With over 738 million members around the world, LinkedIn has become the leading social media platform for professionals. Everyday it is used to network, research, and browse available jobs. While it has proved exceptionally valuable for job-hunters, it has also allowed recruiters and hiring managers to more easily find top talent. A 2016 Jobvite survey indicates “87% of recruiters regularly use LinkedIn.”
So, how can YOU harness LinkedIn to unlock the next phase of your career?
If you’re familiar with LinkedIn, you’ve probably already got a handle on the basics. Choose a professional profile picture; make sure your profile is completed and up-to-date; be personable and respectful in your interactions with others; and share your accomplishments.
This week’s Ingenio webinar discussed how to best network on LinkedIn. If you missed it, register for next week’s here. We’ll be showing you how to best get the attention of a recruiter.
BUT, there are also some nifty tips and tricks to give you a leg up on the millions of other LinkedIn members hunting for jobs. Here are five LinkedIn tips and tricks you didn’t know about that are going to help get you hired.
Using LinkedIn to Stand Out
1. LET THE PEOPLE KNOW
To kick things off, here’s two LinkedIn tricks and tips for the price of one.
Part one: the job alert. So, you’re searching for a job on LinkedIn. Let’s say you type in “Product Manager” into the title search bar and “Dublin, Ireland” into the location search bar. You’re confident that this is the job you are looking for and the location you want to work in. You click “Search” and a list of results unfurls before you. At the top of that list is a button that says “Job Alerts.” By turning job alerts on, you’ll be notified of new jobs that fall under the category of Product Manager in Dublin, Ireland. This means you won’t have to return to search the same criteria over and over again. LinkedIn will let you know when you should be paying attention!
Part two: Now that job alerts are turned on, go to your Settings & Privacy tab. Under “Job Seeking Preferences” you’ll find a switch that will allow you to “Signal your interest to recruiters.” Turn that function on and recruiters from companies that fall under the criteria indicated in your job alert (and only them) will now be able to see that you’re interested in a position as Project Manager in Dublin, Ireland. This makes it far more likely that a hiring manager will reach out to you.
2. THE POWER OF A PRIVATE MESSAGE
If you want to appear more on a specific connection’s LinkedIn feed, send them a private message. When you private message someone on LinkedIn, your posts will feature on their feed more often. Why does this happen? It’s thanks to the LinkedIn algorithm! At Ingenio, we always emphasize the importance of making yourself known to hiring managers. It shows you’re interested, personable, and it distinguishes you from the rest of the applicants. There’s an old adage you might’ve heard of: “Out of sight, out of mind.” Well, it holds true in the application process. This little LinkedIn algorithm hack is a way to stay on the mind of the hiring manager’s at the companies you’re interested in or applying to! But, remember, don’t badger them. Hiring managers are busy people and won’t take kindly to having their time consumed unnecessarily. Be polite and strategic!
3. FEATURE A POST
According to a study by Kinsta: “Only 1% of LinkedIn’s 260 million monthly users share posts.” And that 1% nets about 9 billion impressions. What does this mean for you? This is an opportunity to get your name, story, and experiences on the radar of other LinkedIn users. If only 1% of people are netting 9 billion impressions, posting means you can stand out from your peers. Now, when you do decide to share that post, we recommend you “feature” it. To feature a post, go to the “Featured” section of your LinkedIn profile and click “Add feature.” Ideally, the post should reflect your experiences and interests. If it points to a success or accomplishment? All the better. By featuring a post or article, hiring managers can read about you and what you’ve done when they come across your profile.
4. THE BOOLEAN SEARCH
With Boolean Search you can combine keywords with modifiers like AND or NOT to strategically narrow or broaden your LinkedIn search parameters. It is really handy when you’re looking for specific positions or specific people to network with.
- Quoted searches: If you’re searching for a certain job title or position, enclose it in quotation marks. For example, if you know you want to become a senior project manager, type “senior project manager” into the LinkedIn search bar. This will eliminate any jobs that don’t specifically contain the phrase.
- NOT searches: By typing the word NOT immediately before a phrase, you can exclude it from the search results. Say you want to become an engineer, but you know you aren’t interested in managing other people. By typing “engineer NOT manager” into the LinkedIn search bar, you’ll get results for engineering positions that don’t contain the phrase “manager.”
- OR searches: By typing the word OR in between phrases, you can broaden your search results. For example, if you’re searching for a role in marketing or advertising, but you don’t know exactly what you’d like to do within those fields, search “marketing OR advertising OR business strategy” to get a wide range of results.
- AND searches: When searching for something that fits multiple criteria, type the word AND in between phrases. Say you want a job doing business-to-business marketing. By typing in “Marketing AND B2B” into the search bar, you’ll be able to see all of the jobs available that fit these criteria.
- Parenthetical searches: When your search gets a little complex, parentheses can help to specify what you’re looking for. For example, to find people who have “B2B Marketing” in their profiles, but exclude “assistant to VP” or VPs, type B2B Marketing NOT (assistant OR VP).
5. INSTANT FEEDBACK ON YOUR RESUME AND PROFILE
Resume Worded is a great tool for quick analysis and feedback on your resume and LinkedIn profile. Simply upload your resume in PDF format and Resume Worded’s AI-powered platform parses the information, analyzes it, compares it with other resumes, and gives you a score out of 100. It also tells you how you can improve. To have your LinkedIn profile analyzed, you’ll have to first download your profile in PDF format. To do so, go to your profile page and click the “More” button underneath your headline. A drop-down menu will appear. Click “Save to PDF” to download a neatly-formatted summary of your profile that you can upload to Resume Worded for analysis.
However, while Resume Worded is a convenient way to identify glaring errors and areas for improvement in your resume and LinkedIn profile, we recommend the analysis of a real-life recruitment professional. Where can you find that, you ask? Contact Ingenio CEO Rob Magee to schedule a 1-2-1 Personalized Career Coaching session. These tips and tricks might help optimize your LinkedIn presence, but Rob’s tips and tricks will ultimately land you that job.
LinkedIn has fast become an essential tool for the professional world. These five tips and tricks will help you stand out from other LinkedIn members searching for jobs. To find out more about the importance of LinkedIn in building your personal brand, register for our weekly webinar with Ingenio CEO Rob Magee.
Written by Aidan O’Driscoll
