Has a recruiter approached you before on LinkedIn? If you answered yes, this means you’re probably doing LinkedIn right. If not, and you’re currently job hunting, you’re in luck today.
Here’s a cheat sheet you can use to up your game and have recruiters approach you.
1. Your profile picture – This goes without saying. A professional profile picture is the equivalent of “first impressions matter” and determines whether or not a recruiter will approach you. While a cute family picture may look cute on Facebook, the same should not apply on LinkedIn seeing as it’s a professional platform mostly centered around career-related content and information.
2. Headline – Recruiters use diverse headlines to filter out profiles or industries they’re hiring for. It’s critical that your headline depict the kind of career path or industry you’re in so that you come up in the search results. Avoid using complicated terms or jargon to not hurt your chances of being discovered.
3. Summary – This feature lets you highlight and sum up your career experiences, accomplishments and qualifications, and possibly, what you’re looking to do next. Don’t know how to create a good eye-catching summary? Here’s an article with 5 templates you can use to update your summary if you haven’t already.
4. Career experiences – This includes; your position titles, description of your responsibilities as well as accomplishments and how long you’ve been/were there. Just having your position titles and period of time you were there is not enough. A recruiter wants to get the full list of your work experiences so that they can make an informed decision of how to approach you, or if they need to.
Other things recruiters look for on your profile are:
– Your location; determines how a recruiter should approach you depending on the location of the job they’re hiring for
– Listed skills, endorsements and recommendations from people who have worked with you in the past
– Education and any professional certifications, including any affiliations to professional bodies
– Whether you’re open to new opportunities
Currently, job hunting and wondering how you can utilize LinkedIn to land your next job? Read our blog for 5 tips you can use to possibly get your dream job.