
How to update your LinkedIn Profile Photo
Once you have the right headshot, updating your profile photo in LinkedIn is a breeze:
Navigate to your LinkedIn profile.
Click your profile photo.
Click Add Photo.
Click Update Photo.
Find your headshot and click Open.
Make any adjustments to your photo, ensuring your face is centered.
Once satisified, scroll down and click Save Photo.
If the new photo doesn't auto-update, simply reload the page.
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