There’s a good chance that the employers and hiring managers for the company you want to work for have a LinkedIn account.
At the same time, the most skilled and qualified employees that recruiters are looking for to fill an open job position can be found on LinkedIn.
To be part of the group of successful workers who are landing job offers and interviews left and right, you’ll need to know how to create a LinkedIn profile. One that attracts your prospective hiring manager, which could help you land the golden career opportunity that you’ve been waiting for.
In this guide, we’ll be covering step-by-step how to create an attractive LinkedIn profile.
How Do I Create a LinkedIn Account?
Like building an ATS resume, you’ll need to sell yourself and show why you’re the best candidate to hire. To do that on LinkedIn, it’s crucial to stand out and to catch the attention of your recruiters.
It’s a huge crowd and market, with thousands of other candidates. However, after creating your profile we’ll go through what you can do next to increase your chances.
1. Register On LinkedIn
First, go on LinkedIn and head over to the signup page. Follow the guidelines and fill in the main details required.
2. Upload a Professional Profile Picture
LinkedIn is not the same as other social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram. It’s more professional, so posting a picture of when you had a night out isn’t the best idea.
Think of it as entering a classy hotel – not too formal yet not overly casual.
When it comes to your profile picture, use a professional photo that’s appropriate for the workplace. You may also use stickers, e.g. the “open to work” option to show recruiters you’re available for taking on work. This can help with making your account stand out as your prospective recruiter skims past other candidate profiles.
3. Write an Eye-Catching Headline
The headline of your LinkedIn profile should summarize your expertise and the professional value that you can bring. It’s one of the most important parts of building your profile as it’s one of the main things that catches the visitor’s attention when they look for potential candidates on the job search.
Here are a few examples:
Each of these gets straight to the point and outlines our expertise and what we do in a simple, short sentence.
If you want a specific job position, include this in your headline too. The keywords you use and optimize your profile for will also be along the algorithm so that you’ll be suggested to employers for that specific vacancy.
4. Summary Section
Your summary section should provide an overview of your career, skills, and experience.
Any significant achievements you have can also be included. You can either focus on describing your career objectives or on providing a clear summary of your employment timeline. It’s not too different from how you would approach this section for an ATS resume.
5. Work Experience Section
This is also similar to how you would write your resume work experience section. These should be listed out in reverse chronological order and it needs to include the following:
- Job position
- Company name
- Dates of employment
- Description of tasks and responsibilities
- Relevant results or achievements
Use bullet points underneath each part of your work experience section to make it readable and straight to the point.
If you have any portfolio links to include for any of your work, be sure to include these as well.
6. Education Section
This includes your formal education and the qualifications you have achieved. You need to mention the following:
- Qualification achieved (e.g. computer science bachelor’s degree)
- Where you studied
- Graduation date
It’s not limited to university qualifications too. You may also include other certifications such as relevant coursework, training, or diplomas.
7. Skills Section
Similar to how you would list down your resume skills, you list it down the same way for your LinkedIn. That means including all the relevant skills you have to show recruiters what you’re capable of. It’s pretty straightforward.
You’ll also have the option to pin your top three skills for people to see when visiting your page. Make sure these are your best, relevant skills in the field that you’re confident in.
8. Endorsements
Whenever you get the opportunity, you should try and get your skills endorsed by others such as:
- Previous colleagues
- Co-workers
- Employers
- Managers
It’s a good way to add to your credibility and to show you’re a skilled employee who’s been acknowledged by other professionals.
9. Recommendations
Towards the end of your LinkedIn profile is a recommendations section where people can write a testimonial for you. When you can, ask your hiring manager or previous team leader to write a quick recommendation for you that outlines what it’s like to have you on board. This is a great way of showing prospective employers you’re skilled in what you do.
The testimony of others is also evidence that you’re capable of getting the job done to a good standard.
How Do I Attract Employers on LinkedIn?
At this point, you’ve created your LinkedIn profile. Good job!
But, we’re not quite there just yet. The goal is to land career opportunities, attract employers, and build your network with the right people.
Unfortunately, that won’t happen by itself.
What you’ll need to do is build a strong online presence and become recognizable to others in your industry. This can be done in a few ways such as networking. We’ll go through each of these things that you should be doing below.
1. Send Connection Requests With a Personalized Note
Connect with others in your industry and send a personal note when you do.
Don’t be generic. Personalize your invitation to increase your chances of them accepting your connection request. You’re more likely to build trust and likeability this way. Plus, people are more likely to connect with someone who has a great profile and sends a personalized note.
To find people to connect with, you can start by reaching out to those you know. Afterwards, you can look for mutual connections and go from there.
2. Search For Your Job Positions and Opportunities
Look up your ideal job position that you’re interested in on the search bar.
You can also use the advanced options to filter the search and specify the position and career opportunities you’re searching for.
Next, you’ll have a list of companies who are hiring for the position you’ve searched and filtered for. It’s easy to find jobs that match your interests like this which is what makes LinkedIn one of the best platforms for professionals in the workplace for finding new career opportunities.
3. Create Posts and Good Content
Posting your own content and sharing your insights can demonstrate your expertise and increase your noticeability. The more consistent and active you are, the better. As more people see your posts and recognize you, the more likely the LinkedIn algorithm will suggest your posts on other people’s pages.
Another way to create good content to get noticed is by writing and publishing an article on LinkedIn. This becomes visible on your profile and you can make it public for everyone to see. It’s also a great way to show your expertise on a certain topic or industry.
4. Engage With Others
Don’t just connect with others and leave it from there. Get involved with the community and put yourself out there. You can do this not only by sending connection requests and liking people’s posts but by commenting and getting involved in discussions.
5. Join Relevant Groups
On Facebook, there are groups for pretty much anything. If you searched for a group in the finance or marketing industry, you’ll have a list of communities loaded up. It’s the same with LinkedIn.
Find a relevant group in your industry and join the discussion with other people. It’s a great way to get noticed, build relationships, and make new connections.
6. Use Hashtags
Whenever you create a post or publish an article, use hashtags for better outreach. However, these should all be relevant to what the content is about and the industry you are in. Don’t just spam, and look for quality over quantity when including these.
7. Grow Your Network
You may have heard that your network is your net worth.
All it could take to kick your dream career off is a mutual connection and having the right conversation at the right time. There are people on LinkedIn who you may not expect that can make an introduction for you if they know and like you.
To increase your chances for that to happen, you should aim to grow your network and get to know more like-minded people.
LinkedIn Resume Builder
Once you’ve created a LinkedIn profile, you could also use it to create an ATS resume with Rezi.
It’s an easy hack to skip the resume-building process and it’s free.
See how it works in the short clip below:
Not too difficult, right?
It’s faster to create your resume like this and to make the most out of your efforts from creating a LinkedIn profile. Here’s what Rodrigo had to say about Rezi:
“Really innovative feature! This combined with Rezi's already established features will surely help job-seekers. I've got a lot more interviews since I started using Rezi!”
Final Piece of Advice
It’s very similar to building a resume, just a slightly different approach as it’s not as formal but not too casual.
One key takeaway from all of this as you continue to put yourself out there and take action is to be genuine. Aside from that, use each of these steps discussed to create a LinkedIn profile and build your presence. So, you can land incoming messages and interviews from your prospective employers.
If you know other job seekers who are struggling to create a LinkedIn profile, please feel free to share this guide with them!
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