LinkedIn Loves Job Seekers

Job seekers are successfully leveraging social media, especially LinkedIn. But for many, this still seems a foreign language. Since I recently volunteered for Southwest Job Network at an event they held at Mesa Community College, it seemed appropriate to share some ideas with you. After all, social media is for sharing, caring and connecting.

First you need to learn how to optimize your LinkedIn profile to make it easy for people to find you, establish yourself as an expert in your field, add skills, languages, publications in the appropriate sections of your profile and build trust by having recommendations. LinkedIn is where recruiters search for skills, experience and passion. It’s after they find you that they evaluate if you could be a potential match for a client. You can see who’s viewed your profile and the traffic you’ve attracted. Those that view can make their settings private to varying degrees so you may see a name and picture, just a job title or anonymous. Here’s a screen shot of what I mean:

Take the time to evaluate the trends and examine who views your profile. You may find that you are not attracting your target audience…so rethink your keywords and re-optimize accordingly.

Also in LinkedIn, research the applications directory (found under the more tab in LinkedIn) as there are many tools that can be used for enhancing your profile. If you are a good writer, consider starting to blog about the 10-20 things that makes a [enter your career or ideal job title] great. If you’re a photographer the Creative Portfolio Display can help showcase your work.

Use LinkedIn Groups to connect to your peers, share an article you’ve found educational with the group, join in the discussions and start to engage your professional peers. You never know who knows someone that can help you.

If you are interested in particular companies you’d like to work for, LinkedIn offers the “Follow” option. By following a company you can get updates on new hires, promotions, employees and job postings. When you see the employees, LinkedIn shows you if you have any direct connections by putting a little blue 1st box next to their name. If you see 2nd or 3rd then one of your connections knows someone there and might be willing to introduce you. FYI-companies can see you are following them. If that bothers you, then just check to see if they have any job postings under the careers tab of the company profile.

Let’s help job candidates, especially Veterans and those in the construction industry, improve their LinkedIn profiles and give tips on how to use social media to attract opportunities. Please share this with the people you know to help them find a job. Also add your tips in the comments and let me know if this has helped you.