How to Attract Recruiters on LinkedIn

One of the things I get asked most about from job seekers is how to find recruiters.

My answer is this: Unless you have an existing relationship with a recruiter OR someone has referred you to a specific recruiter, it is a waste of time. It’s like looking for a needle in a pile of needles.

A better strategy if you are actively job searching is to create a LI profile that attracts the right recruiters, with the right opportunities, to you.

Note that I’m not going to talk about how to move around in the LI community, or position yourself as a SME, or what exactly to write in your profile.

Rather, I’m going to talk about how recruiters utilize LI – and how you can leverage that information to get more eyes on your content.

In other words, today I’m talking about how to get recruiters to your profile – not how to optimize what they see when they get there.

Let’s start with how recruiters might approach the task of finding candidates utilizing LI.

LinkedIn Recruiter

LinkedIn offers three levels for recruiters, with varying levels of power depending on how much recruiters will use it, and in what ways.

One of the tools recruiters use is Advanced Search, with filters for industry, location, current company, past company, and education.

Recruiters can use Boolean searches, such as SALES NOT MARKETING or HUMAN RESOURCES AND BUSINESS PARTNER.

Tip: Make sure you have the correct industry on your profile. These are periodically updated and there may be a more accurate one for you now – or you may have changed industries since you created your profile.

Your Skills Section

You have space for 100 skills in this section. Here’s how to optimize:

-Look at job descriptions for positions you would be interested in applying for and qualified for. What keywords and skills are they asking for?

-When you begin putting in a keyword or phrase in your Skills section, a drop-down menu will appear. Choose AS MANY of the applicable terms as you can – overlap is not only okay, it is desirable.

-The terms in your Skills section are now tied into the job or jobs in which you displayed them. This works both ways: You can include skills as you put in a job description, or you can add Skills in the Skills section and tell LI which job to tie that Skill to.

-Especially with the most important Skills you want to promote, include them in your Experience section, in both the job description and your achievements – as well as in your About section and your Headline. If a term is key to your brand, it should show up several times.

-If you have a Job Seeker Premium account, you will see what qualifications a job is looking for and how you compare. If you can say that you possess any of the qualifications they are asking for that you don’t yet show on your profile, then add them to your Skills section and possible elsewhere in your profile.

What most LinkedIn profiles suffer from

When I review the LinkedIn profiles of people I have a consult with, it’s not what’s there that is of concern – it is what isn’t there.

As I mentioned, incorporating keywords throughout your profile is important, acting as what I like to call “Recruiter Flypaper.”

At the same time, your profile should be readable – a story you are telling a colleague about yourself. They should know you better after reading your profile – but if all you have in your Experience section is the employer’s name, your job title, and dates of employment, they won’t know you better.

In other words: weave those keywords throughout your profile – just don’t make your profile a laundry list of keywords.

Don’t worry if the wrong recruiters reach out

Clients will often tell me that recruiters offering 100% commission jobs or jobs that are not in their area of expertise at all are reaching out to them.

My question to them is this: Are you also getting contacted by the RIGHT recruiters? If so, then getting contacted by the WRONG recruiters is part of the game.

BUT – if you are ONLY getting contacted by the WRONG recruiters – or no recruiters at all – your first step would be to take the suggestions I have given you in this episode.

If that doesn’t move the needle, then reach out to a professional LI writer to overhaul your profile (your resume probably needs it, too).

It could be that your search functionality is optimized – but recruiters are unimpressed by what they see once they reach your profile. I’ll talk more about that in another episode.

Get into your Skills section, remove any skills that you no longer use or what to promote, and start adding more of the keywords that match with the jobs you want to be considered for.

I’m personally not a fan of using soft skills very heavily in this section, because I don’t see recruiters doing a search on, for instance, “Hard working.” While there’s nothing wrong with including soft skills, doing so may take up space better given to hard skills, such as “SAP Inventory Management.”

A final word – you can reorder this section. LI automatically lists them in descending order of how many endorsements each has, so a new addition to your Skills section is likely going to go to the bottom of the list.