Alongside your profile picture and headline, your LinkedIn cover photo plays a crucial part in your LinkedIn identity.
It represents your professional self, and as such, it requires the equal amount of attention you would dedicate to any of the other sections of your LinkedIn header.
Additionally, a LinkedIn background photo offers a visual representation of what you and your business are all about. Therefore, it is highly relevant for forming the first impression of anyone visiting your LinkedIn profile.
In this blog, you’ll learn:
- How to change your LinkedIn cover photo
- How to change your LinkedIn cover photo on the app
- The LinkedIn background photo size
- Where you can find LinkedIn cover photo templates and what online design platforms to use
- Examples of different LinkedIn cover photos that make your LinkedIn profile look neat and professional and send the right message to those who visit it.
Furthermore, if you think that your LinkedIn profile needs more optimization for sales, recruiting, finding a freelance project, check out our FREE master class - Set Up Your LinkedIn Profile: Complete Guide.
How to change your LinkedIn cover photo?
This is your LinkedIn cover photo or LinkedIn background photo or LinkedIn banner image.
You can change it anytime and as many times as you wish.
#1 Click on the pencil icon in the top right corner of your LinkedIn profile’s header, where your LinkedIn background photo is located. You will see two pencil icons, the lower one takes you to change your name, last name, headline, locations, etc., while the upper one takes you to change your LinkedIn cover photo.
#2 You will be offered to adjust the portion of the uploaded image and decide which part of it you want to display as your LinkedIn cover photo.
Additionally, you have the option to apply a filter of your choice to the picture.
By clicking the “Adjust” icon you can play with your image:
- Brightness
- Contrast
- Saturation
- Vignette
How to change your LinkedIn cover photo on the app?
The LinkedIn app offers the same editing options as mentioned above.
#1 Go to your home LinkedIn profile page and click the pencil icon in the top right corner.
#2 In the button, you’ll find the options to edit, add a photo or delete the existing one. We’ll show you what the process of adding a completely new photo and editing it looks like.
#3 Choose what photo you wish to upload.
#4 Once you’ve uploaded the photo, you’ll get the same editing options as above.
The LinkedIn background photo size
In 2022, the LinkedIn company page cover photo should be 1660 x 800 px, while the LinkedIn personal background photo size should be 1584 x 396 px.
You can upload it as a JPEG or PNG file.
The LinkedIn background photo should be 8MB or smaller.
The LinkedIn cover photos are cropped differently on mobile and desktop devices. Make sure to view your profile on both kinds of displays when setting up a new LinkedIn background photo.
Where can I find LinkedIn cover photo templates?
Once you decided on what kind of image you wish to feature as your cover photo, you’ll need to find an image without copyright, make one of your own, or have a designer or someone design-savvy do it for you.
| paid stock image websites | free stock image websites | online graphic design platforms |
| iStockphoto.com | Vecteezy | Canva |
| Shutterstock.com | Freepik | Fotor |
| Envato.com | Morguefile | VistaCreate |
| Depositphotos.com | Pixabay | Freepick |
| StockAdobe.com | Stockvault | |
| Pexels | ||
| Picjumbo | ||
| Pikwizard | ||
| Rawpixel | ||
| Reshot |
In our next section, you will find 10 ideas on different types of LinkedIn cover photos depending on the message you wish to get across with it.
LINKEDIN BACKGROUND PHOTO: BEST PRACTICES WITH EXAMPLES
As mentioned above, your LinkedIn background photo should be complementary to your profile picture and headline, and, together with other sections of your LinkedIn header, offer clarity on what your business is all about to whoever visits your page.
However, this doesn’t mean that you have one solution only.
Here’s a list of 10 LinkedIn cover photo best practices with examples.
#1 The end benefit that your customers desire
An excellent way to draw attention to yourself is to either highlight your client’s most common pain point or ask a question that you know they’ll answer affirmatively.
It should be related to the service you offer and a pain point that your product or service can solve.
This way, those who visit your profile will not only get basic info about your company’s name, location, and other things that you wish to highlight, but they will immediately know how you can be of service to them.
#2 The people you serve
Featuring your customers is beneficial because people who visit your LinkedIn profile know right away if they potentially fall into that category. Additionally, people are more drawn to images of real people, faces, and their expressions, so a LinkedIn cover photo of this kind will make them want to investigate further.
A LinkedIn cover photo that showcases your clientele or your target clients doesn’t need to be their actual photo, of course. You can get a stock image that features people who are good examples of the types of people you serve.
#3 Your location or the location of your business
Highlighting the location of your business make sense if what you do is restricted to a specific area or it’s particularly significant for it.
These types of LinkedIn cover photos don’t have to be necessarily limited to industries such as tourism for example. Still, they can be applied to any business or industry that acts locally.
On the other hand, displaying the city where you work or where you came from or that is particularly dear to your heart independently from the location of your business can work for “humanizing” your LinkedIn profile a bit. Just because LinkedIn is a professional network whose members are encouraged to connect, network, and chat in the name of business, that doesn’t mean you should hide that you are a human before anything else. In fact, people are more likely to work with those whom they can connect with, rather than robots.
#4 Objects and tools relevant to your job
Featuring an object such as a photo camera if you are a photographer can seem a bit forgone, but it doesn’t need to be! Just look at how creative, yet informative the above LinkedIn cover photo is.
Without even reading through this LinkedIn user’s profile, you can understand what he does for a living and what technologies he knows (JavaScript, React, NodeJS). Furthermore, he adds a personal touch to his LinkedIn background photo by mentioning the things he loves, believes in, and does outside his regular working hours.
This type of LinkedIn cover photo is excellent for freelancers and people who are searching for a job, as it says straight off the bat what your professional strengths are.
#5 LinkedIn cover photo of you doing your work
A picture of yourself doing your work can be a great choice if your job is actually some kind of service that can be presented clearly in a photo.
On LinkedIn, usually, these types of LinkedIn cover photos are typical for motivational and public speakers, or for those who want to highlight them speaking in front of larger audiences.
It doesn’t mean that it will not work for other industries as well, just put your creativity to use and make sure you have someone to take a good shot of it.
#6 Your product or service on your LinkedIn background photo
This is a pretty straightforward, yet effective way to tell your profile visitors what you are all about in general or at the moment. Furthermore, it is a great way to promote a book, podcast, service, you name it.
As you may see from the above and below examples, both products that these LinkedIn members are promoting are accompanied by a catchy Call-To-Action.
#7 Your career path
If you find your career path to be the most valuable part of your curriculum or your valuable unique selling point, here’s a creative and smart idea of how your LinkedIn profile visitors can learn all about it.
This LinkedIn member decided to display his path from a college to the company for which he currently works. However, this creative idea can be applied in so many ways depending on what you wish to highlight in your LinkedIn background photo.
#8 Your company’s logo or your company's LinkedIn cover photo
Some companies have LinkedIn cover photos designed specifically for their employees. This can be the simplest way to tell your profile visitors where you work right off the bat.
Featuring a LinkedIn background photo with just your company’s logo or some other kind of visual representation of your company can be a good choice if you feel strongly about the brand.
Furthermore, your company’s LinkedIn cover photo can contain a mission statement, values, or any message that your brand wants to get across.
#9 An inspiring quote
An inspirational quote can refer to something you personally believe in, it can have to do with your brand or it can spur your lead to think if they need your service.
If combined with an attractive design, this type of LinkedIn cover photo can be pretty effective and draw leads to further investigate your profile.
#10 Office space or a building for corporate, executives, legal, and similar
The above example is a good LinkedIn cover photo of people working in corporate, upper management, legal, and anyone who finds their business space to give off the impression of professionalism, a specific status symbol, high-level service, or similar.
Furthermore, if your office is a well-known building, or it has been there for ages so that it even became part of the city's history, displaying it in your background might give your LinkedIn profile visitors a sense of familiarity.
Summary
The LinkedIn cover photo plays an important role in how your LinkedIn profile comes across to others. Particularly if you are in sales, and plan to do prospecting on LinkedIn, outreach, and other LinkedIn lead generation activities.
That’s why we advise you to take the following steps before deciding with which idea to move forward.
- Where do you want to put your focus on? Is it your clients, yourself, your space, or objects that you use for work?
- How do you want your clients to feel? Empowered, encouraged, do you want to emanate professionalism, trust, or loyalty?
- Do you wish to have both objects and text on your LinkedIn cover photo?
- Is it going to be in line with your profile picture color and style-wise?
Once this is made clear, you can proceed with creating your actual LinkedIn cover photo!
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