LinkedIn, the business orientated social network is currently used by 364,000,000 users across 200 countries worldwide. The service has rapidly expanded from being able to connect with fellow work colleagues, to offering job adverts, blogs and groups to talk with fellow professionals in your industry. So why is it that so many people aren’t making the most of LinkedIn, especially candidates trying to sell themselves to prospective companies?
More and more businesses are using LinkedIn to pre-screen candidates as part of the recruitment process. You could be missing out by having an incomplete, inappropriate or out-of-date LinkedIn profile. It’s important to treat LinkedIn like an additional CV or portfolio, here’s some tips to help you get the most out of LinkedIn:
- Your headline is the perfect place to start for kicking off visibility. Located right beneath your name, you have 120 characters worth of headline, for what is highly SEO optimised copy on your profile. LinkedIn uses keywords for search like any other website, so approach the content for your profile strategically, including keywords and phrases throughout your profile. Don’t just state your job title and company.
- Recommendations are a useful feature most people do not take advantage off fully. Recommendations are bite-sized references that are visible to potential employees and show the full profile of the endorser for credibility. It is a massive bonus important to have written recommendations from colleagues, management, people you manage or customers.
- As mentioned above as part of LinkedIn’s growing portfolio of features, ‘posts’ are a great to get noted and get your personal brand out there. LinkedIn Pulse works just as well as WordPress and similar sites with blogging capability and is completely free to use. Whack out your own original content and watch the views, comments and shares come rolling in.
- Finally, adding media to your profile is an additional way to show off your skillset. On your profile you can upload a variety of file formats, varying from: PDF, .png,.jpeg and even PowerPoint presentations. These can serve as a great way to increase the visual appeal of your profile.
LinkedIn is perhaps the most accessible online CV around, take advantage of it and maximise it to increase your visibility to employers!
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