Using LinkedIn to raise your profile and drive traffic to you and your website is a vital tool for event planner.  Here are our top ten LinkedIn tactics for event planners

1. Make sure you start with the end in mind – what do you want to achieve via your LinkedIn account?  Who do you want to connect with and why?  Do you want to drive traffic to your website or encourage people to make direct contact with you?  Do you want to carry out market research and understand your customers more, or simply win more business?  Or do you want people to sign up for one of your events, or recommend an event to others?
2. Once you know what you want to achieve, make sure you know what keywords people are searching on for your services, and use your keywords in your Headline, Job Title and Summary – this will increase your chances of showing up when people search for your services or expertise
3. Join groups and contribute to discussions where your expertise will be of benefit – don’t forget to put a link back to your website or blog
4. Connect with as many people within the industry as possible, they will help you to share your expertise and link with other like minded people – we find the best way to link with people is via the groups we join
5. Complete your profile as thoroughly as possible.  Include as much information as possible (interests, experience, education etc) and use keywords where appropriate
6. Use Linked In Applications such as WordPress, My Travel, Twitter, Slideshare and Google Presentations.  Also make sure you use the Events Plug In to promote the events your are working on, as well as to find out what other events are happening in your industry
7. Ask for recommendations and recommend others.  People searching for your services will want to know who has used you in the past, and what they say about you
8. Update your status with useful information, links to content, links to other peoples content (if your connections will find it useful) as much as possible.
9. Include your LinkedIn profile link in other places like Twitter, Digg, and other social media websites.
10. Finally, make sure you include your company URL somewhere on your profile.