Professional online profile review for the people who want to be found.
A few years ago I had a client who told me he hadn't updated his public-facing professional profile since 2018. What struck me at the time was that he was perfectly happy in his current role; he wasn't applying anywhere. The reason he wanted the profile sharpened up was that he wanted to be the person who came up when somebody he respected was looking for someone to call.
Who this work is for.
You aren't actively job-hunting. You probably won't be in the next quarter. What you would like is for the version of you that lives on professional networks to match the version of you a hiring manager would meet in person. The thing about professional online profiles is that they are read mostly by people who don't yet know you, and skim-read at that: fifteen seconds is generous, ten more typical. The copy has to do its work in that window.
Looking back across the clients I've worked with on profile copy, there is a clear difference between people in their thirties (whose profiles read as resumes) and people in their forties and fifties (whose profiles often read as a less interesting version of who they are now). The work for the former is editorial; the work for the latter is closer to recovering specifics that have been polished out.
What profile-review work covers.
- The headline and the about-section copy, written so somebody reading at speed can place who you are and what you do in two sentences. The headline is the bit that gets surfaced in search results; the about-section is the bit that determines whether somebody clicks through to your experience block.
- The experience block, role by role. what is described and what isn't, where the specifics have been polished out, what would be useful to put back. We work in passes; one role at a time, in priority order.
- The featured items and recommendations, where applicable. What's surfaced at the top of the profile signals who you are far more strongly than the about-section does.
- The settings and the contact-card hygiene. what is publicly visible, who can message you, what a recruiter sees first when they search for your role-family. These are usually a quick fix and worth doing in the first session.
- A six-month review point. most profiles drift, and a single follow-up session in six months is the most useful piece of aftercare I offer for this work.
How the engagement runs.
- Send the current profile URL ahead of session one. If your profile is private, change the visibility to public for the duration of the work; you can revert afterwards.
- Session one: read and audit. We go through the profile as a recruiter would read it: top to bottom, fifteen seconds, then again with notes. The audit produces a written list of what to keep, what to rewrite, what to add, what to remove.
- Between sessions you redraft. The redraft happens in your own voice in a working document, not on the live profile.
- Session two: final read and publication. We read the new copy aloud, agree on the final version, and you publish during the session.
- Optional six-month review (single session). Six months later, a single 60-minute session to update the experience block with anything new and refresh the about-section if needed.
Common questions about profile work.
Do I have to be actively job-hunting to do profile work?
Most of the people I do profile work with are not actively applying. They want to be findable when an interesting opening comes up, which is what a public-facing professional profile is for. The work is therefore a slower, more deliberate kind of editing than the urgent rewrite that goes with a live application.
Will you write my profile from scratch?
No. Same principle as CV work: a profile written from scratch by someone else reads as such. I review and rewrite what's there. If your current profile is sparse, the first session is mostly draft work, pulling out the specifics from your career history that haven't yet made it onto the page.
How long does the work take?
Two sessions over a fortnight is the usual shape. Session one is a structural read and a list of what's missing. Session two is a final pass on the redrafted copy. Most clients then leave the result alone for several months and return for a refresh once a year.
Format and pricing.
Every engagement is online or in person in Manchester. There is no half-day workshop, no group programme, no upsell.