When Face­book sud­denly changed to time­line, there was wide­spread con­tro­versy. Some liked the double-picture spread. Oth­ers were con­cerned that the change would make it far too easy for view­ers to access the early years of your Face­book his­tory. And who wants their mid­dle school pic­tures open to the public?

Now it’s not just Face­book that’s chang­ing. LinkedIn has also recently altered its for­mat to a new, more visu­ally stream­lined pro­file for­mat. But before we hem and haw over social media changes, let’s take a look at the details. This for­mat may just work to your advantage.

So what’s dif­fer­ent? First thing you’ll prob­a­bly notice is that your pic­ture is much big­ger. While the photo slot is still square-shaped, it will be all the more notice­able when view­ers land on your page. As always, make sure it’s pro­fes­sional! Addi­tion­ally, the lay­out of your infor­ma­tion will no longer appear like a print resume con­verted online. In fact, it will read visu­ally a bit like the Face­book “About” sec­tion. The logo of each com­pany you have worked for will appear next to its title.  Each cat­e­gory of the pro­file (i.e. “Expe­ri­ence,” “Edu­ca­tion,” or “Orga­ni­za­tions”) will be headed in dark, all-capped font. And next to each head­ing will appear its own logo.

Sec­ond, to the right of your pro­file you’ll see some­thing called “Pro­file Strength.” This is a mea­sure vis­i­ble only to you that will tell you how com­pet­i­tive your pro­file is on LinkedIn. While this mea­sure is mostly based on com­plete­ness of your pro­file, there’s another way you can strengthen your pro­file with another new LinkedIn feature.

Now, at the top of your pro­file any viewer can see your activ­ity feed—did you con­nect with a new per­son? Post a sta­tus? Update your photo? This feed is a good way to show your con­nec­tions, what you’re up to, and the more you come up in the news feed the bet­ter. Aim for adding some­thing to your pro­file about once a month.

Another key change is your new abil­ity to “fol­low” thought leaders—a sim­i­lar sys­tem to fol­low­ing on Twit­ter or sub­scrib­ing on Face­book. Take a moment to research the top thinkers in your field. This fea­ture will help keep you up-to-date and also help oth­ers learn a bit more about your inter­ests and aspirations.

My over­all impres­sion is opti­mistic. Because of the easy on the eyes lay­out, peo­ple who view your pro­file will bet­ter be able to remem­ber you. Sounds fair enough. See for your­self. For more infor­ma­tion on build­ing your best LinkedIn pro­file, visit Career Ser­vices social media page.