networking 101 & linkedin tips w/ me :)

full transcript

auto-generated from the audio, so expect a few typos. the audio is the source of truth.

Hello, hello. Thanks for listening to guidance counselor 2.0. Listen, I want to give you a quick rundown of what this podcast is and what you're about to get into as you listen to these episodes. We had guidance counselors in middle school. We had guidance counselors in high school, but we didn't really have guidance counselors in college and now as professionals. We don't really have anybody to turn to to ask a quick question to learn something about the job search or to navigate your career. So that is what I want this podcast to be for you. I want it for it to be a tool for you to navigate the job search and your career.

So that being said, I hope you enjoy this episode and if you need to reach me, Taylor at vacovac.com is how to get in touch with me old-fashioned email social media at tdsintdessey. And then finally, please rate and review this in the app store because I want this to be discoverable for others so they can navigate their careers. Hope you enjoy the episode. Just me this morning, I'm going to dive into a little bit more LinkedIn tips. The reason for that is because my screen show was working last time I got it figured out. So we're going to go over LinkedIn again this morning and want to talk about conferences and so I'm heading down to render next week.

It really just got me thinking about conference season. I want you all to maximize your conference season this year. It takes a lot to get approval from a company. It takes a lot to get to the conference. It takes a lot of energy to network with people. And I want to make sure that you get everything circuit. So again, we're going to dive into that today. Say hey, let me know you're tuning in. I would love to hear from you this morning. So there's two reasons for the show. I always talk about the first reason is the networking. The reason why I tell people to say hey to comment to at me to let me know where you're tuning in from is because if you don't comment people don't know you're watching.

And if people can't see you, you could lose out an opportunity potentially network or somebody that could potentially help you find your dream job down the road. This is a networking tool. I've become fascinated. We're going to talk a little about this day again on the networking side of things as have something in common. Have something common. I want this show to be the thing that you have in common with somebody else. So that's why I tell people to comment to say hey, even if like no lurking just stop an emoji. Alright, give me a thumbs up. Let me know you're here. Let other people know you're here.

I think I'm potentially network with you. Again, I've had a bunch of people DM me that Taylor. I've met so many great people from your show and that makes me so so happy. So again, no lurkers this Monday morning. If you are scrolling across this this morning. Hello. Hey, and again, comments. The next part of this show is a is a live interactive show. Right. So I want questions. We're going to go over again to topics. We're going to go over the networking linked inside of things. You probably tell you talk about this all the day and time. I know, but people struggle with this.

There's one thing that I realize that people struggle with most of the job search. It's seriously the networking side of things. We're going to talk about that today. I see some people tune in this morning. All going to be at render here next week. So it's going to be a blast. Two late. They're almost sold out. I think a thousand people are going to attend a thousand freaking people. It's going to be a monster for conference. So use the code GC two dash zero if you haven't already and I will see you next week. Want to give a shout to people tuning in this morning.

As always, Ricardo, Mr. Consistent Barrett former guests of the show. It's great to see you. And have been Carly. It's great to see you as Max. My man from South Florida. Julie. What's going on big dog James. It's great to see you as well. Okay. What's going on. Can't wait to see you at render as well. I'm going to come back to the next week. So we're going to see you. And with the next week. And I'm going to see you up patria. Wonderful to see you. Thank you so much. It's doing new doven shirt very, very excited. I like it a lot. Abdiss what's what's good.

Chris. Good morning. Chelsea Chelsea. My brain blanked on me checking from the Pacific Northwest. I love it. What's going on with my stream? Streamyros's got to get to that. What happened? Alan, what's up, big dog? It's great to see you from Tampa. I love it. All right, y'all. So let's dive in. First and foremost, conference season. Conference season. So let's talk about it. We are getting into conference season right now. Let's talk about some practical tips, some practical tips that you can do to separate yourself from the network events. First and foremost, I'm trying the dot card. This is not a paid ad by any means, but dot card if you're watching.

Let me know. But so check out dot card. I don't know if you all had experience with it. I thought it was originally stupid. So one of my colleagues said it to me goes, hey, what do you think of this? I was like, ah, this is kind of dumb. But after going to react Miami, now I think the dot card makes a ton of sense. And here's why I think the dot card makes a ton of sense. Watching people, oh my gosh, what's going on with my stream? Anyone else having problems with the stream? It keeps pausing restarting on me. Can someone give me a thumbs up that I'm good?

I don't want to keep running my mouth. Stream me art. I may have to find another, I may have to find another stream. I say, mate, can you someone give me a thumbs up before going any further? Can someone give me a thumbs up at all? Thumbs up? Thumbs up that this is working. I still see people trickling in. Can anyone else see me working fine, working fine? You're long to have money morning, Alicia, what's going on? I don't know if you all seen the TikToks with like they make fun of the moms of the multi-level marketing. But I feel like that's me right now.

First conference is COVID, B-size Knoxville. I love it. All right, so I'm going to dive in. It looks like people are still trickling in. It looks like it's working. So the first thing is the dot card. So check that out. So it is basically a business card where you can like bump to your phone, like you can take the card and bump to your phone. So when I was in react Miami, what's that when I was at react Miami? They're literally, like it was so awkward. Like I wouldn't meet people in the hallway track and be like, hey, so and so, what's your name again?

What was it again? I mean, it was like awkward dating, right? What's your name? What's your number? What's your, what's your ad sign, right? Like, what is it? It was so awkward, right? I find I just started my handy my phone to people. Like basically like at a girl at a conference or at a girl at a date here. Just, just take my phone, plug in your number. So that guy, so that was a lot of friction, right? So when it comes to networking, there's a lot of friction involved right now. I think, I think from my perspective, the dark card will eliminate that friction.

So check that, it's only $20, it's $20. And you can program all your social media on it and people can buy us. I'm gonna try it next week. I'm gonna keep you updated with how it is, but possibly check that out. Because here's the deal. Business cards, I think the, I think the traditional business card just doesn't work anymore. It just does it. I think people throw it away. I think people, you know, just ignore it, right? I think it's, I think people, when it comes to networking, people want to approach it how, like on their own terms. And I feel like if there's a dot card or a QR code or a dive into QR code in here in a second, especially for companies and booths, I think it's so much easier and to last people with consumed content, how they wanna consume it, right?

So the next thing I wanna talk about too, is so dot card number one, two, when it comes to networking, it's getting people in your ecosystem, right? So that can be the dot card. If you don't want to use the dot card, try to get people like to one platform use the most, right? Whether it's Twitter, whether it's Instagram, whether it's LinkedIn, try to connect with them somewhere, right? Because again, what do I talk about all the time that networking is like and in common, on people status is right? True example, render in Miami, I was in React for React Miami. I went to a render, ATL pop up down in Miami, right?

I met so many great individuals and I tried to, I was like, I was like, hey, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, to like Instagram, right? So it's like five or six guys in Gaza connect with on Instagram for render ATL down in Miami. And I've been like DMing them up, like chatting them up, liking, commenting, all their stuff they post. And I already feel like I have so much better of a rapport with those people going into render next week, right? Because I took the time to direct them to a social media channel and then I liked and comment on their stuff, right? I'm telling you, I literally, I do what I preach, right?

When I meet people, I'm like, hey, do you want to go Twitter? Do you want to do LinkedIn? Do you want to do Instagram? Now, the dot card, good Lord, I see people commenting that the fee's just not good today. I'm so sorry, y'all. I'm gonna keep running on my mouth. Hopefully you get something out of this, but I do apologize for technical difficulties. Stream your art's been acting up on me. So all that being said, give people to a social. Now if I tell you, I don't use social media. Okay, well, this is, I cannot talk about this a lot when it comes to networking, right?

You want to use a platform. Before you go to a conference, I would either get your LinkedIn really set up, your Twitter, your Instagram, whatever. Those seem to be the main three, right? Not really Facebook. So do that. The second thing is companies, if you are watching this, I think every company needs to have a QR code. You need to have a QR code on your boot somewhere. So people can scan it, right? So many, like I'm fine with conference swag, with the brochures, the PDF slicks, how to sell in your company. No one reads that. People are just don't worry. I can't tell you how many times.

I just throw away paper, right? I think QR codes are the real deal when it comes to conferences. And some of the most successful booths that I saw on React Miami were actually leveraging QR codes to allow people to go to their site, to consume their content the way they want to consume it. And then if they want more questions, they can come back in person. And so all that being said, literally when it comes to QR codes, the companies need to be more mindful of this during conferences, because it's about friction. All this is about friction. Also another thing I want to talk about too, when it comes to networking at conferences, the hallway tracks, right?

I've talked about this before. The hallway tracks are incredibly, incredibly important. Take the time, zone in on the hallway tracks. Also too, don't go to all the sessions. You don't have to go to all the sessions. Take a break for yourself, right? Hallway tracks always try to be there for the hallway tracks. And finally, pick a handful of people, pick a handful of individuals that really, that you want to meet, right? Whether they're speakers, whether they're, you know, and now I would do the talks too, right? Really when it comes down to these conferences, there's so much intentionality behind it, so much intentionality. And so my best advice to you is pick a handful of conferences you want to go to.

Pick a handful of sessions. Pick a handful of speakers that you want to meet and dive into those. And then once you do that, the conference, give yourself a break. Give yourself literally a break to understand that, hey, you can go to your room. I've met all my people, I've met all my individuals, I've gone to all my talks. Give yourself that break. I find myself all the time giving like, oh my gosh, oh my gosh, I haven't done enough, I haven't done enough. So again, really make sure, really make sure that you're intentional for going to your conferences. Pick your talks that you want to attend to, pick the individuals you want to meet, and dive in and network with those folks.

I got a bunch of comments coming in. Alicia goes, if you are also creating content, almost all the inspiration I get for content comes off the back of a comment. I've been a record, yeah. Most of the people I've had on shows are because they've commented on something I've posted. So again, I can't tell you the importance of liking and commenting people like this is so arbitrary. It's not arbitrary. That's how you build relationships in today's world in my opinion. James, it's great to see you. Salim is great to see you. It's so great to hear by a lot of people, Norman, what's going on.

All right, so I want to dive into LinkedIn real quick. And I want to fly through LinkedIn on what the most important parts of LinkedIn is real quick, because I wasn't able to do this last week. So I'm going to go and share my screen. Let's see here. I want to go and share my screen. And therefore you can see what I'm talking about. All right, cool. So I'm going to share my screen. All right, so first off right here, it's kind of confusing watching me in this too, but this is the cover banner photo, right? So let's go to another person. I'm going to go to my buddy Dan Thompson because I love his banner photo.

So the banner photo is incredibly important. I'm just going to hit the top three parts of the LinkedIn since we're already halfway through my session this morning. So the top three parts of LinkedIn is your banner cover photo. A lot of y'all have these like LiveLaf love quotes, these pictures of a mountain, like pictures of a lake. Like that's not going to help you find a job. When I, the cover banner photo is the first thing that anybody sees when they come to your profile, it's half to make it engaging. So for this, for example, right, Dan, what's his Twitter handle, his email, and a little bit about him, right?

I can't stress enough with you all right now that literally in today's world, there is a huge blend between professional and personal. Use the LinkedIn banner photo to bring in your personal life and make it something fun. For example, I was mentoring one-on-one a developer out in California, June developer, and he was the backstreet boys audio engineer on the last tour they did. And so I told him, I said, man, I said, you need to put that on your LinkedIn profile because it allows somebody to DMU and they know who you are. And that is incredibly important. Again, having something in common, building a rapport, you can do that through the Instagram banner.

The second thing I want to talk about is the title portion. So this is incredibly important. So when it comes to the title portion, when it comes to the title portion of your, when it comes to the title portion, of your LinkedIn, this is the TLDR of your profile. So when it comes to somebody looking at, when it comes to someone's looking at your profile, this title portion is the summary of your entire profile. So like when a recruiter, for example, I'm gonna go over this real quick, whenever recruiter recruits, they type in the word dotnet developer. Right? There are, you know, all these people, see, I'm gonna go to locations real quick, all filters.

Also, if you are not comfortable using the filter within LinkedIn, I would highly recommend. So there are a 615 people within LinkedIn that have the word dotnet developer. The reason why the title's so important is because this is the title. This is what recruiters see. And here's the deal recruiters don't have time to sit through 615 results. So a lot of times we just look at the title portion. Right? The title portion, if you wanna compare to marketing, this is your SEO, you may have to finagle this a little bit to get the appropriate title so people can message you. But again, the title portion is incredibly important.

The next part of your profile that I wanna go over real quick, that's incredibly important, is the featured section. A lot of y'all don't have the featured section, so I wanna go over that real quick. That's this right here. It is a place where you can essentially pin a post, a link, something you've done, your GitHub, a portfolio project. This is where you need to focus right here. Make sure your featured section is up and running. Finally, finally, I wanna go through here. Recommendations are important. Listen, there's so much that comes into play with the job search and recommendations. Recommendations give you clout. Now, a lot of people are like, recommendations are dumb.

Anybody can write a recommendation. Listen, I get it, but at the end of the day, if you go to a restaurant, if you Google a restaurant in your town and one restaurant's got 300, 300 ratings on Google and the other one has 100, or maybe zero, which one are you gonna go to probably the 300 person, or the 300 person, the 300 review restaurant, right? Again, there's so much that comes into play with the job search and marketing and viewing people and viewing things, maybe more than they are unless they are. And I understand that people can be very traditional, but that's stupid. I am who I am.

I understand that, but there is a lot of play in the game in the job search and I'm trying to help you with that. So all that being said, that's everything this morning. Short, sweet. I wanna talk about networking at conferences, listen again, conferences. So important. I know it's a lot. You gotta ask time off. You gotta ask your boss for funding. There's a lot there and I want you to maximize your time at conferences. And so hopefully you learn something from that. Also, again, LinkedIn and credit-important tool. I actually came up with this morning, when it comes to the job search, your resume is not searchable.

Sure, you can have it on dice. Sure, you can have it on D. But the end of the day, your resume is not searchable. Your LinkedIn is searchable. Right, again, if we're talking about marketing funnel here, your LinkedIn is top of the funnel because it can be searchable. I can type in the word dotnet developer and Nashville and potentially find you. If I type in the word dotnet developer and Nashville, I may not ever be able to find you with your resume. So your LinkedIn is the most searchable thing that you have for people, recruiters, hiring managers, whatever to find you. So make sure that it's completely updated.

Hopefully y'all got something out of this today. Kind of crazy this morning. The stream may be lagging a little bit. So hopefully you got something out of it. Feel free to share this with somebody or your network who may need to hear this, especially maybe if you have somebody in your network about to go to a conference that needs to know about this. But y'all, thank you again for hanging out with me this morning. Hopefully you learned something. Tomorrow morning, Ken Wheeler, the original bad boy, JavaScript, as he likes to say. I had a Ken on the show. He's a render, ATL speaker. We're gonna dive into some pretty cool topics.

I don't know what yet, but it's gonna be a blast. So I'll see y'all tomorrow, not 30 am central. And y'all have a great Monday. And I appreciate y'all all the time. Peace. Hey, you did it. You listened to an entire episode. And I am very grateful. Cause you know why? There's a lot of podcasts out there. There's a lot of episodes. And I myself rarely finished an entire episode. So I appreciate you so, so much for listening. Quick reminder, please rate and review this podcast in the app store. I want this to be discoverable to others and the only way that happens is if you take the time right now and rate and review it.

Please, like right now. Unless you're driving, then don't do it. So thank you again. If you need to reach out to me, tailoratvaco.com or at t-dasting on all social media handles. And I hope you have a fantastic day.