Your headline on LinkedIn is shown more than just about anything else on your profile (except your name and photo). Let's talk about how to make every character count.
Sure, you can go with "[Title] at [Company]", which would be fine enough.
But when your headline appears in search results, connection requests, comment sections, and DMs, you may want to consider the impact those initial words are having on the people who see it.
What makes a LinkedIn headline actually good?
A good headline demonstrates credibility within two seconds. So if you're using an "I help X with Y" headline: you're a few years behind the curve and you sound like everyone else. Instead, think about this:
If you are a founder, CEO, executive, consultant, or other "higher-than-average status" title, then it's a good idea to use it in your headline. If you're the Founder & CEO and you start your headline with "Venture capital ecosystem helper" then you're losing credibility, not gaining it.
On the other hand, if you're a sales rep or BDR or job seeker, you may not want to take up half of your visually-available headline space with "Sales Development Representative". Those 32 characters scream "I'm going to pitch you the moment we connect" to an executive.
Cali's headline below works much better, for example. She strategically uses industry terms on her LinkedIn profile, not her title:
How long should your LinkedIn headline be?
LinkedIn allows you to type up to 220 characters for your profile's Headline. But all 220 are only visible when someone is viewing your profile itself. Far fewer — just 61–66 characters, to be exact — are displayed next to your picture on posts, comments, and nested comment replies:
For example, Dan Goodman's full headline:
Gets shortened to "🥊Employee Advocate 🔄 Counter to Human Resources 🦸 Severanc" next to his posts and comments:
Put your headline into a text editor and make sure of three things:
- The most important thing you want to convey is shown in the first 61 characters
- The rest of the characters, if any, contribute to credibility building for those already viewing your full profile
- The whole thing isn't "a mouthful" — i.e. hard to read at a glance
The formulas behind great LinkedIn headlines
Here are four template formulas to get your creative juices flowing — not to copy and paste verbatim, but to use as a starting point:
[Title] @ [Company] | [outcomes/distinctions]
e.g. "manage your social with demandbird.com | schedule & repurpose everywhere"
This is a bit long in the sense that the last word would be cut off in-feed, but it conveys enough to the target market. What I really like about headlines like this is that they include the actual URL — making it trivially easy for people to find your website, especially if your site isn't easy to find by searching its name.
[Role/credential] + [distinctive angle]
e.g. "ranked #1 for 'funny copywriter' (i killed all the others)"
I have always enjoyed Lianna's headlines. She both conveys what she does and her unique way of doing it — and backs it up by being hilarious in person, including at her MicroConf talks.
[Social proof signal] + [what you do]
e.g. "exited 3x martech startups | now helping founders do email marketing better"
This answers our question from before: "what do the people in my ecosystem want to see, at a glance?" Three relevant exits in the industry clearly puts someone in their buyer's peer group — without needing to lean on a current title.
[Mission/belief statement]
e.g. "Great marketing doesn't interrupt — it earns attention"
This works best when either (a) you already have enough industry presence that your name conveys credibility on its own, or (b) the mission statement is so good it outpunches a title — especially if the company name is generic or unfamiliar.
LinkedIn headline examples for salespeople
Enough obscurity and 'customer blending' to pique curiosity. How did you get into the YC special projects team? What does ARLTR stand for — are you just a Roman Empire fan? Either way, you seem more well-rounded than the average seller. Nice photo, too.
Not hiding "I'm in sales" while also giving enough overall focus and personality to diffuse the risk of "I'm going to pitch you the moment we connect".
Do we put this in the 'founders' section, or the 'sales' section? The fact that I can't decide is a really good thing. The headline self-selects people into either "yes" or "no" on this concept — all you have to do to want to connect is find it intriguing.
Classic Title + Value Prop headline, playing into the current fascination with "AI for X". Likely to convert well on that basis alone. But get a banner image in there, Tyson — it looks barren!
It's all about the job the customer needs to be done, not about "Look at me, I'm in President's Club". Awesome headline, Celina.
LinkedIn headline examples for marketers
You gotta love it. She backs up the humor in person. Makes you immediately see how she's different from using ChatGPT to write your content.
"I'm friendly, I'm competent, I have the cred to back it up." Easy to connect with, easy to want to hire.
You don't even have to make a 'credibility conclusion' to see what kind of person Alex is and want to connect with him. Scroll down his profile and you see all you need to see... but first: chickens!
LinkedIn headline examples for job seekers
The #OpenToWork banner debate: Sara uses it, and that's totally fine. The headline doesn't come across as desperate — it comes across as "here's what I'm good at and what I want to do".
Sammer opts for no banner as a recent graduate — totally fine. The focus is on "here's what I'm here to do and who I am". Good work.
LinkedIn headline examples for founders and consultants
If you're in B2B, you recognize the pink of Omni Lab. By adding "HIRING" in his headline, Jonathan goes beyond simply telling people what his agency offers — he signals they're growing, not just selling.
It's important for a founder or consultant to communicate exactly what their company offers, quickly. His numerical proof point establishes credibility without requiring much reading.
It's good branding to use a short, confident slogan in the headline if you can. This tells you not just that he's a founder, but what their product is about — so you can quickly decide if you want to connect.
Louise isn't technically a founder, but her headline belongs here because it's a great founder's headline. Coupling the slogan with a well-customised CTA button below the headline creates a high-converting LinkedIn presence.
LinkedIn headline examples for students and new graduates
He's already doing a ton while still in school, and clearly gets social: it's him, holding the iconic bird. All lowercase tells you his personality too.
You're not "trying to become" an engineer, you are one already. This communicates the right kind of mindset.
4 things to avoid in your LinkedIn headline
The headline can enhance, or actively detract from, your credibility. Avoid these:
- Don't just use your job title unless it's a 'good one'. Putting Sales Development Representative and nothing else is a recipe for a low connection acceptance rate.
- Avoid buzzword soup. Anyone can say they're a results-driven strategic leader — so don't say it. Show it through a different choice of focus.
- Remove anything actively off-putting. We assume you're joking about "throat-punching the Gen Z mental health crisis" — but this kind of humour is polarising and, in our view, decidedly not good for anything related to mental health, children, or families.
- Reposition irrelevant achievements. If you're in a sales role, talk about what your customers care about — not that you're a Sales Quota Crusher Who Gets Wasted At President's Club. There's a place for that on your profile: the job description section, below the fold. Your headline is not that place.
How to know if your headline is working
Some questions to ask yourself:
- How does your outbound connection acceptance rate compare to peers in similar roles?
- Do you frequently send requests, people view your profile, but don't accept?
- Do people comment on your headline directly or indirectly when reaching out?
Don't stress about having "the perfect headline". I change mine every 3–4 months, or whenever I think there's a more effective way of communicating what I offer to my ecosystem.
Is the rest of your LinkedIn content working as hard as your headline?
Use the free LinkedIn Post Grader to score any post across hook strength, readability, CTA, and engagement triggers. No login required.
Try the Post Grader free →Beyond your headline
One thing I haven't mentioned yet, but want to close with: you can't look at your headline in isolation. It's one piece of your profile, and it should mesh well with:
- Your photo (make it good!)
- Your banner (please add one!)
- Your accomplishments
- Your network strength
- Your industry reputation overall
So whether you write your own headline or use AI or a dedicated tool to do it, view your profile and your professional presence as one big, cohesive thing — not as a text field to be optimised in isolation.
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