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How to Make Your LinkedIn Profile Irresistible to Recruiters, with Arnie Fertig

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A great LinkedIn profile is a vital part of any serious job search.  94-97% of recruiters and employers use LinkedIn to find candidates with the right skills, experience, and connections. So, smart job hunters use the platform to tell a compelling professional story, document accomplishments, and show what they can do for others.

This week’s guest, Arnie Fertig, is a LinkedIn expert who knows how to use the platform to find a job. Arnie shares what recruiters on LinkedIn are looking for. He offers practical tips for building a compelling, eye-catching profile, as well as strategies for building rewarding professional relationships on LinkedIn.

This Week’s Guest

Arnie Fertig is the founder of JobHuntercoach.com, where he helps people master the nuts and bolts of job hunting to find their personal brand and shorten the time until they are hired. He is a former executive recruiter and a leading expert on LinkedIn. Arnie also writes a bi-weekly column for the on careers blog for US News and World Report.

Resources from this Episode

Transcript

Mac Prichard:

This is find your dream job a podcast that helps you get hired and have the career you want and make a difference in life. I am Mac Prichard your host and publisher of Mac’s List. Our show is brought to you by Mac’s List and by our book Land your Dream Job in Portland and Beyond. To learn more about the book and the updated edition that we published on February 1, visit macslist.org/book.

Ben Forstag:

Hey Mac been here I have a question for you.

Mac Prichard:

Fire away Ben.

Ben Forstag:

We have an audience for a podcast that goes across the country and indeed around the world.

Mac Prichard:

I understand we are huge in China.

Ben Forstag:

We are big in China and we even have some listeners in Iran and I’m going to put out my call again if you’re listening to us in Iran please send me an e-mail I would like to hear your story. The reason I bring this up if I’ve gotten e-mails from several of our listeners asking whether our book is only appropriate for people looking for a job in Portland.

Mac Prichard:

That’s a great question we are Portland is our home town and we are very proud of it. Much of the information in the book is aimed at Portlanders it reflects our strength. You’ll find that if you do read the book that it’s valuable to anybody looking for work. There are eight chapters and they take you through what you need to do in any job search whether you’re in New York, Austin, Portland or even Tehran. The questions that you will find that we answer in the book include how do I find a well-paying engaging job. What can I do to stand out from other applicants. How do I learn about jobs that are never publicly posted. What do I need to do to get started in a new field. These are common problems for all job seekers and the advice you will find in our book will help you no matter where you live.

LinkedIn is a vital part of any serious job search or recruitment. Smart job hunters use LinkedIn to tell a compelling professional story, document accomplishments and show what they can do for others. Recruiters use LinkedIn to find people who have the skills, experience and connections that employers want. In a recent show episode number 17 with Joshua Waltman who is the author of Job Search and Social Media for Dummies. We touched on the importance of a LinkedIn account and the basic elements your page must have. Now that you’ve taken that first step it’s time to do more. After all of as of last year there was almost 400 million LinkedIn members. What will you do to stand out in such a crowded field?

This week on find your dream job we will tell you how to make your LinkedIn profile irresistible especially to recruiters. I speak to our guest expert Arnie Fertig former headhunter who has helped hundreds of people create great LinkedIn profiles. Ben Forstag has seven practical steps you can take now to shine on LinkedIn and our guest co-host Dawn Rasmussen will answer a question from a listener.

Joining us again this week is our guest co-host Dawn Rasmussen a pathfinder career and writing services. Dawn thanks for coming into the studio.

Dawn Rasmussen:

Thanks for having me, it’s good to be here.

Mac Prichard:

It’s great to see you again. Dawn, Ben when you two think about your LinkedIn profile what’s the one change that you’ve made that has produced the best result for you?

Dawn Rasmussen:

I would say making your profile as robust as possible. So many people they just do a very cursory just one liner about their work or whatever. You really need to go in with a fine tooth comb and add as much relative content as possible. Making sure that you keep track of those keywords because that’s how people search for you and for me, my clients find me through keywords on LinkedIn. You have to pay attention to those things.

Mac Prichard:

Okay good tip. Ben?

Ben Forstag:

For me it’s just updating my profile regularly instead of one big massive edit I try to go in there and tinker with it every couple of weeks or so. The thing that does is it puts you out there in front of your contacts, they see the changes you’re making and it is just a trigger for a conversation with contacts. I remember during my last job search I made some change on my profile and I got two or three people who reached out to me and said oh hey Ben it’s been a while since we talked tell me what’s going on what are you looking for what’s the good word. I think that’s a good habit to get into just so you’re always up there with folks.

Dawn Rasmussen:

I was going to say one other thing I actually publish articles too and I had one unexpectedly went viral there’s no magic formula for things going viral. It was kind of a controversial thing I said what you wear determines your career. It was talking about how people should dress for interviews and things like that. It really sparked a pretty big conversation on LinkedIn, I think I got over 117,000 views on that article. It’s just interesting because that brought a lot of people to my profile too because they were checking me out. That is a great publishing platform is to Ben’s point is to have some content that’s constantly coming out that’s refreshed about yourself too.

Mac Prichard:

I remember that post that you wrote Dawn and the attention you got from it, that’s a great point. It’s actually related to my tip which is there’s a status update section and even if you’re not creating original content to publish on LinkedIn you can take blog posts for example that you’ve already written for your company blog or an organization blog and write a little status update about them there and draw people to them blog. It gets to your point Ben about having a dynamic site that engages people and attracts the attention of others.

Now let’s turn to Ben Forstag our managing director who is out there every week exploring the Internet and he’s looking for blogs, podcast, books all kinds of tools that you can use in your job search. Ben what do you have for his this week?

Ben Forstag:

This week we’re talking about LinkedIn and I want to share a couple of resources around one of the most visible aspects of your LinkedIn profile. That’s the photo you use and I know it seems a little silly to be talking about a LinkedIn photo on a podcast, but it’s amazing how many bad LinkedIn photos there are out there and what a turn off this is for prospective employers.

Mac Prichard:

Are you looking for nominations right now because I have one I could share?

Ben Forstag:

Well you know lets hear it.

Mac Prichard:

I got an e-mail from somebody who wanted an informational interview, good guy and I went to his LinkedIn profile and there was a photograph of him with a cigarette dangling from his mouth.

Dawn Rasmussen:

I had an executive client who had a LinkedIn profile that had him in a water ski flotation vest with a woman’s hair cut off at the shoulder. It was pretty bad.

Mac Prichard:

That’s hard to top I guess if he had been wearing Speedos.

Dawn Rasmussen:

It was shoulders up thank goodness.

Ben Forstag:

I know our friends over at Mathis and Potestio which is a recruiting firm here in Portland and we actually had Steve Potestio on an earlier episode of the podcast. They had a bad LinkedIn photo contest where users could submit their own bad LinkedIn photos which is well intentioned and well hearted little contest. I’ll see if I can find the link to that and include it in the show notes. On past shows we talked about the importance of having a professional looking photo on LinkedIn. Our specific advice for those photos has been fairly high level. No spring break photos with a woman’s hair in the background. No photos of your cat etc. I thought I would get a little more into the weeds today and offer some more specific tips for taking the perfect LinkedIn profile pic. I’ll be showing two different blog posts today. The first is from the website entrepreneur.com and is entitled seven tips to make sure your LinkedIn picture is helping not hurting your prospects. These are all quick and dirty rules for having an appropriate LinkedIn photo and I will go over them real quickly.

One, appear approachable, friendly, smiling and looking at the camera. Two remember this is about you don’t include other people distracting backgrounds etcetera. Three make sure your photo is up to date and they have a great quote here. “If your professional headshot isn’t old enough to buy a drink in the bar it’s time to get a new one.” Look the part, clothes and grooming matter no wrinkled shirts, shorts et cetera, this speaks to your point earlier Dawn. Five, skip the Facebook esk photos. LinkedIn and Facebook are different platforms with different audiences so you want to get a photo that’s appropriate for the LinkedIn. Six, no selfies allowed this is a big one I think especially for Millennials. Selfies tend to be lower quality and it’s clear that you’re taking a selfie of yourself and the image itself is often pretty hazy. Seven, Photoshop with caution, a little bit is great but too much is bad.

Mac Prichard:

It’s important to invest in your career and your job search and getting a good quality headshot from a professional photographer might set you back $50 $100. Again it will pay so many dividends down the road.

Ben Forstag:

Increasingly at professional conferences I noticed the organizer of the conference will bring a photographer as part of your registration you will get a headshot. If you’re at an event and that’s an option certainly take advantage of that because that’s gold for your career. The first part of the equation is taking a good photo. The second part is formatting that image so it looks great on your profile. LinkedIn recommends an optimal image dimension of 400 pixels wide by 400 pixels tall. Meeting those recommendations is important to make sure that your photos are crisp and clear. On LinkedIn you can tell when someone has uploaded a profile photo that is too small because their photo will be highly pix-elated or blurry or sometimes it appears like a little small picture with a blurrier version of a picture behind it.

Here’s the rub though, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and all of these other social media platforms all have their own optimal image dimensions. They always seem to be changing those dimensions every 12 to 18 months. For the second resource I want to share today, it’s a cheat sheet for keeping up to date with those optimal image sizes. It comes from a website called Social Media Examiner and it’s titled the Ultimate Guide to Social Media Image Sizes. This is a resource I use on a regular basis when I’m posting articles for Mac’s list, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram and so forth. I’m not going to delve into all of the numbers here but I definitely suggest you check it out. Let me add there is a benefit here beyond looking good in your profile photos. When you’re adapting your images to each social media platform you are so showcasing your familiarity with that service. This is a great way to show your employees that you know how social media works. That you know how to connect with different social media audiences and that you have a higher level of attention to detail, all important skills when you’re talking to a prospective employer.

Mac Prichard:

Thank you Ben, if you have a suggestion for Ben, he would love to hear from you. You can e-mail him his address is Ben@Macslist.org. Now it’s time to hear from you our listeners, we are going to turn to our guest co-host Dawn Rasmussen from Pathfinder Career and Writing Services. She joins us here in the studio to answer one of your questions.

Dawn Rasmussen:

The question from a reader reads what should my LinkedIn title be if I am currently unemployed. Hint, unemployed is not a job title it is not gold. Unfortunately a lot of people do that.

Mac Prichard:

The other variation I see of that is currently seeking opportunities in _________.

Dawn Rasmussen:

Or looking for my next opportunity that’s not helpful.

Mac Prichard:

Right what do you think of those?

Dawn Rasmussen:

That’s not helpful, that’s not specific. I always say you don’t want to draw attention to the fact that you’re unemployed. When you’re thinking about your LinkedIn title you want to think about the job title that you eventually want to have and so that’s the first thing anybody is going to see and they’re going to put you in a bucket. What bucket do you want to be put in. You don’t want to be put in the unemployment and you don’t want to be put in the looking for the next opportunity bucket. You need to be aligning yourself with your target and that will help your audience understand you.

Mac Prichard:

Lets just pause there for moment Dawn, why don’t you want to be in the unemployed or seeking opportunity bucket?

Dawn Rasmussen:

It raises a lot of questions and it brings up negative before positive in my opinion. I think you should be optimistic and looking forward instead of ruminating about what just happened and so it’s just a bad place to be in my opinion.

Mac Prichard:

I agree and I would also add that there’s research that shows unfairly employers tend not to hire people that have been unemployed for a long time.

Dawn Rasmussen:

That is true, that is true. One thing that you do you want to do along this whole process it’s a fine line but you want to come up with a headline that’s accurate and speaks to your experience but also focuses on your next opportunity that you want. For example, if you’re in the field of journalism your title should either include journalist or reporter or whatever your specialist is. To make it clear what types of jobs you are interested in or what you’ve had. That will help make you more searchable and getting back to the keyword thing you always need to have keywords in your profile. It’s important to really kind of think forward like I said not look backwards.

Ben Forstag:

I have a follow up question here. In previous episodes we talked about the importance of being open about your employment search and letting people know especially your own personal contacts like hey I’m out there I’m looking for a new opportunity. How do you balance your advice about not being upfront with it with earlier advice about also being open and letting people know that you’re available for new opportunities?

Dawn Rasmussen:

That’s a very good question Ben and my suggestion is to take your summary section use that as a way to talk about your forward thinking and what you bring to the table. Then towards the end of your summary section say if you could benefit from someone who has this type of expertise contact me.

Ben Forstag:

That’s great.

Mac Prichard:

Thank you Dawn. If you have a question for us please e-mail communitymanager@MacsList.org. These segments are sponsored by the 2016 edition of Land Your Dream Job in Portland and Beyond. We’ve made our book even better we added new contact and we’re offering it in the formats that you want. For the first time ever you can read Land Your Dream Job in Portland and Beyond as a paperback book or you can download on to your Kindle, Nook or your iPad. Whatever the format our goal is the same we want to give you the tools and tips that you need to get meaningful work that makes a difference. For more information visit macslist.org/book and sign up for our special newsletter. You will get updates about the book not available elsewhere as well as exclusive content and special discounts.

Now lets turn to this week’s guest expert Arnie Fertig. Arnie Fertig is the founder of JobHuntercoach.com. where he helps people master the nuts and bolts of job hunting to find their personal brand and shorten the time until they are hired. He is a former executive recruiter and a leading expert on LinkedIn. Arnie also writes a weekly column for the on careers blog for US News and World Report. Arnie is a graduate of the University of Vermont, Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government and the Hebrew Union college-Jewish Institute of Religion where he was ordained as a rabbi. Arnie thanks for joining us on the show.

Arnie Fertig:

My pleasure.

Mac Prichard:

I know you think long and hard about LinkedIn because you were a recruiter for many years and now you help job seekers. I know our listeners are very interested in hearing about how they can make their LinkedIn profiles most appealing to recruiters and employers. Let’s start Arnie by telling us how recruiters use LinkedIn.

Arnie Fertig:

I just interviewed a recruiter last week and he told me his entire practice was focused on LinkedIn. He uses it to advertise jobs, he uses it to search in a Google like way within LinkedIn to find candidates based on very complex searches. He looks at what people write in their groups and what their qualifications are and reaches out to those people that he thinks would be good fits for the searches on which he’s working.

Mac Prichard:

Arnie I know you talk to recruiters all the time and other career counselors as well. In your experience is that uncommon that a recruiter spends all of his or her day on LinkedIn and uses the tool that extensively?

Arnie Fertig:

The latest I’ve seen is somewhere between 94 and 97% of all recruiters use LinkedIn to source candidates. That’s virtually everyone at this point. More than that, it’s used by HR departments and hiring managers in the sourcing and the vetting of candidates as well.

Mac Prichard:

It’s interesting that figure of almost 100% is so high and just this week I’ve looked at a report from the Pew Research Center which said that about half of adult Americans are on LinkedIn. Perhaps as much as half of the workforce isn’t where recruiters are. Tell us Arnie when recruiters are trolling LinkedIn profiles what are they looking for?

Arnie Fertig:

They are were looking for keywords to match critical elements of a job description or a position description that they’re looking to fill. They will look at the requirements of the job. They will look at specific skills. They will look at things that would be relevant to the particular employer for example, distance to the job. They might look for the university training that one has had. Certain employers are fond of hiring people from a certain set of universities. They can search to see who has a particular degree from a particular university in a particular year located in such and such a place. They will get very granular with their searches and so that means that you need to have all of that information filled out so that you can come up as the response to a detailed query when a recruiter makes it.

Mac Prichard:

Listeners obviously cant control now where they went to school or where they live but they do have the ability to plug in key words, not only in their LinkedIn profile but in the skills section. What advice do you give people in thinking about those keywords and what is the strategy behind choosing them and how many should they choose?

Arnie Fertig:

I don’t think it’s a question of how many to choose and I don’t think it’s a question of just cramming your profile with keywords at this point because recruiters are more sophisticated than that. What they want to see are accomplishments and what they want to see are accomplishments that match up to the kind of expectations that employers have for the role that is to be filled. I would suggest that somebody take a look at several different job descriptions of positions that they might like to fill. Whether they are local or not whether they’re actually going to apply or not but the kind of position that makes sense for your next job. Plum those job descriptions for the key words for the skills that are called for, for the educational background that’s called for, for the verbs that talk about what you’ll be doing in that job. Make sure that you use those words in the way that you describe what you’ve accomplished in your current and former roles.

Mac Prichard:

Don’t talk about duties or tasks but about accomplishments and think strategically about the words you use in describing those accomplishments.

Arnie Fertig:

Exactly right. I think a resume is about telling a story it’s about giving a context or a challenge in which you encountered about the actions that you took to confront that challenge and what the results were in each little resume bullet. But in a LinkedIn profile you want to focus less on the responsibilities and more on the accomplishments. Make it much more personal, active and engaging. Because LinkedIn you have to remember is a social medium and it’s fine to use the word I and it’s fine to talk about what you’re passionate about and what really you’re proud of in terms of what you’ve done in your professional roles.

Mac Prichard:

That’s an important point you’re making because I think many people reflectively treat their LinkedIn profile like a resume and I think the challenge, it’s challenging for them to use the first person to say I rather than put everything into the third person. Why is that more effective why do recruiters like that?

Arnie Fertig:

I think it’s a question of being personable and showing that this is a social medium and that you can connect in a social way back and forth and interacting. When I’m interacting with you and your profile it’s you as a person not a resume that speaks about you in the presumed third person. LinkedIn is about ultimately not just looking for jobs and saying I’m out here look at me I want a job. It’s about creating relationships and it’s important to create the relationships with the recruiters even before you’re looking for a job so that you know the kind of people that are looking or the kind of recruiters that are looking for people like you.

Mac Prichard:

Let’s talk about that Arnie, we often hear from people here at Mac’s list who want to get in touch with recruiters and are uncertain about how to approach them and then once they do make a contact how to manage that relationship. What’s your advice about how to connect with recruiters through LinkedIn and how to keep that relationship going

Arnie Fertig:

It’s fairly simple to do a search an advanced people search on LinkedIn and look for people who have the title recruiter and do a geographic search based relatively close to where you are in terms of your zip code. Do a sub search on that to see who is recruiting in your industry or for people with your particular skill set. Narrow it down to a relatively small handful of recruiters. Then begin to reach out to them just in a sense of saying hi I’d love to have you know who I am, Id love to be of help to you in the searches that you’re conducting and would it be possible for me to have 10 minutes of your time to talk with you. A lot of people will be more than happy to be approached even if it isn’t in the context account of saying I know you’re looking for so and so now please consider me.

Mac Prichard:

When you get that appointment what kind of expectation should you have as a job seeker when you sit down with an executive recruiter either in person or perhaps over Skype for 10 minutes. How should you approach that meeting and what kind of results should you expect to get from it?

Arnie Fertig:

As an internet working meeting it’s about building a relationship and building a relationship isn’t just you’ve got, I need, therefore give me. It’s about what can I do for you. It’s about trying to understand the prospective and the needs of the other person. You want to find out what kind of searches the recruiter does, what kind of people does he or she look for on a regular basis. Offer to make connections for them when you can. At the same time the recruiter will likely ask you that’s great I really appreciate that and tell me also about you. Then you want to be able to succinctly provide in a nutshell, in a sentence or two, your own personal branding statement. Hi I’m a _______ ________ career person and I’m particularly adept at doing such and such and my proudest accomplishments are such and such. Stop let the recruiter then come in and ask more questions and find out more about what it is that he or she is looking to find out for you.

Mac Prichard:

Think about what you can do for the recruiter and how you can be helpful, be clear about what you can offer in terms of your experience and skills and then listen and engage the recruiter in a conversation about how you might work together.

Arnie Fertig:

Exactly it’s about building relationships, having conversations not just capturing 10 minutes of somebody’s time and haranguing them with your story and expecting them to help you.

Mac Prichard:

What’s your best advice Arnie about how to keep that relationship going after you have that conversation?

Arnie Fertig:

From time to time you might want to introduce somebody to that recruiter. Check out their website and see what they’re looking for and see if you know somebody that could be helpful to them. Either somebody who was a thought leader in the field or somebody who actually might be looking for a job who actually meets the criteria of the recruiter is looking for.

Mac Prichard:

Let’s bring it back to LinkedIn, we talked about the things that people should do and how to leverage LinkedIn into connecting with recruiters. Thinking about people’s profiles Arnie what do recruiters don’t want to see on your LinkedIn page?

Arnie Fertig:

They don’t want to see a non professional picture. It’s really critical to present a good headshot of yourself with a contrasting solid background so it doesn’t look like you’ve got a tree coming out of your head. Whatever it might be in the background. You don’t want to see children or pets or you standing on a mountain in a distance. You want a good professional headshot first and foremost. You then want to have a good solid title up at the top of your profile. What it is that you do for example, I see on Dawn’s profile, Dawn Rasmussen’s profile she has labeled herself as a CMP certified resume writer. It tells you in a nutshell who she is and what she does. That’s a very good use of the profile the same way you can say here’s what I am and give a job title or give a description of what it is you do.

Mac Prichard:

What are some of the biggest missed opportunities that you see that things people should know how to do and just don’t take advantage of?

Arnie Fertig:

There are few things, number one to recognize what people see and what they don’t see. Many recruiters have a paid recruiting package that enables them to see all kinds of information. But some don’t, some have a free account and you never know who’s who. You want to make sure that if you come up as a third degree connection to somebody else’s search where your name and your contact information will be blocked you want to make yourself find-able. The first thing you want to do in your summary is to give your name and your e-mail address. Not your address, not your phone number, not your social security number, and not your visa number. Just your name and your e-mail address so that somebody if they’re interested in what they see in you will be able to reach out and to contact you directly.

You then want to make sure as you go through the rest of the LinkedIn profile that you fill in all of the possible fields, all of the possible sections of your profile. You can list up to 50 skills you should do that. You can list your publications and your certifications and your experience and when you come to talk about the positions that you currently have and you had in the past you want to focus on giving people a sense of the size and scope and scale of what it is you’ve done and the accomplishments that you’ve made. You want to feel it in you don’t want to just leave your company and job title, otherwise nobody knows what you do or how you compare to anybody else who works in a similar company or has a similar job title.

I think it’s very important for people to understand that using LinkedIn isn’t just about putting out a profile. It’s also about being active on it. Using it as a networking tool online to create relationships. It’s about interacting with the people that you’re already connected to and continuing to build your network. It’s important to understand that there are multiple ways to find jobs on LinkedIn. Not only on jobs tab which is essentially a paid job board but also in your home page on your scroll on the homepage as you’re connected to a lot of people especially recruiters and people who tend to do hiring. HR folks you’ll see that they will often just put a a simple post up that they’re looking for so and so or such and such and those come scrolling by so it’s important to check that.

It’s important to check out the jobs that are listed in the various groups that you might belong to. Again you can be in 50 groups you should be in what I think of as a basket of basket of groups. There’s groups based on your locality, groups based on your title or your industry. Groups based on your skill set, groups based on your outside interests or your alumni groups from colleges and universities that you’ve attended. There is all different kinds of groups and you should be in some of each of those kinds of groups. Within each group there is a job tab to look at that and see what jobs are posted there. Those jobs are not necessarily going to be found on the large job tab at the top of the LinkedIn portal. Those jobs are just to be seen by the people in the group and often it’s a way that recruiters and HR people have of finding just a very small talent pool of highly qualified individuals for the specific search that they’re doing. They don’t want to be bothered by having to go through 500 resumes that everybody else is sending in.

Mac Prichard:

There is a whole universe of niche job boards out there at LinkedIn that are just hiding in plain sight and they are not that hard to find but you do have to know where to look.

Arnie Fertig:

Right.

Mac Prichard:

Well thank Arnie, tell us what’s coming up next for you.

Arnie Fertig:

I’m putting out an eBook, it’s available actually to people who are listening to this podcast on how to booster interviewing skills to get a job. I’m going to be publishing that soon but as an advance to that anybody who is listening to this podcast can get that free and immediately.

Mac Prichard:

Great and the URL for that which you were kind enough to send me before the show is info.jobhuntercoach.com/dreamjob. We will be sure to include that in the show notes. To learn more about Arnie visit jobhuntercoach.com, you can also connect with him on LinkedIn. You accept LinkedIn connections you told me Arnie.

Arnie Fertig:

Absolutely.

Mac Prichard:

We will include those links in the show notes. Thank you Arnie for joining us.

Arnie Fertig:

It’s been my pleasure thank you Mac for inviting me.

Mac Prichard:

Welcome back to the Mac’s List studio. Dawn, Ben what were some of the key takeaways for you from my conversation with Arnie?

Ben Forstag:

I think Arnie had a lot of good points, the one that I thought that was really astute was including your name and your e-mail address in the first line of your summary. I know I use LinkedIn a lot to find people and to reach out and if you can find that e-mail address especially if you’re not already a contact with that person it’s so valuable and it makes reaching out so much easier.

Mac Prichard:

I agree, I’ve been frustrated so many times trying to reach people who have a public LinkedIn profile and there’s no way to contact them other than through LinkedIn and many people don’t check their LinkedIn mail accounts regularly. It can be weeks even months before you hear back from them.

Ben Forstag:

We’ve all played the game of trying to reverse engineer an e-mail address based on the company URL and maybe it’s their last name, maybe it’s the first initial and last name. If you can avoid that frustration and just make it very clear how to reach out to you that’s the best.

Mac Prichard:

Make it easy for people to find you. How about you Dawn, what were some of the key points you heard?

Dawn Rasmussen:

He hit it right on the head this is a social media forum and you have to write and compel the audience, make them want to pick up the phone or type out a special e-mail to you. Make them want to reach out making it personal is the biggest thing. It really also just craving a constant stream of meaningful content and you can use that to connect to recruiters. I think Arnie mentioned that once you make that connection to the recruiter you can send them people, why not send them articles that might be helpful. You could become a helpful resource to the recruiters but then also show traction within your own profile that makes people want to reach out to you.

Mac Prichard:

I agree and for me the key point is one I keep running across again and again, people still think of LinkedIn as some kind of online resume book as if it’s an electronic binder and you put your resume inside it and magic things will happen you just have to sit and wait. That’s not how it works and there’s so much more as you say Dawn that you can get out of that platform.

Dawn Rasmussen:

I use the euphemism that this is a garden and you reap what you sow, if you only plant one or two seeds then you only get that amount back. You have to look at LinkedIn as sort of a garden that keeps … it needs nurturing, it needs to be watered, it needs to be tended to, then you reap and sow what you put into it.

Mac Prichard:

Good advice, thank you Dawn and thank you Ben and thank you our listeners. If you like what you hear on the show you can help us by leaving a review and a rating at iTunes. It just takes a moment and it helps others discover our show and that helps us serve other job seekers. Here is an excerpt from one of the reviews we received recently. It’s from wildiris2008, that’s her iTunes name and she writes, really impressed with the quality and relevance of this podcast series particularly the guest speakers. I’ve listened to several shows and episode two about staying marketable in the absence of job security stands out. I’ve fallen into that trap of slacking off on professional development and networking when I get comfortable on the job and Dawn Rasmussen who is with here today offers concrete practical suggestions for how to stay focused on the long-term journey, says wildiris2008. Highly recommended for novice and seasoned job seekers alike.

Thank you wildires2008 and thank you to the scores of other listeners who have left a review. Please take a moment to leave your own comments and ratings just go to www.macslist.org/iTunes. Thanks again for listening and we will back next week with more tools and tips that you can use to find your dream job.