The One LinkedIn Mistake 90% of Job Seekers Make (And How to Fix It)

Did you know that using LinkedIn as a resume placeholder costs you interviews and job offers? It also restricts your network growth and visibility to recruiters. 99% of job seekers aren’t using LinkedIn's 50+ tools and features to accelerate their job search. Are you one of them?

After teaching 6000+ job seekers last year, I’ve found that most people have a sense that there’s more they could do to leverage LinkedIn; they just don’t know how or what that looks like.

In this post, you’ll learn why using LinkedIn as a resume placeholder hinders your job search and discover five new features you can take advantage of to double your interview invitations from recruiters, grow your network 4x, and connect with hiring managers.

If you want to discover how to message hiring managers so they’ll actually respond and how to utilize the other 50+ features LinkedIn has to leverage in your job search, I teach these topics as part of my LinkedIn Unlocked Course.

Are you using LinkedIn as a resume placeholder?

Karen, a Communications Manager, was using LinkedIn as a resume placeholder. She’d been job searching for about 5 months and received no interest, interviews, or offers. Manley, a Sr. Technology Program Manager, used LinkedIn more like Facebook or Twitter — to keep up with colleagues. Both Karen and Manley sensed there was more they could do to make their time on LinkedIn even more effective. They just weren’t sure what that looked like.

Using LinkedIn as a resume placeholder costs you interviews, job offers, and visibility with recruiters. It also leaves the hidden job market untapped and fails to give you the best advantage in your job search. Did you know 7 people are hired on LinkedIn every minute in 2024? Yes, in this crazy market. And that’s not all coming from job postings.

A whole host of roles are never posted to LinkedIn’s Jobs page, which people are hired for through LinkedIn. LinkedIn users are sought out and contacted by recruiters who use LinkedIn as one large candidate database. There are roles that people share on their LinkedIn feeds. Recruiters even post about roles they’re hiring for in their LinkedIn headlines, profiles, groups, and status updates.

Here’s the thing…if you’re not actively engaging on LinkedIn, you’re missing out on scores of opportunities that other active candidates are snatching up.

It’s not just that you’re not seeing them. It’s that recruiters don’t see you. If recruiters don’t see your profile, comments, or posts, you’re losing job interviews and offers. It doesn’t get much worse than that. The opportunities are out there — to the tune of 7 every minute.

Hopefully, I’ve convinced you that scrolling through LinkedIn and using it as a resume placeholder costs you big time. Let’s chat about how to fix that, starting with the five features of LinkedIn that will set you up for greater visibility with recruiters so you can begin getting interview invitations.

5 features that set you up for job search success on LinkedIn

I used these five hacks to increase my husband’s LinkedIn profile views by 8,500% during his first week job searching on LinkedIn. I teach these five hacks to my LinkedIn Unlocked course students, and the results have been equally impressive. Melissa saw a 1,277% increase in profile views, Jacob a 2,000% increase, and some others increased as much as 12,000%. So, let’s dive in.

Optimize your LinkedIn profile headline.

A strong LinkedIn headline receives 21x more profile views. Your LinkedIn profile headline needs more than just your job title. It is one of the first things that recruiters and potential employers see. To make your LinkedIn profile more visible to employers and recruiters, update your headline. My favorite headline formula is:

???????????? ?????? ?????????? | ?? ????????-???????????????? ???????????????? | ???????????????? ???????????????? ??????????????????

My husband’s headline update landed him an invitation for an interview with a recruiter within 24 hours. When Karen updated her headline using this formula, she saw her profile views triple.

Add at least two positions.

LinkedIn reports that many users add job titles and employment dates to their profiles but don’t fill in the details of their work experience. This hampers your prospects of being contacted by recruiters for interviews and by your network about potential opportunities. Adding accomplishments under each position is essential. It lets people know what you do and how you do it. This not only helps you stand out to recruiters but also increases the optimization of your profile as LinkedIn parses skills from your profile to alert recruiters as to whether you’re qualified for a role. If your work experience doesn’t include relevant skills, you’re missing out on opportunities to be considered for positions.

Add a professional photo.

Adding a photo increases the likelihood of people accepting your connection requests by 9x. Also, LinkedIn states that profiles with photos are 26x more likely to be contacted by a recruiter than those without photos.

Check your privacy settings to see how your profile photo is set?

1) all LinkedIn members can see it

2) no one can

3) only your connections can

4) only your network can.?

If you want to increase the likelihood that recruiters will see it, then it’s best to set it to All LinkedIn Members. You can always adjust it after your job search if you prefer more privacy.

I'll share additional features and strategies in my LinkedIn Live on September 10th at 1 pm ET. You can click to attend and check out more on the event here.

Use skills to increase your profile views by 1,000% or more

This is my absolute favorite LinkedIn hack. This is the one that increased my husband’s profile views 8,500% and skyrocketed every LinkedIn Unlocked student’s profile views by at least 1,000%. Needless to say, it’s incredibly potent, and I recommend stopping what you’re doing to go try this — right now.

Adding five or more skills to your LinkedIn profile will get you 17X more profile views. Why? Because 50% or more recruiters use skills to fill roles.?

You can find the most relevant skills for your target role in a few ways.?

First, you can head to the Jobs tab, click on a job opening, and look for the Skills Match feature at the top of the job posting. It should look like the image below.

Look through the list; if you possess any skills not listed on your profile, make sure to add them immediately. And obviously, don’t add anything that you don’t possess.

Second, some profiles have the “More” tab, which you can click and select “build a resume.” From there, you can create a resume from your profile, and LinkedIn will populate keyword suggestions based on your chosen target job title.?

This feature seems to be coming and going, as LinkedIn has reported it will replace it with an AI resume builder.?

Third, you can analyze 4-5 job descriptions to find relevant hard skills listed in the posting and then add those to your skills section. If you’re ChatGPT savvy you can copy and paste the job descriptions into the chat and give it instructions to pull out all of the required skills for each role. Then, make sure to add the relevant ones to your profile.

When it comes to skills, you want to ensure that these hard skills are in your headline, summary, position description, and skills section on your profile.

If you place them in these areas, your profile will be optimized for recruiter searches, and your views will increase. You’ll start having more people reach out to you about openings.

Leveraging LinkedIn’s most powerful feature

The power of LinkedIn is in your engagement and activity on the platform. Read that again.

The power of LinkedIn is in your engagement and activity on the platform.

If you want your network to grow, you want to be visible to employers, and you want to attract opportunities, you need to post at least three times per week and invest 15–30 minutes actively commenting on your connections’ and target company’s posts (again, three times per week).

When you share content on LinkedIn, you get 4X more profile views.?

When you engage with content on LinkedIn, your profile views increase by another 4X.?

Put the two strategies together, and your profile views will increase exponentially.

Commenting and engaging:

• Increases your network and recruiter visibility, meaning you get more interview invites.
• Expands your connections as you receive more connection requests and followers, increasing your network size and visibility with hiring managers.
• Creates a stronger and healthier network as you build solid, mutually beneficial relationships with your connections so that your network can lead you to positions that are not posted publicly.

If you’re wondering how to be more proactive in your outreach, here are ten opportunities to reach out to your network.

1. Someone viewed your profile. Send them a connection request. LinkedIn will show you if you have mutual connections. This is an open door.

2. Someone sent you an invitation to connect. Message them to say thanks and introduce yourself if you’re not familiar with each other.

3. Your invitation to connect is accepted. Follow up with a personalized message to thank them and introduce yourself.

4. Someone in your network posted about a job change. Congratulate them. Make a note to follow up with them in 30 days to see how it’s going and possibly ask how they made a successful career move.

5. Contact gets promoted. Message them or comment on their post to congratulate them.

6. It’s a contact’s birthday. Send them well wishes.

7. It’s a contact’s work anniversary. Send them well wishes.

8. The contact is mentioned in the news — an awesome way to follow their work.

9. Your connection updated something in their profile — photo, summary, etc. You know who likes to hear that you like their new headshot? Everybody! Just keep it professional. Women do not want to be hit on. “I like your new profile picture, Betty.” is acceptable. “I love your new profile picture, Betty. You look gorgeous — great smile!” is unprofessional, and Betty will likely block you.

10. A contact liked your LinkedIn article. Thank them for their support. I really appreciate it when people take the time to like and comment on my articles and newsletters. It lets me know that the advice and information I provide are valuable to people and that my mission of helping others is succeeding.

Everyone enjoys appreciation and gratitude, even in small, simple gestures. Take the time to show appreciation to someone in your network today.

In my LinkedIn Unlocked course, I share twenty other opportunities to authentically connect with your network and build genuine relationships. Plus, I provide templates for what to say in different scenarios — including trying to communicate with hiring managers.

I? also teach my system for consistently engaging with my most important connections and colleagues. The strategies I share helped me become a LinkedIn Top Voice and reach 191,000+ followers without chasing the algorithm or trying to “go viral.” They’ve also helped over 6000 job seekers become in-demand candidates, fielding multiple interviews and offers.

I'm sharing even more strategies in a LinkedIn Live on September 10th at 1 pm ET. You can click to attend and check out more on the event here.

3 other effective ways to use LinkedIn in your job search

I’m excited to share these three LinkedIn features with you. They will help to amplify your job search efforts.?

Let recruiters know you’re interested.

The “I’m interested” feature lets you indicate interest in working with a specific company by heading to their LinkedIn Company Page and clicking “I’m interested.” Once you click “I’m interested,” your profile and information are privately shared with the recruiters at the company so they can keep you in mind for future opportunities.

This is one way to get notified about roles before they’re ever posted online for the masses. It also helps recruiters build a pipeline of potential candidates who are likely to respond if they reach out about an opening. Not every company has this turned on. You can head to LinkedIn’s Company Page to see what it looks like. The button is on the About tab.?

Share your resume with all recruiters.

Another great job seeker-friendly feature is “Share your resume with all recruiters.” This feature lets the additional information in your saved resumes on LinkedIn be shared with all recruiters. So, let’s say not everything from your resume is on your LinkedIn profile — which is perfectly normal because your LinkedIn profile isn’t designed to replicate your resume. Any info on the resumes saved to your LinkedIn profile can then be shared with recruiters, which increases your chances of getting noticed.

This feature is another way to optimize your visibility and searchability on the platform. This feature will pull out specific skills, company names, and other search data that recruiters use when searching for candidates using LinkedIn Recruiter. In that case, turning this feature on will benefit you greatly because it boosts your chances of popping up in search results.?

Go to the Jobs tab. On the left side, you’ll see Application Settings. Click it. The screen below will pop up. Toggle the feature on.

Top Choice

If you have LinkedIn Premium, you get the added benefit of being able to mark three jobs as your Top Choice. This adds a badge to your application with the company that recruiters can see. It also allows you to explain why that job is a Top Choice. It’s a great way to spotlight your profile to recruiters.?

If you want to discover how to message hiring managers so they’ll actually respond and how to utilize the other 50+ features LinkedIn has to leverage in your job search, I teach these topics as part of my LinkedIn Unlocked Course. The course opens for enrollment in September. You can get on the waitlist now, and I’ll send you a 5-video email series I created showing you the changes I made to my husband’s LinkedIn profile to help him get interviews within 24 hours and increase his profile views by 8500%.?

OK, we’ve covered why LinkedIn isn’t a resume placeholder, how to get noticed by recruiters, and three new features to use when job searching on LinkedIn.

If you enjoyed this article and learned something new, please let me know by liking it and commenting below with “helpful” if it was helpful to you.

Now that you know how to get more interview invitations, what about doubling your network size or messaging hiring managers? My LinkedIn Unlocked course will help you with that.

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