Before anyone reads a single line of your About section, they have already decided whether you are worth their time. That judgment happens in the top third of your LinkedIn profile, in the space visible before a visitor ever scrolls or taps “see more.” Personal branding expert William Arruda calls this space the strongest opportunity most people waste, since the background image, headshot, and headline do the heavy lifting of a first impression before a single sentence of your story gets read (Arruda, 2025a).