17 Ways To Post On LinkedIn To Get Noticed

Robin Ryan

Andrew is a Baby Boomer and Director at a Fortune 500 company that I was working with last week to write his LinkedIn profile when I asked him why he didn’t post on LinkedIn. He was trying to get more attention for himself while looking for a specific kind of job. He has never posted before and needed some guidance on exactly what to put out there. I turned to Hannah Morgan, a guru of job search information.

Before becoming a job search strategist and facilitator, Morgan of Rochester New York spent time working in HR recruiting where a lot of hiring was going on. She also worked for Lee Hecht Harrison doing outplacement classes and I asked for her advice.

I asked why people don’t post and she noted three reasons:

#1 they don’t know what to post

#2 they worry it’s self-promotion

#3 they don’t realize it is important to post and share with their network

The easiest thing to do is post about your job, occupation, your company, your industry and share that with your network. If you found it on LinkedIn, then just re-share it. A good place to find articles is Twitter. Also, consider the following business newsfeeds and be the first to post big business news. You need to be fast on these within the first couple hours of when the story breaks. Mergers, Acquisitions, major new product releases. I recommend you follow the NY Times and Bloomberg. You must add a comment before you post. Pick out a key point or simply ask a question.

Why take the time to post

When you share it shows up in the news feed of all the people that you’re connected to. This keeps you up-to-date with your group and the shares can engage others and get you on the radar of people in front of your network. It might also attract the attention of a recruiter or HR person.

One misstep to avoid is do not share anything negative on social media. Always say something positive, for example, maybe your company is doing a layoff don’t post “oh my old company downsizing again.” Remember words live forever on social media so be overly cautious about what you put out there, Morgan recommends.

People using LinkedIn expect to see posts in their feed that are professional (work-related), helpful, educational, useful, and/or informative.

What to Post
Are you looking for ideas for what to post on LinkedIn? Morgan offered 16 different types of status updates you can adapt and use.

1. Ask a question. Start a conversation about something in your field or industry or ask for advice. You want to get comments to your questions as this keeps the post live in other people’s feed. 

2. Use hashtags. If you want to make sure that people notice the content of what you’re posting, just use hashtags. You can use up to three. so if you are writing about the company say for example your writing about T-Mobile you would do #TMobile or if you’re writing about your industry you would do #finance as this allows your information to get more attention and possibly a recruiter might be looking for it.

3. Share a Video. You may not feel comfortable on camera, but you can share a video that educates or inspires.

See all 17 ways and the complete Forbes article