LinkedIn has the highest return on investment for job hunt search results in all social media. Studies show 65 to 75% of Fortune 500 and other companies are actively recruiting via LinkedIn. Many times LinkedIn pulls from other job boards so you can have some overlap. Not every employer puts jobs on LinkedIn, so you do not necessarily want to limit yourself to only LinkedIn, but it is one of the highest social media platforms to use for finding a job.
With LinkedIn, you can find people based on similar characteristics. One of the most effective ways to leverage LinkedIn is searching through your university/college alumni. An alumni search can explore where people live, what they do, what they studied, and more. You are trying to hone down from 700 million LinkedIn members to the handful of folks you want to connect with.
If you know the company or role you are seeking, you can do a specific search using those criteria. LinkedIn works off of a Boolean search.
How To State You’re Looking For A Job On LinkedIn
If you are currently employed and concerned your employer might see you are looking for a job, write your LinkedIn profile the same way you would describe what you offer your current company. A recruiter will respond to those keywords and tone even though it doesn’t say “I’m looking for a job.” They will see those capabilities and want to chat with you.
If your current employer is looking to fill a position for which you qualify and uses the LinkedIn recruiter platform to run a search algorithm, you would not be presented to your company recruiter.
If that recruiter is using the general LinkedIn platform and does a Boolean search, your profile may come back to that recruiter. If you’re out on the platform and doing job alert searching, your employer cannot see that.
There’s a widget you can apply to your LinkedIn profile, allowing you to put a banner around your picture stating you are open to work and looking for a new job. You can also hide that banner from the general public and only have recruiters see it.
Hiring Managers and Recruiters Do Use LinkedIn To Post Jobs
Hiring managers and recruiters use LinkedIn to post jobs and also use it for passive searches even if they don’t have a job posting. They’re always searching for candidates. If you were looking for a job as say a software developer, you would come up with thousands of job postings.
Leveraging LinkedIn and Your Social Network To Find Jobs
Make sure your LinkedIn profile is optimized because people will generally go to your LinkedIn profile first to check out your professional background. It should represent your capabilities and skills in the best way possible. If your profile is not optimized, spend the time doing that first.
A complete LinkedIn profile will summarize your professional experience to your connections, current and future employers, and recruiters. Through your profile, you can showcase your professional life, milestones, skills, and interests.
Other social networks, like Facebook, are becoming increasingly more important for job searching. There are more groups listed on Facebook now for certain types of jobs. You want to make sure that your Facebook page is appropriate for job searching.
Twitter as well is being used more and more now for job postings and may link you back to a job posting in LinkedIn or onto a company website. We’ve even seen social media outlets such as TikTok being used for job search and postings. Regardless of the platform, you want to make sure everything is professionally done. Spend the time to go through your social media networks to make sure that you are presenting the brand you want people to see. You also want to make sure that on LinkedIn you’re reacting to posts in your feed because that’s how you build your currency and your relevancy on the platform.
Using Job Boards Search Results And Company Websites
Job seekers use job boards by searching by title and skills. The job seeker should use company websites and career pages to narrow down the titles that are most relevant in that company and potentially the industry overall.
Job titles are not always the same across industries. If you want to be a marketing director, that may not be what it’s called somewhere else. It might be a customer engagement manager. Job titles are challenging. First, recognize your skills, characteristics, experiences, education, and align those with certain titles.
Job seekers can also use a website called O*NET OnLine. O*NET gives cross-references to different titles based on skill set, which is another way to look at job titles. It is a great way to narrow down job titles you can use to do further research and find the people with whom to network. Start with what skills and capabilities you’re leveraging versus the job title you’re looking for.
LinkedIn Job Search Tool
LinkedIn has a job search tool that allows you to search open jobs by title, company, location, and skill set. They recently launched “Career Explorer” which is designed to help job seekers transition into a different field by analyzing their existing skill set.