In this video, The Offer Stage Consulting Founder and CEO Pamela Shand talks about the importance of LinkedIn to your career advancement. It doesn’t matter whether you are trying to build influence in your current career or you are actively looking for a new one. LinkedIn can be leveraged in many ways to accelerate your success.
Pamela offers a look at this networking platform in two ways. First she describes why you need LinkedIn as a part of your career strategy and then how to meaningfully engage on the network.
Below is a quick summary of what she mentions in the video so you can quickly put her suggestions into action!
Why LinkedIn Is So Important To Your Career
Personal Branding
LinkedIn is the perfect place to establish yourself as an influencer and thought leader. On no other “social networking” site can you find a professional audience interested in what you have to say. Many company leaders begin their search for new ideas and insight on LinkedIn. You want to be positioned as an expert in your field or passion. Linkedin provides a place to make that happen.
You can post your own original articles as well as subject matter updates in your feed. Anyone following you will see those updates and articles.
You aren’t limited to just written texts. LinkedIn allows you to post PowerPoint presentations, audio, and video content. All forms of media can give you the power to build your personal brand so use them in your profile.
Access To Hidden Job Market
What is the hidden job market? The hidden job market is open jobs that are never posted. The open position is only known to the company that is hiring or maybe some select recruiters.
We see this here at JobsZon.com. Occasionally companies will contact us about filling a job, but they don’t want it advertised. They want us to use our network, including LinkedIn, to find great people for those openings. (That is another reason for you to send us your resume!). If you aren’t connected to people on LinkedIn, know one will know you are out there. They won’t remember you are an expert or thought leader in your field.
You want to have access to this hidden job market. Unless you have a rolodex of thousands of contacts you connect with weekly, you’ll never be found for some of these off-the-grid job openings.
Connecting and Networking Gives You Access
One of the most powerful embedded features of LinkedIn is the access to market research. No longer do you have to go looking blindly and uninformed.
An incredible amount of market and company data is available on LinkedIn. This helps you target companies for advancement and career opportunities. If you haven’t looked, you will be surprised at the kinds of data just laying around the network. Click most company pages and you’ll see their hiring trends, revenue size, employee size, and who you are already connected with at the organization.
You can even research the company culture, salaries for specific jobs, and what benefits are offered. When you have an interview or meeting scheduled you can jump over and review the interviewer’s profile. See what their background with the company is like. Maybe you have some common experiences or interests? Having that kind of knowledge will make you more confident and poised in your meeting.
Send us your resume and we will make it searchable to over 1000 executive recruiting firms!
(Your name and contact info will be kept confidential)
Key Ways To Engage On LinkedIn
As Pamela notes in her video, just being on LinkedIn won’t get you the full power of the network. You must engage and be engaging! Here are six ways you can effectively engage on LinkedIn and get the full value of the network.
Have a Complete Profile
Believe it or not, like most things there is a right way to set up your LinkedIn profile. We aren’t going to get into that in this post, but we do recommend you get the BlueSky Guide To LinkedIn. It is the best course on who to set up your profile for maximum results AND how to build your network.
Just be sure you have the key areas filled in. If you are actively looking for a new job, put in your contact information! We recommend you create a different, professional Gmail address for this. It is amazing how many people we see that want a job, but don’t have anyway for a recruiter to contact them outside of the platform.
Get a professional headshot made and use that. This is not Facebook. Your vacation photo is not the best option.
List projects you have worked on that are relevant to your job search or career. Community service or volunteer work is important to include. If you have active or a leader in an industry association put that in your profile.
Just think of what things will make you look like the go to person for your profession or passion. Those are the kinds of things to build into your LinkedIn profile.
Connect With Recruiters and Hiring Managers
Reach out and invite recruiters to join your personal network. Let them know where you are in your career and what you are looking for. I accept almost every invitation I get in LinkedIn. Go HERE and invite me to join your network and you’ll also have access down to my second level connections.
The same is true for hiring managers at companies. Make a list of the 25 to 30 companies you’d want to work for. Find the person you’d most likely report to at that company and connect with them. Also look for the internal recruiters there and also connect with them. This is how you get the inside track on open positions and deepen your awareness of that hidden job market.
Set Up Job Alerts
Where you aware that you can get an automated email when job openings become available?
Just do a search for open jobs based on your personal criteria. Save that search and then when a company posts that job on LinkedIn, you get an email right when the job becomes available. Better yet — LinkedIn will tell you who you already know at the company posting the email. Now that is a powerful way to network for a job!
Let Employers and Recruiters know
LinkedIn allows to you let other employers and recruiters know that you are available for new opportunities. There is a feature you can click on your profile – ‘Open To New Opportunities”. When you enable this feature, it sends a discrete and confidential message to people that might be looking for someone matching your profile. Your current employer will not see this.
This will keep you top-of-mind for those searching to find people like you on LinkedIn.
Find Nearby
If you are searching for new job, or serious about building your personal brand, you are going to be attending events and networking functions. Before you go, download the LinkedIn app on your smartphone. Then you can click the ‘Find Nearby’ feature and it will show you all the LinkedIn members in the room!
You’ll see profiles of these people pop up. If there is someone you want to meet, take and minute and see if you have some things in common. This is a great ice-breaker for you to introduce yourself with. You can use the info to follow up with others, noting that your were recently at the same even and would like to connect with them on LinkedIn.
Share Updates and Articles
Pamela’s final tip is similar to most social networking platforms…. sharing content. Again, LinkedIn is a bit different. You’ll want to adjust the kinds of content your share.
Keep in mind the two reasons, at the top of this post, as to why LinkedIn is important. You want to use it to build your personal brand and access the hidden job market. When you are sharing content you want to keep this two objectives in mind.
Share things that demonstrate you are connected to the industry or interests. Make a comment about your insight or perspective on the content you are sharing. Ask a question about it to get others to respond. These are ways you can engage with your network.
Also like and comment on the content others in your network are sharing. Let them know your thoughts and offer your expertise on the subject. This kind of activity goes a long way in positioning you as an influencer, thought leader, or expert. Check your messages regularly and respond appropriately. As your network grows you will start to get some spammy sales messages. Just ignore those and they eventually go away.
LinkedIn is the go-to tool for your career. There is no better place to build your personal brand and access the hidden job market. Make the effort to do it right. If you aren’t sure where to start, or you just want to enhance your profile, check out the BlueSky Guide To LinkedIn.