One of our most popular blog posts has been on how to add a “view my linkedin profile” button to an email signature, but it was so long ago that we thought it deserved an update.
Just a couple of weeks ago we published a fancy “view my linkedin company profile” button which you can read more about here and I designed this button the same way so you can have a matching pair in your signature email: fancy huh?
This is how you add a button in Microsoft Outlook, but if you use a different email program, the steps may be slightly different; If you follow these instructions, you will find how to create a linkedin button link for mac mail or gmail as well.
microsoft outlook
1. Create a linkedin button image like the one below, or download ours by right-clicking it and hitting “save as”.
2. save the image locally to your desktop in a graphic file format such as .jpg or .png.
3. if you click on profile in the top menu, you can copy the url of your personal profile. see below highlighted in blue
4. in this case the link is https://uk.linkedin.com/in/thelinkedinman
5. then go to outlook and select “options” then “mail” then “signatures”.
6. if you have an existing email signature, select it from the list. if you don’t have one, select “new” and type the text you want your signature to include.
7. Next, select where in your signature you want the linkedin button to appear. click the “insert chart” button (highlighted in the image below by the red circle).
8. after that, click on the hyperlink button (represented by the green circle). if you have difficulty locating it correctly, we often make the signature entirely in word and then paste it in.
9. paste the url of your personal linkedin profile into the hyperlink box and then click “accept”. (You may need to click “OK” a couple of times to complete the process.)
10. ta daa! You now have a live button link in your email signature that will take visitors directly to your personal linkedin profile.
linkedin personal profile url link is a great way to promote your presence on linkedin as you can see on your personal profile who has been visiting you via the “who’s viewed your profile” feature.
let me know what responses you get to your new email link. And if you’ve found any other great ways to promote your personal LinkedIn profile, let us know now, as it’s always good to hear from you in terms of what you’re doing or what’s worked for you.
instructions for other platforms like gmail and macmail are below.
gmail
now, while we’re not gmail users, we know some of you are! here is a set of instructions courtesy of google help on how to create a linkedin button link to your personal linkedin profile in gmail, follow these steps:
1. go to the tool icon on the top right and select “settings”.
2. in the “general” tab, scroll down to “signature” and select the signature radio button. type the text you want, then paste the linkedin button where you want it to appear.
3. highlight the button and select the “link” tool, and then insert the url of your personal linkedin profile.
4. verify that your signature appears the way you want, and then scroll to the bottom of the page and select “save changes.”
I hope everything works out well for you.
macmail
now, although james uses an apple mac, we tend to use microsoft office, but we wanted to include mac mail users as well. We did a quick search online and put together a set of instructions on how to create a linkedin button link in a mac email signature. it’s a bit more complicated, but the steps are:
1. open your html editor and create your email signature exactly how you want it to appear. include the linkedin button as an active link with the url of your personal linkedin profile. press “select all” and copy the text, then save this file as my_sig.html.
2. open mac mail and go to “preferences”. select the account you want to create the signature for and click the “+” option to create a temporary signature file.
3. close “preferences” and exit mac mail.
4. Using Finder, go to the macintosh hd/users//library folder and open the “mail” folder. go to the “v2” folder, select the “maildata” folder and then go to the folder called “signatures”.
5. look for the most recent file under “signatures” ending in .mailsignature. (that’s the temporary signature you just saved a few moments before). Open it with your html editor.
6. without touching the top header block of metadata, select and delete the remaining text, then paste the text you saved into the signature file my_sig.html. save these changes and close the file.
7. select the .mailsignature file you just saved again and go to the menu bar. select “file” then “get info”, then check “blocked” at the bottom of “general info”.
8. go back to mac mail preferences and select your account. compose a new message and your new signature, complete with a live image link, should appear.
Links in email signatures for your own profile are a great way to increase your brand awareness, remind people about you and what a great job you do. We all send hundreds or even thousands of emails, so just think of the added exposure. enjoy!
Let us know in the comments below if you have used your personal linkedin profile url in other ways. for example, we have also used james’s www link on our twitter account. what are your ideas?