Virtual Appearance Tips | LinkedIn Banner Dimensions

Have you been sprucing up your virtual appearance recently? If you are working from home as a result of the pandemic you have probably figured out how to keep your laptop camera at eye level (pretty please) and have considered your background—"no" to the chicken thawing on the counter and "yes" to a cool photo of your favorite vacation spot. No comment on your hair.

Of course, there is a lot more to your virtual appearance than what happens on a video chat. Chances are your prospect | donor | business partner | client has looked you up on LinkedIn. If it has been some time since you last connected it's even more likely. How does your LinkedIn personal profile look? If you are an entrepreneur, have you created a company page? Does the look and feel align with your personal page? Are you publishing articles in addition to posting and sharing content? I expanded on this topic last August with 5 LinkedIn Tips to Grow Your Small Business or Nonprofit.

While on the topic of "look and feel" of your page, a good quick read on it is this interview with personal branding guru, Dorie Clark. Yes, "personal brand" does sound like marketing mumbo jumbo but it's important. It's really about managing your reputation. I'd wager that you'd find it a meaningful endeavor to dust it off and keep it looking good and up to date.

Which gets us to the purpose of this post. As you are updating your page(s) please don't neglect the banner image at the top. For some reason, all of the dimensions of the banners on LinkedIn are different. As of now, April 2020, I find the dimensions in this post's accompanying image to work best for banners. I'm also typing them below in case the image doesn't appear for you.

• Personal page: 1584 x 396 (profile image = 400 x 400)

• Company page: 1128 x 191 (logo = 300 x 300)

• Publishing page: 2000 x 600 (This is for the banner for published articles on LinkedIn, not for a general post. For that I use 560 x 315.)

Be sure to leave a buffer around the outside of the banner so that you can adjust/zoom accordingly once you upload the image to LinkedIn. Plus, they present differently on mobile and you may need the added cushion. Also, when publishing content (ie. articles) note that when you upload your image you are given a couple of options (in the center at the bottom of the image next to the mini trashcan) on how the image will appear.

Discussions with my clients are often the most animated when we get to banner creation versus talking about their "about" section which is much harder! A picture really is worth a thousand words. If you need help creating an image try using Canva (see 4 Simple Tools to Support Your Meaningful Work).

If you use different banner dimensions or have other ideas, recommendations, questions or need some help please send me a note.