10 Ways to Improve Your Social Media Profiles in One Hour or Less

What? Improve all my social media profiles—in one hour. Really?

Yup.

I get it—you’re busy. Or maybe lazy (no judgement).

Either way, you’ve got posts to review, schedule, and publish. Campaigns to declare, launch, and manage. Emails to write and respond to. Countless deadlines for this and that.

And… a boss to please so they’ll feel at ease because ‘you got this’. So your brand shows up just right, for all your social media profiles.

This guide is for you.

Each tip should take only a few minutes. All together, about an hour. Schedule it for this week. You can do that, right?

Clock’s a ticking… what are we waiting for?

1. Make sure you’re using the right size images

So your brand face will look professional and beautiful—no matter where you show up.

Optimize your profile images on each network. Often, this only takes a quick crop, which you can do in minutes.

Think about, too… where else these images might show up.

For instance…

How will it look expanded? Or small, when showing up in people’s streams? How will it look on mobile compared to desktop?

Each social network states the optimal images sizes. Because they know all thy ways they’ll be seen. Trust them.

This guide tells all. But I’ll summarize a few since you’re on the clock.

• Facebook profile picture: 170 X 170 pixels
• Facebook cover photo: 828 X 465 pixels
• Twitter profile photo: 400 X 400 pixels
• Twitter header image: 1,500 X 500 pixels
• Google+ profile picture: 250 X 250 pixels (minimum)
• Google+ cover photo: 1080 X 608 pixels
• LinkedIn profile photo: 400 X 400 pixels (minimum)
• LinkedIn custom background: 1584 X 396
• LinkedIn cover photo: 974 X 330 pixels
• LinkedIn banner image: 646 X 220 pixels
• Instagram profile picture: 110 X 110 pixels
• Pinterest profile picture: 150 X 150 pixels
• YouTube profile picture: 800 X 800 pixels
• YouTube cover photo: 2,560 X 1,440 pixels on desktop

2. Use the same profile image on every network

Your brand logo or image should be consistent across all networks.

The more you appear the same in feeds across social networks, the more likely you’ll get and stay top-of-mind. People will think of you before your competitor when they need your product or service.

But if you use different photos and logos you’ll dilute your brand’s visual identity (and recognizability).

3. Make sure your handles are consistent, too

For photos, appearing consistently increases brand recognition.

Same for handles. Also… it makes it easier for others to search and find you.

Want to increases the chances for people mentioning your brand? And, help them find and follow you?

Then make it obvious when they type the ‘@’ sign.

With a simple handle, as close to your personal or brand name as possible.

Just about every social media platform drops down a list in place to help you be clicked.

Now how will you appear in such a list with a mishmash of name, city, area, and any other secret codes. That might work for 007, but you’re not in the spy game, you’re in the buy game.

4. Untag yourself from bad photos and inappropriate posts

Tags are great for talking with more fans. If used right.

But if you’re tagging inappropriate photos or posts, you’ll look like an amateur, instead of a pro. You might face legal woes too.

So… two approaches to make sure you’re using tags best.

Check your photo tag settings

Make sure your settings align with your social media policy.

For your networks you can do some of the following:

• See where you’ve been tagged
• See who can see your tagged photos and posts
• Approve photos you’ve been tagged in before they appear
• Remove tags from unwanted photos and posts
• Restrict who can tag you in photos

Check each network for what’s available for your strategy.

Review tags regularly

Create a routine to check and review the posts you’re tagged in. Then untag yourself from any bad photos or inappropriate posts.

You might ask.. why not just shut down tagging?

Because:

• It’s like hearing your name called out from the crowd
• Tags elicit a response from others
• You can jump into pertinent conversations
• You’ll show up in more places

Tags exist for those reasons, so don’t cut yourself or brand off from being seen more.

5. Be discoverable in a search

Use the right keywords in your profile to be discovered for your business, industry, or niche.

When people do web searches, you want your brand logo to show up above the fold.

It’s easy (and fast) to add the right words to your social profile.

Here’s a couple ways:

Identify the right keywords

Find out what people search for most when looking for professionals in your space. Keyword tools like SEMrush and Google Keyword Planner will help identify the right words and terms.

Use those keywords

Update your social media profiles with the words and phrases identified above.

For: LinkedIn job title, description, experience, and skills sections. Do the same kind of thing for all your social accounts. In your bio, for photos, interests and more.

Don’t just stuff a list of keywords into these sections.

Work them in naturally, like how you talk. The search engine gods will reward and rank you higher. So you’ll show up, not down, the results page.

6. Fill in every field

While you’re adding keywords to your profile, make sure all the fields are filled in.

Why?

So readers won’t perceive you as unprofessional and lazy.

And don’t write gibberish. Write succinct and clear sentences, explaining…

• What you or your brand does
• What people who follow you can expect to see
• Maybe even a clear call-to-action for what they should do next (but that’s outside this hour of power)

Make your words engaging, too, not boring. Here’s some tips I wrote for you.

Also, check this over time. Social networks remove, add, and update fields.

7. Cross promote

There’s probably a field ‘Website” for your social profile.

Most people enter in their website. Makes sense, right?

But you can do better. Use this field to link to your other social profiles—as another form of cross promotion.

• Facebook allows you to add multiple website fields
• LinkedIn allows you to add your Twitter account
• Pinterest allows you to connect to Facebook and Twitter

For the social networks that give you only a single “website” field, mix it up. State a current landing or promo page. Or a new downloadable guide. Update and change it around over time.

8. Test your links

Hey, while you’re in there updating your links—make sure they work, too.

Typos happen. It takes just a sec or two to test them. Otherwise, you’ll confuse users and look unprofessional. And worse, not get those cross promotion benefits.

Test every link on every profile.

That’s it. Next…

9. Build social trust

How? By asking friendlies for reviews, endorsements, and recommendations.

This includes friends, family, past and current clients.

It shows others you’ve succeeded. Readers trust that more than an ad.

You won’t get all these up on your profiles in an hour. This is about asking.

Here’s a few ways.

Use LinkedIn’s endorsements section. People can click to endorse your skills.

Even more powerful are LinkedIn recommendations. When you do ask for these (and you should) make it easier for them.

“Hey Joe, it was great working together on our last project. Think you could write a recommendation for my part? If so, here’s a few questions to make it easy for you.”

• What talents, abilities, & characteristics describe me?
• What successes did we experienced together?
• What I’m good at?
• What can be counted on?
• Are there any other distinguishing features you think I possess?
• What was my impact on you?
• What was my impact on the company?
• How did I change what you do?
• What’s one thing you get with me that you can’t get anywhere else?
• What are five words that describe me?

Pro tip: Give love, too. Use those questions to write a recommendation for someone, without them even asking.

For Facebook pages, use their visitor post section. So people can highlight the good work you’ve done.

For Twitter, pin positive tweets to the top of your stream. This allows you to control what visitors see when they first arrive.

There’s plenty of goodness you can create for you and your brand in a few minutes.

10. Pin your best content to the top of your profile

More about pins.

Unlike other posts, pinned one’s stay put. They are the first things people see when looking you up. Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn support pinning.

This is your chance to showcase your best work. Choose wisely. Maybe a key message, a new landing page, a hot offer, or a cool video? Make the most of pinning.

How did that go?

Did you get all those done in an hour?

But I know it was still worth your time. Feels good, right, to have all your social profiles tidy and optimized for your business. I bet your boss will dig it, too.

Easily manage all your social media profiles using Hootsuite. From a single dashboard you can schedule and publish posts, engage your followers, monitor relevant conversations, measure results, manage your ads, and much more. Try it free today.

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