3 Secrets to Getting Recruiters to Find You on LinkedIn

by Joshua Waldman

Have you ever wondered why you aren’t getting random calls from recruiters looking for someone with your experience and skills? I mean, the economy is coming back. Companies are hiring. And hiring managers are STILL struggling to fill positions. There should be a huge number of recruiters out there teaming to find people just like you!

Well, all of that is true. But chances are you are impossible to find!

Recently, I wrote a social media job search training curriculum for an unemployment organization. I had seven days to find trainers to subcontract and deliver it.

So I wrote up a job description and sent it out on my social media channels, emailed it to my network, and called a few friends. Five days later, I had no one, except a few pathetic emails from people who didn’t even send me their resume or LinkedIn profile link. The one resume that was sent in was so generic that I wondered if the person even read my job description.

With just two days left to deliver my candidates, I decided to do what most recruiters do in my exact situation. No, not start drinking! Do people searches on LinkedIn.

Several great candidates showed up as first or second degree connections. Of those, just one seemed to be available for contract work. So I InMailed her an inquiry, and she responded with a resume and video of her training. She was a perfect fit.

Life lesson: recruiting is hard work!

If you’re looking for a job, and you are reasonably smart, then there are recruiters out there who would benefit from talking to you. I’m guessing from my own experience, that they simply can’t find you. Or if they do find you, something about your LinkedIn profile turns them away.

In either case, you have more control over this situation than you think. Getting found by recruiters doesn’t have to be a passive strategy.

Here is a two part active strategy for getting found.

First, Get on Search Results

The first step to getting found by recruiters is to simply show up. Like me, recruiters are using keywords to search their LinkedIn profiles. Results will show up based on degree of separation and presence of the search term.

Tip 1: become 1st degree connected to as many recruiters as possible. They are the ones making the most searches. Having recruiters in your network increases your chances of popping up based on your degree of separation.

Tip 2: describe yourself as specifically and as accurately as possible. The well known social media strategist Christopher Penn uses his own profile as a great example of this:

My job is simple: get qualified leads in the door using Inbound Marketing methods such as social media, search, and email.

Not terrible, but it leaves a lot to be desired. Here’s the much improved version:

My job is simple: get qualified leads in the door using Inbound Marketing methods such as social media, search, and email. In the first 8 months, I’ve helped to create a 10x increase in the number of inbound leads through organic SEO, social media marketing, email marketing, and other marketing methods.

Tip 3 and the complete http://careerenlightenment.com/ article