10 Ways to Boost Your LinkedIn Profile To Get Hired

Your online presence is extremely important in the Tech industry, whether you’re looking for a job or upgrading your current position — Your profile is your opportunity to tell a story of who you are. Here are some practical tips from my journey to get my dream job as a software developer.

It’s no secret Linkedin is the largest professional networking platform in the world and studies have shown that 91% of companies use LinkedIn to research candidates. Did you know that if your LinkedIn profile is 100% complete, you will receive 40x more job offers and business opportunities? If you want to be noticed, you must make sure your profile looks at its best and treat it as more than a paper CV.
Follow these guidelines to land your next career goal!

Freshen Up Your Profile

1. Brand Yourself

Imagine yourself in a big tech conference, being introduced to someone you admire in the tech industry. You’ll probably look them directly in the eye, smile gently and say your name and what you do for a living. This is exactly how your profile should look like. Here are the key sections you need to focus on to make your profile top-notch:

2. Image, Headline & Intro

Making a great first impression is everything. Be in control of how you present yourself when getting a glimpse at your profile.

So what can you do?

• Upload a high quality image that is professional, clear and facing-front (no sunglasses!)
• Draft a headline that is brief, readable and relevant
• Summarize an intro section up to one paragraph that gives an overview of your experience and the type of things you are interested in
• Try avoiding cheesy titles for your headline like “Ninja” or “Superstar”

3. Experience & Education

The main content of your profile, this section should include the WHY people should hire you and what have you accomplished so far.

Don’t write about what you did in your previous job,
write about what you have achieved during your work

Main strategy:

• Write down the places you’ve worked, any schools you attended and professional training you had (courses, coding bootcamps)
• Specify 3 things that you have accomplished or completed in each one
• List the technologies, languages and frameworks you’ve used
• Go over each one and style them in a way that targets your next position. If it’s not relevant for your next position - let it go

4. Projects

Did you built a side project? Did you work on a final assignment? Side projects will present you as more professional, passionate, hard working and will give a glimpse of what you are capable of.

This is the place to be proud and show off

So what can you do?

• Add your projects with a title and a short description explaining what you did. Don’t hold back on technical terms to explain how, this is the right place for it.
• Share your code on Github, Bitbucket, or any other platform. If possible, even publish them to Google Play or App Store and add the link.

5. Skills & Endorsements

As an engineer, a skill can be a platform, a language, a type of framework, a career interest. Also consider listing ‘people skills’ to tell about your nature. Think about what people would say if asked what kind of qualities do you have that stand out? As always, aim for your next position, for example, list leadership qualities if you’re looking for a managing career path.

According to Linkedin, members with five or more skills listed are contacted up to 33 times more by recruiters and other LinkedIn members, and receive up to 17 times more profile views.

So what can you do?

• Choose at least 5 relevant skills and strengths you want to be known for
• List them in order of priority for high ranking in search results
• Ask for endorsements from your connections (will get to how to build your network in a bit) and of course, keep it mutual by endorsing others

6. Recommendations

Remember that big tech conference we went to in the beginning of the article? this is the part when you leave and the person that introduced you will say a few words and vouch for you. This is a very powerful section you can use to make you more accessible and trustworthy.

So what can you do?

• List 10 things you want to emphasis, qualities that can characterize you and think who is best to testify that quality about you
• Choose 7 people from your network you know and trust, preferable colleagues, managers, class mates, teachers etc
• Suggest to send them a draft or some sentences that can get them started. Remember they are probably very busy with their daily lives and you want to make it easier for them to help you

A couple of recommendation on my Linkedin profile

Grow Your Network

7. Connect with others:

LinkedIn has a massive search algorithms engine in which you’ll only show up in your 1st, 2nd, and 3rd degree connections searches. Basically, if you’re not connected with individuals at these levels, you’re invisible to them. Think about a person you want to connect with, if you have 30+ mutual connections, it gives them some kind of reinsurance to add you to their network.

Your main goal is to reach 500+ 1st degree connections. It seems like a lot but break it down to small milestones every week like 100, 150, 200 and so on, it will help you focus and be efficient overall.

So who can you connect with?

• All the people you know in the tech industry. It can be friends, people you got to know in a conferences/Meetup’s, group organizers you exchanged some words with, lecturers you heard, etc
• Other developers in your field (Don’t know that many yet? Soon I’ll be posting an article about how to mingle and friend other developers, make sure to check that out)
• CTO’s, team leaders and senior developers in the field you’re aiming for, also, target employees who work for the companies you want
• Highly endorsed developers in the skills you’re most interested in
• People titled as human resource / Hi Tech recruiters / head hunters

Search for employees to connect with

Search for people by their primary skill

Spread The Word

Now, you’re all set to get out there. Engage with people at your network in a private conversation, it’s also a way of developing a relationship.

Here are some guidelines for the different types of messages you’d want to draft ahead. Your goal is send out ~10 every day. Important tip - keep it documented, you don’t want to make mistakes and spam people. Be prepared that probably most of them will not reply to you as soon as you’d expect, it’s OK.

8. Personal message for friends:

• Friendly, easy going, ask for their help as a favor
• Let them know that you’re looking for a job and ask if they can keep an ear out for you
• If your friend is not working in your profession, don’t go into specifics, just title it as a developer/software engineer position. It’s ok if you get something that is not exactly in your field, you can still contact the person and leverage the conversation so they will know exactly what you’re looking for, you’ve earned another person who keeps an ear out for you

9. Formal message for recruiters:

• Professional, clear, brief
• Keep it very focused. they will probably just take a quick look so right off the bat, they need to know what you are looking for and what is your added value
• Add links to your projects, if you have any. and use buzzwords to explain your experience

10. Say hello to other professionals:

• Balance this one as a hybrid of the two above
• First, introduce yourself. they don’t know you but in this case, you want them to really remember you. Your goal is to keep you in mind if they are hiring or know anyone who is hiring
• Casually mention one achievement you’re proud of, this will make you more memorable and impressive
• It’s great to talk technicals about your experience but don’t spread around buzzwords, it can sound confusing and insecure

After all this, you probably wonder how it worked out for me? Well, it was not always easy but the results were amazing! I got a lot more offers, interview and exposure after boosting my profile by maintaining daily, achievable goals.

I ended up finding my dream job as a full stack developer (Android and Backend in Scala) thanks to this focused, thought out strategy.
I hope my tips will help you on your journey to find your next position or just freshen up your current profile.

Connect with me on Linkedin, let me know if this article helped you in any way :)

Good luck!