LinkedIn SEO: How to Be Found & Followed

LinkedIn SEO: How to Be Found & Followed

You’ve finally committed to LinkedIn. You’re showing up, publishing, even dropping long-form gems. But here’s the real question: Is anyone discovering your work? Or are your efforts disappearing into the...

Sep 4, 2025

You’ve finally committed to LinkedIn. You’re showing up, publishing, even dropping long-form gems. But here’s the real question: Is anyone discovering your work? Or are your efforts disappearing into the digital black?

In a platform of over 1 billion members, where more than 16,000 posts are published every minute, visibility is more than just hitting “Post” and praying to the social media gods. For both individual professionals and brands, visibility on LinkedIn isn’t just about consistency. It’s about discoverability. True visibility is about showing up in the right searches, reaching the right feeds, and being seen by the people who matter; buyers, partners, investors, recruits, or peers. Think of your presence on Linkedin as a storefront on the busiest digital street in business. Without a clear sign (profile), visible value (content), and foot traffic (SEO), you’re invisible, even if you’re brilliant.

Whether you’re a solopreneur building a personal brand or a B2B marketing team running a company page, LinkedIn SEO is how you move from posting into the void to building real reach, recognition, and results.

In this guide, we’ll unpack:

  • How to tune your profile so the right people find you
  • What types of content actually build authority and visibility
  • How to create a cohesive keyword strategy that connects your profile, posts, and videos, boosting discoverability across LinkedIn and Google

In a sea of endless content, the difference between being present and being seen is strategy.

Why Brands Can’t Afford to Ignore LinkedIn

For professionals and brands alike, LinkedIn isn’t just where your history lives; it’s where your influence starts. With over 1 billion members and a growing emphasis on thought leadership, LinkedIn has become the go-to place for decision-makers, buyers, and talent to discover new ideas, partners, and solutions.

Unlike other platforms, content on LinkedIn has a longer shelf life, a more targeted audience, and a built-in culture of curiosity.

Map of LinkedIn usage in different countries across the world.

For individuals, the platform gives you direct access to get in front of the people who shape industries, steer budgets, set hiring strategies, and spark innovation across the world. From C-suite execs and VCs to department heads and founders, these are the voices driving transformation in tech, finance, healthcare, climate, education, and beyond. And they’re not just watching; they’re engaging, reading, resharing and contributing themselves.

For brands, LinkedIn is a critical channel to earn trust, educate potential buyers, and stay top-of-mind throughout the B2B buying journey. As a high-intent platform, professionals come to LinkedIn not to scroll aimlessly, but to actively seek industry insights, expert perspectives, product education, and thought leadership that help them solve problems and make smarter decisions.

LinkedIn drives 40% of all B2B leads generated via social media, and content receives 15x more impressions than job postings, meaning the effort you invest in blog posts, product breakdowns, or customer stories reaches a highly engaged, relevant audience and builds lasting market momentum.

​​Whether you’re a startup, a B2B SaaS brand, or a Fortune 500 enterprise, LinkedIn content is how you earn trust before the pitch, educate buyers before the demo, and stay top-of-mind between sales cycles. It’s brand demand creation, credibility building, and pipeline acceleration.

In a world where visibility is currency, publishing on LinkedIn is one of the most strategic plays you can make.

3 Core SEO Linkedin Practices That Get You Found

To get started with LinkedIn SEO, you must think like both a creator and a strategist. Here’s how to do exactly that:

Profiles as Landing Pages: Turn Passive Visitors Into Active Prospects

Your LinkedIn profile is the front door to your brand. And like any high-converting landing page, it should guide visitors toward action while showcasing credibility, clarity, and consistency at every scroll.

Graphic showing how your LinkedIn profile can drive conversions.

To make your profile work harder for you:

  • Lead with strong visuals. Your profile photo, banner, and headline should clearly reflect who you are and what you do. Think of it as a branded billboard; clean, confident, and aligned.
  • Use your About section as a hook. Go beyond a resume recap. Tell a compelling story that communicates value and sparks curiosity.
  • Feature content that proves your impact. Use the “Featured” section to highlight top posts, case studies, and media that showcase your mission and expertise. Upload custom, branded thumbnails for visual cohesion.
  • Add clear CTAs. Whether it’s “Let’s Connect” or “Book a Demo,” guide people to their next step.
  • Turn on Creator Mode. Unlock like hashtag discoverability, intro links, and access to LinkedIn Live, Newsletters, and analytics.
  • Show social proof. Use media, case studies, or testimonials to validate your credibility and results.
  • Write for your audience. Speak to their needs and challenges. Keep your value clear.

Together, these elements transform your profile from a static page into a strategic asset. But even the most polished profile won’t drive results if it’s not discoverable.

If there’s one takeaway to remember from this entire blog, it’s this: Your brand needs a cohesive keyword strategy that connects your LinkedIn profile and all of your content.

To maximize your effort on LinkedIn, your brand needs to anchor its presence around a unified set of SEO-informed keywords; not just on your page, but in every piece of content you post. From your About section to Page tagline, Featured posts, Showcase Pages, and branded content, all messaging should consistently reflect the topics your target audience is actively searching for.

When your brand consistently uses the same set of relevant, search-informed keywords across its LinkedIn profile and content, you improve discoverability and establish topical authority. LinkedIn’s algorithm and external search engines like Google rely on keyword consistency to surface the most relevant pages and posts. By aligning your messaging with the language your audience is already searching for, your brand becomes more visible in search results, more likely to be recommended, and more trusted as a leader in your space.

This not only drives impressions, it attracts the right kind of engagement from decision-makers who are actively seeking solutions like yours.

How to Find LinkedIn Keywords

To identify LinkedIn keywords, start by identifying 3-5 core keyword themes that reflect your audience’s interests and your brand’s unique value proposition:

  • Use these keywords naturally across your company’s LinkedIn page.
  • Make sure your content reinforces these same themes.

Cohesion is a key ingredient to a successful LinkedIn SEO strategy. When your keywords align across every profile element and touchpoint, you strengthen your brand’s visibility, relevance, and credibility at every stage of the consumer journey. When built right, your profile converts.

Align With LinkedIn User Search Intent

If your content doesn’t match what your audience is actively searching for, you’re missing the mark and the audience entirely. LinkedIn’s algorithm favors relevance. That means your posts, profile, and language should reflect the exact questions, problems, and goals your target audience is already curious about.

Audience-aligned LinkedIn content flow for LinkedIn SEO.

Your brand can’t afford to be self-centered. On LinkedIn, your audience’s curiosity, not your agenda, should drive the conversation. Instead of pushing what you want to say, focus on what they need to hear:

  • Address real pain points and priorities. What are they stuck on? What’s keeping them from moving forward? Speak directly to the obstacles and opportunities your audience cares about most.
  • Mirror the words they actually use. Skip the internal lingo. Use the same phrases, keywords, and terminology your audience is typing into search; this improves both relatability and discoverability.
  • Deliver content that solves, not just sells. Share frameworks, lessons, or examples that provide real value. The more useful your content, the more credible your brand becomes.
  • Meet them where they are in the buyer journey. Not everyone is ready to convert. Most of your audience isn’t ready to buy; they’re still learning, questioning, or unaware of the problem altogether. Tailor your messaging to spark curiosity, build understanding, inform, show social proof, and offer clear next steps for those who are ready.

Think of your LinkedIn presence as a solution hub, not a brand broadcast system. When your content fulfills a searcher’s intent first, you’re earning a viewership; more importantly, you’re earning trust, visibility, and relevance on the feed and in search.

LinkedIn SEO strategy guide with 7 tips for ranking well.

Mobile‑First Design: Write for the Scroll, Not the Desktop

The majority of LinkedIn users experience the platform the same way they do Instagram or Twitter: on their phones, in short bursts, and often without sound. In fact, over 80% of LinkedIn engagement happens on mobile (and, coincidentally, 80% of videos are also watched on mute). That means long, dense paragraphs and sound-dependent media are often skipped entirely.

Chart of mobile phone engagement across popular websites.

To stop the scroll and boost readability here are few quick tips:

  • Break up your written material into short, skimmable paragraphs (1-2 lines max)
  • Lead with visual cues like bullet points, arrows, emojis, etc.
  • Use impactful hooks in the first line; evoke an emotion to earn the “See More” click
  • Include mobile-friendly visuals like carousels, quote cards, or graphics with embedded and skimmable (not overbearing) text
  • Add subtitles or captions to all your videos; autoplay is muted by default

With people putting in 8+ hours of daily screentime on their phones, readability is crucial and attention is brutally short. If your content doesn’t catch the eye or earn interest in seconds, it’s as good as gone.

People will scroll right past a wall of text, skip over muted videos, and bounce from posts that don’t visually invite them in. Poor formatting not only looks bad, but will cost you visibility.

LinkedIn SEO Meets Google: How to Make Your Videos Discoverable in the Short Videos Tab

With Google rolling out its new Short Videos tab in search, your video LinkedIn content has more potential for visibility than ever before. This dedicated section in Google’s mobile and desktop search surfaces short-form video content from platforms like TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts; and it’s beginning to pull in content from LinkedIn, too.

That means your videos can reach beyond the audience engaging on your LinkedIn feed. When properly optimized, they can show up in Google search results alongside other high-performing video content.

The Short Videos tab in Google Search, where LinkedIn content can appear.

For brands, this is a huge opportunity. But it also raises the bar for how you approach LinkedIn video marketing. The benefits of search-optimized video are becoming dependent on how you package the material. That includes three key elements: your thumbnail, caption, and title. Google doesn’t “watch” your video, but it can read these elements and uses them to decide whether your content is relevant to a user’s search query:

  • Clear, compelling titles that include targeted keywords help Google understand your message.
  • Branded or visually engaging thumbnails improve click-through rates by signaling value and professionalism.
  • Captions (especially those with keywords or within transcripts) enhance accessibility and help search engines crawl the substance of your video.

With this strong strategy, you can create a dual-channel discovery loop: your audience can find your videos on LinkedIn and through Google. So while short-form content might seem like a top-of-funnel tool, it’s now also part of your SEO strategy; helping your brand become discoverable when people are searching for insights, tools, or expertise tied to your industry.

In short, LinkedIn video marketing is no longer a closed-loop system. With the rise of the Google Short Videos tab, your optimized content can compete on a whole new level.

Measuring Success: Beyond Impressions & Rankings

From an SEO lens, success doesn’t look like simply showing up; it’s being sought out. When someone searches your brand name because your content keeps appearing, that’s true impact. That kind of brand gravity is far more valuable than vanity metrics. Yes, you want views and conversions, but what matters even more is whether those views build trust and recognition.

While impressions and clicks matter, they’re only surface-level indicators. Modern SEO on platforms like LinkedIn is about building authority over time across multiple touchpoints. Visibility becomes valuable when it’s memorable.

On LinkedIn, that means treating your profile and content like SEO assets. Optimize every element with consistent, search-friendly language. When someone Googles “best marketing agency,” your LinkedIn videos and articles should surface. Not by luck, but because your strategy was built to be discoverable.

And once people find you, what are they doing next? Track:

  • Click-Through Rate (CTR): Are your headlines and thumbnails doing their job?
  • Dwell Time: Are users consuming the full carousel or video, or bouncing quickly?
  • Branded Search Volume: Are more people searching for your company name or leadership team after LinkedIn content goes live?

This is where LinkedIn SEO overlaps with broader search strategy. With Google now indexing short-form videos (including those from LinkedIn), your captions, thumbnails, and descriptions aren’t just social copy; they’re metadata. They should align with the same keywords you’re using in blogs, YouTube, and paid search.

Finally, treat analytics as insight, not a scoreboard. Use LinkedIn’s native tools to track post performance and audience demographics, but also monitor what content is being reshared, saved, or generating conversation. Those actions are your SEO signals: they tell algorithms (and real people) that your content is worth surfacing.

LinkedIn SEO FAQs

Want to make your LinkedIn presence easier to find, easier to trust, and more likely to convert? Start with SEO. These quick answers will get you moving.

How do I make my brand more discoverable on LinkedIn?

Use relevant, consistent keywords in your page headline, About section, services list, and content. Align your language with what your ideal audience is typing into search bars, not internal jargon.

Does LinkedIn content show up on Google?

Yes, especially video and article content. With Google’s new short videos tab, well-optimized video titles, captions, and thumbnails from LinkedIn can appear in search results. SEO isn’t just for your website anymore.

What types of content are best for LinkedIn SEO?

Content that answers specific questions or speaks directly to audience pain points tends to rank better. Use keyword-rich copy (but be careful not to overstuff), carousels, and video formats. Ensure your thumbnails, captions, and CTAs align with those terms as well.

Is it worth optimizing my company page if we’re not posting daily?

Yes. Your profile is your foundation and optimizing it with strong keywords ensures you’re visible even when content isn’t flowing daily. SEO works over time, so clear direction and intent matters more than frequency.

Can SEO help generate leads on LinkedIn?

When your brand content and profile are aligned with buyer search behavior, you’re far more likely to be discovered by relevant audiences without needing virality. This will drive higher-quality engagement and conversions.

LinkedIn SEO: Final Thoughts

Your mindset towards visibility on LinkedIn should be like that of an architect. When you intentionally optimize your profile, align content to search behavior, and design for mobile engagement, you’re building a discoverable brand ecosystem.

The brands that win aren’t the loudest; they’re the most findable, the most relevant, and the most consistently clear about their value. Start small: pick one SEO-focused action this week, run a keyword-aligned audit, revamp your headline, launch an evergreen content series or update your featured section. Lay the groundwork for visibility that compounds.

Berkley Moates
Berkley Moates is an Community Manager with 4+ years of experience in organic social media strategy and content creation. She has experience building out social strategies across a diverse roster of music venue, podcast, music tech, private investment, and entrepreneurial brands. Her most viral piece of Linkedin content received 24+ million views, 2.9 million likes, and 257K shares.

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