LinkedIn for Students: The Ultimate Guide to Leveraging LinkedIn to Kickstart Your Career [Updated]

It’s graduation season again in the Philippines, and knowing that a lot of fresh graduates would be out there looking for jobs as they join the workforce, let me share these tips with you and show you how you can leverage LinkedIn to kickstart your career.

As I mentioned in this post, when I graduated from UP several years ago, my idea of getting a job was either to send my CV to as many companies as possible and pray that one of them would contact me OR to be a walk-in applicant and hope that I’d be lucky enough to get picked by recruiters.

Back then, waiting for hours at the audience entrance of that huge TV network seemed to be the “norm” so I didn’t question what I was doing. Besides, I had no idea how else I could get myself a job if not through showing up and doing it their way.

Fast forward to October 2016. I received these messages below on the same day:

At that time, I was no longer interested in office-based jobs, as I had already been working from home as a managing editor for a business brokerage firm based in the US. And that company also found me through LinkedIn:

With LinkedIn, you can make recruiters and employers come to you

Since I discovered LinkedIn in 2014, this platform has brought endless opportunities to me.

Students and graduates these days are so lucky. With technology and social media, especially LinkedIn, you can get recruiters or employers contact you directly.

No more long queue. No summer heat to endure. No travel expenses. No resume needed to get found.

You can literally get found while you’re asleep.

Although you can definitely use LinkedIn to search jobs that you want or companies you’d like to work for, most of the time, you don’t need to look for them -- instead, recruiters or employers are the ones who will come find you.

As what Suzy Welch said:

If you maximize your LinkedIn profile, you may not be looking for your next job. It could come find you.

Of course, before you get to this point in which recruiters approach you and invite you to apply, you need to do some real work on your LinkedIn profile and your personal brand.

Let me tell you this:

The best time to start your professional journey is while you’re in school.

>>> Make LinkedIn work for you! Subscribe to my Weekly LinkedIn Tips.<<<

This is going to be quite a long article, so here's an outline of the topics I'll discuss:

I. What is LinkedIn?

II. Need some inspiration to get started?

III. How to use LinkedIn to kickstart your career: Build, build, build

A. Build Your LinkedIn Profile

• Use a professional photo
• Use keywords that you want to be found for
• Tell your story using text, video or images
• Add a compelling headline and profile summary
• Use your LinkedIn profile as your portfolio
• Add your skills and ask for endorsements
• Set the right location and industry
• Add social proof

B. Build Your Credibility

• Create original content 
• Engage 
• Be consistent
• Be authentic

C. Build Relationships

• Publish a useful content
• Share your story
• Share career and business opportunities
• Collaborate
• Introduce your connections 
• Engage with your connections' content
• Give away free stuff
• Build a community
• Join or host a #LinkedInLocal meetup
• Refer a potential customer
• Be a mentor
• Be authentic
• Be YOU

IV. LinkedIn Features That Can Get You More Opportunities

A. Career Interests

B. Career Advice Hub

C. The LinkedIn Alumni Page

D. LinkedIn Learning

V. Final Takeaways

Let's get started!

What is LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is the world’s largest network of professionals. Its mission is to “connect the world’s professionals to make them more productive and successful and to transform the way companies hire, market and sell.”

As I always say, LinkedIn is a one-stop place to learn, build your personal brand, network, help other people, seek help from other professionals and ultimately grow as a professional. It is not simply a place to look for jobs. It’s much more than just your online CV.

As of January 2020, LinkedIn already has over 675 million members in 200 countries and territories worldwide. In the Philippines, LinkedIn has more than seven million members.

Need some inspiration to get started?

I curated some of my favorite articles and posts to help you visualize the power of LinkedIn in helping students, graduates and job-seekers land their dream jobs or internships. Check these out:

1. This LinkedIn post helped Akosua Boadi-Agyemang land an internship at Microsoft (Just in case you're not aware, Microsoft acquired LinkedIn in 2016). Akosua wrote an article about how "being bold" landed her a Microsoft internship.

2. Senior student Alyssa Mangaoang has built her LinkedIn presence through content creation. This led to multiple opportunities, including speaking at VideoCon 2018, the world's largest video community. Follow #alyssahq to see her posts.

3. Although the CEO of The Muse, Kathryn Minshew, wasn't looking to hire a marketing head in 2012, she hired Bell as Director of Marketing a few months after receiving a cold LinkedIn message from Elliott Bell.

So are you ready to start your professional journey? It all starts here on LinkedIn.

>>> Make LinkedIn work for you! Subscribe to my Weekly LinkedIn Tips.<<<

How to Use LinkedIn to Kickstart Your Career: Build, build, build

Optimizing your LinkedIn profile is a forward-looking activity. Your CV could highlight what you’ve done in the past. Your LinkedIn profile, on the other hand, should emphasize what you want to be in the future and how you’ll get there -- that’s why I call it a forward-looking activity.

You create and optimize your LinkedIn profile because you want to achieve your professional goals. It may sound simple, but it’s quite more complicated than that.

Before you jump in, remember this:

You must have clarity on who you want to be and where you want to go. This is non-negotiable.

If you jump in without clarity, you can end up lost. And when things don’t work, you’ll think that LinkedIn doesn’t work.

To make it work for you, focus on these 3 Bs: Build your profile. Build your credibility. Build relationships.

#1 Build your LinkedIn Profile

Always start by creating a LinkedIn profile that puts you in the best position to be interesting to your target company. Then, make sure your profile articulates what you’re really great at and who you want to be in the future.

Use a Professional Photo

Think about how you want to look during your first job interview. That’s how you should look in your LinkedIn profile photo. If you wouldn’t wear a toga (or your 'sablay,' for UP grads) in your job interview, then don't use your graduation photos on your profile.

Use a professional headshot. Never opt for not using a profile photo at all. According to LinkedIn, with a profile photo, you're likely to get up to 21x more profile views and receive 9x more connection requests.

Use Keywords That You Want to be Found For

Choose 3-5 keywords that you want to be found for and make sure you use those words throughout your profile especially on your headline, profile summary and job titles.

Tell Your Story Using Text, Video or Images

Most people think that LinkedIn, as a professional network, is boring and too formal. This is not true. Yes, most discussions are anchored on professional themes, but personal stories that are driven or that have served as lessons for someone’s career or business, have a place on LinkedIn, too! 

One of the best ways to differentiate yourself from the pack is to tell your story. You could share your values. Your passions. Your aspiration. Your journey. Use the content type you’re most comfortable with -- be it text, videos or images.

Add a Compelling Headline and Profile Summary

Add your keywords to your headline. It helps you get discovered on LinkedIn. Make it clear on the headline whatever it is that you do. You can use up to 120 characters in your headline. Maximize that by using your keywords and removing any non-content word that doesn't help you get discovered.

If you want to get noticed by your dream company, you’ve got to stand out and since the majority do not take the time to craft their Profile Summary, just writing a great summary or just leaving it empty could already tell something about you.

As a fresh graduate looking to get hired in your dream company, the Profile Summary is an opportunity for you to “talk” to the decision-makers in your target companies. So how can you do this?

Do your research. Research your target company and their industry. Find out if they’re currently hiring for a position that you’d like. If they are, read the information on the job posting.

Research what kind of employees they prefer to hire -- do they hire more on skills or attitude or both? Do further research to discover their culture and values.

Only after doing your research will you be able to craft a perfect Profile Summary that will position yourself as the best candidate for a position you want to apply for.

Include what makes you unique. Your values, aspiration, passions, stories. Authenticity starts in your Profile Summary. That's what will make you stand out.

Don’t forget to add your keywords throughout your Profile Summary to increase your chances of getting found. You can use up to 2,000 characters in your Profile Summary.

Use Your LinkedIn Profile as Your Portfolio

One of the advantages of LinkedIn versus a typical CV is that you can attach rich media including images, videos, presentations,etc. to your profile. So if you don't have your own website, you can use LinkedIn to showcase your portfolio.

Building your profile while you’re in school is ideal because it allows you to become intentional in your school activities.

For example, every time you have a school project, instead of just keeping your project files in your computer, you can upload them to your LinkedIn profile and show your target company what you’ve been doing to prepare yourself for the real world.

This could even motivate you to be more active in school so you have more projects to add to your profile to help you stand out.

Add Your Skills and Ask for Endorsements

Recruiters select applicants using the Skills filter on LinkedIn to find the best candidates. To make Skills & Endorsements work for you, make sure to add the skills that you want to be found or hired for and ask your connections to endorse you for those skills.

The more endorsements you have on a particular skill, the higher you'll rank in the search results, so don’t be afraid to ask for endorsements from your teachers, internship supervisors, and those you’ve worked with in your school projects.

Pin the top 3 skills that you want to be found for. Here's a beautiful infographic that clearly explains how your Skills & Endorsements are used by recruiters in their selection of candidates.

Set the right location and industry

Take note that recruiters search by location and industry. So if you choose the wrong location or industry, it could cost you an opportunity. If possible, be as specific as possible with your location.

For example, if you select Philippines as your location, you won't get found by recruiters who filter location by NCR - National Capital Region. Choosing NCR, on the other hand, will also make you appear in the wider search parameter, Philippines.

Add Social Proof

Ask for recommendations. If your teachers are on LinkedIn, ask them to recommend you. If you can get your teachers or internship supervisors to give you a video testimonial, that would be awesome! Be creative. Treat LinkedIn as a tool that can help you magnify what you have done in and outside of your school.

>>> Make LinkedIn work for you! Subscribe to my Weekly LinkedIn Tips.<<<

#2 Build your credibility

Once your profile is complete, your next challenge is to build your credibility. For many students, this seems to be a real challenge.

You might be thinking -- with all the professionals on LinkedIn, how can you stand out and build your credibility?

Always begin with what you already have, then work your way up by investing more on your own learning and skills.

Here are some tips in building your credibility:

Create Original Content

Remember those papers you’ve written for your English class or History subject? Or perhaps you had a group work that really stood out with you as a leader? Or you most probably created a documentary or music video or any video highlighting what you’ve learned in one of your classes.

You could also write an article or create a video about your internship experience. What lessons did you learn from working with other professionals in the company? Is there anyone you wish to express gratitude to? Write about it on LinkedIn.

Or you may share some tips for future seniors through a how-to article.

If you’ve joined a debate and you’re passionate about the topic, go write an article expressing your stand on the issue. Such position paper can help your future employer see how you think and how you view such topics.

Engage

Your presence on LinkedIn isn’t a one-way thing. You can’t just throw away stuff on your connections’ news feed. Make sure you also show what you know by joining conversations.

When you see a post that resonates with you, go ahead and share your thoughts. Liking a post is great for visibility, but your goal is to attract your target company and land your dream job, so simply ‘liking’ won’t get you there.

What should you do then? Add your thoughts by commenting on other people’s content or share their posts by adding your thoughts. Treat every comment as a “mini-post” that will allow you to add value to conversations.

Wondering how far a LinkedIn comment could take you? Check out Alyssa Mangaoang’s post about how a LinkedIn comment led her to finding an internship opportunity.

Be Consistent

You can’t build your credibility by writing an article or two. To increase your credibility, you have to consistently create and curate content for your network. And always think about your target company -- will the content you share and publish make you a much better candidate when they need someone with your expertise?

Be Authentic

As you build your credibility and your LinkedIn presence, it will lead to building your personal brand -- even if you don’t even think about personal branding.

In a student conference where I gave a talk a couple of years ago, I learned that most Filipinos perceive ‘personal branding’ as a way to brag, which does not appeal to the Filipino culture.

But let me tell you this: Personal branding isn’t about bragging.

It’s actually the opposite.

Your personal brand will last and you will thrive ONLY if you are authentic. Be you.

That’s the key to successfully branding yourself. Just be yourself.

“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.” – Oscar Wilde

>>> Make LinkedIn work for you! Subscribe to my Weekly LinkedIn Tips.<<<

#3 Build relationships

Building your profile is a great way to get found. And building your credibility can help make your professional journey more fulfilling.

However, the real magic on LinkedIn happens only when you start building relationships. Use LinkedIn to learn from your fellow professionals, whether they are from the same industry or a different vertical. 

Building relationships is simple, but not easy for many LinkedIn members. Why? Because most people are focused on what they can get, instead of what they can give.

The truth is, you can forge strong relationships by making genuine efforts to ADD VALUE to your network. Don’t connect for the sake of connecting. Provide value in any way you can.

But what does it mean by ‘adding value’? Here a few ways you can do this:

• Publish a useful content. If your content can make people better at what they do, then go ahead and hit ‘Publish’!
• Share your story. Sometimes, all that people need is a little inspiration to keep them going.
• Share career and business opportunities with your network.
• Collaborate on a project.
• Introduce your connections to people you know.
• Engage with your connections’ content. Your likes, shares and comments can help them build an audience.
• Give away free stuff: free talks, free consultation, free webinars, free ebook, free advice, etc.
• Build a community. A supportive community makes all the difference!
• Join or host #LinkedInLocal meetups and get to know people behind their profiles.
• Refer a potential customer to your network.
• Be a mentor. There’s always someone who can learn from you.
• Be authentic. Your personal brand is your authentic self.
• Be YOU. You can add value by simply being you!

LinkedIn Features that can Get You More Opportunities

As you build your profile, build your credibility and build relationships through LinkedIn, you're actually building your personal brand as a professional. This will bring endless opportunities to you in the form of:

• Jobs
• Collaboration
• Attracting like-minded people
• Speaking engagements
• Free PR (getting interviewed or featured in media sites)
• Finding a mentor
• Finding a mentee who might need your help
• ... and more!

LinkedIn features that can help open up more opportunities for you:

Career Interests

Go to Jobs >>> Career Interests

From there, you can turn on that button on the upper right-hand corner to "let recruiters now you're open" to opportunities. You can then further refine your preferences to signal to recruiters whether you're actively looking for a job, you're just "casually looking," etc.

My Advice: Make sure that you select the right preferences including location, industry, whether you're open to work remotely, etc., to help recruiters find you at the right time and in wherever stage you are in your job search.

In your dashboard, you'll also see this so you can easily update your preferences:

Career Advice Hub

Sign up on Career Advice to receive professional advice from those who signed up to give advice. LinkedIn will then match you -- as someone seeking advice -- with those who are willing to give advice on your selected themes.

Since I choose to give advice, here's how Career Advice Hub looks like from my side:

If you use this feature to seek help and you receive a reply from another LinkedIn member who's willing to give advice, just make sure that you reply, as well. In my experience, I tried to reach out to one of those seeking advice, but I never heard from them.

My Advice: Take this opportunity to learn from your fellow professionals. It's always great to feel that you're not alone in your journey and that someone somewhere is willing to help remove the roadblocks for you. Besides, you never know what other opportunities can transpire from your conversations.

>>> Make LinkedIn work for you! Subscribe to my Weekly LinkedIn Tips.<<<

The LinkedIn Alumni Page

This site is mostly hidden from LinkedIn members. To go to the alumni page, you can either:

(1) Search your school on the search box.

(2) Click on the university on Education section of your profile.

Either way, you'd be directed to your Alumni Page. Just make sure to choose ALUMNI on the options on the left tab.

Once you're there, you'll see useful insights about your fellow alumni. Imagine having the ability to contact or connect with any of your fellow alumni. It's totally possible through LinkedIn!

Using the Alumni Insights, you can find LinkedIn members from your school by filtering these criteria:

• Where they live
• Where they work
• What they do
• What they studied
• What they are skilled at
• How you are connected

My Advice: Use the Alumni Tool as your research tool to find the perfect person to reach out to, whether you're looking into getting hired at a particular company, or you're looking into building relationship with a mentor. Try it!

Here's what LinkedIn recommends:

LinkedIn Learning

LinkedIn Learning is available only to Premium subscribers, but having access to hundreds of courses is absolutely worth the LinkedIn Premium Career subscription.

You can choose courses from these three broad categories: Business, Creative or Technology

You can either take individual courses or enroll in the whole Learning Path, which is a series of relevant individual courses that can help you upgrade your skills towards specializing in a broad topic.

For example, if you'd like to specialize in becoming a digital marketer, taking the 'Become a Digital Marketer' will be of great help. As you can see below, taking this Learning Path will require you to commit 19 hours to complete a series of 7 individual courses including Online Marketing Foundations, SEO Foundations, Google Analytics Essential, etc.

My Advice: If you get a job opportunity that requires you to do a job that you haven't had much experience on, check if there are LinkedIn Learning courses available to help you, then take those courses to prepare yourself for the job.

I did this in 2016. In order to land a freelance job that paid six figures a month, I took a 10-course Lynda.com Learning Path -- 'Become a Content Marketer' -- to help me get through the interview. At that time, although I understood what content marketing was, I had no idea how to execute a complete content strategy. So taking this Learning Path has been very helpful. Thanks to LinkedIn Learning, I got that job!

At the time, it was still Lynda.com, which although LinkedIn has acquired in 2015, has not been integrated yet with the LinkedIn platform. 'Become a Content Marketer' is also now available here on LinkedIn Learning.

Final Takeaways

LinkedIn has evolved a lot since it was founded in 2003. As you can see, LinkedIn is more than just a job portal. It's a portal to all kinds of opportunities that can take your career to the next level.

So take advantage of this platform to empower yourself to go from where you are to where you want to be.

Good luck and I wish you all the best in your search for the perfect career path!

If you find this article useful, please SHARE with your network. Thanks!

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About Virginia Bautista

Virginia Bautista is an independent LinkedIn trainer, speaker and consultant based in the Philippines. Virginia works with local and international clients in leveraging LinkedIn for personal branding, company branding, lead generation and content marketing through online and onsite LinkedIn workshops and LinkedIn account management. Virginia has been featured twice in Forbes and twice in Entrepreneur Media, among others.