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Unlocking the potential of LinkedIn as a recruitment tool is like discovering a gold mine of technical talent. With its vast network of professionals and its laser focus on all things business, LinkedIn has become the leading platform for recruiters and employers alike. But here's the catch - knowing how to navigate LinkedIn for recruitment is essential. There's no room for guesswork or haphazard approaches. In this article, we delve into how to harness LinkedIn's power to attract and recruit highly skilled technical talent.
The power of LinkedIn in recruiting
LinkedIn has become an exceptionally powerful tool for talent acquisition. It allows recruiters to search for candidates using specific criteria. This targeted approach saves time and effort and ensures recruiters connect with candidates with the desired expertise.
LinkedIn also allows you to recruit passive candidates who otherwise might not be looking for work. Recruiting passive candidates is one of the significant advantages of using LinkedIn for talent acquisition. Passive candidates refer to employed individuals not actively looking for new job opportunities. LinkedIn provides a platform to reach out to these candidates and potentially attract them to your organisation.
How to use LinkedIn for recruiting
LinkedIn has a vast user base of professionals from various industries and experience levels. This allows recruiters to access a pool of candidates who may possess the skills and qualifications they seek. Here are ten ways to use LinkedIn to find and hire potential tech experts you may or may not have thought of.
1. Recruit passive candidates
Recruiting through LinkedIn requires a strategic approach, including crafting compelling messages, leveraging connections, and highlighting the benefits of joining your organisation. By utilising LinkedIn's features effectively, recruiters can tap into a hidden talent pool and increase their chances of hiring highly skilled candidates. Here's how LinkedIn enables recruiting passive candidates:
- Advanced Search Filters: Recruiters with Premium accounts can use LinkedIn's advanced search filters to refine their candidate search by specifying location, industry, job title, skills, and other criteria. This helps identify potential passive candidates who match the role's requirements. They can also save these searches to receive regular updates on new candidates who meet their criteria.
- Reviewing profiles: Recruiters can thoroughly review candidates' LinkedIn profiles to assess their professional experience, skills, education, and recommendations. They can also look for shared connections or mutual interests that could help establish a rapport with the candidate.
- InMail Messaging: Recruiters can reach out to potential candidates through LinkedIn's messaging system, known as InMail, to initiate conversations, share job opportunities, and request additional information or resumes. It’s important to note that the Basic (free) account will only let you directly message LinkedIn members you're connected to.
- Talent Insights: LinkedIn's talent insights provide valuable data and analytics about the workforce in specific industries or companies. This information helps recruiters identify potential passive candidates who are likely to fit their organisation well.
2. Posting job advertisements
Recruiters can post jobs to advertise openings to attract potential candidates and recruit through LinkedIn. They can specify the desired qualifications, experience, and location, and LinkedIn will display the job posting to relevant candidates based on their profiles and preferences.
Here are some tips to optimise job postings for maximum visibility on LinkedIn:
- Craft a compelling job title: When creating a job posting on LinkedIn, use a job title that is clear, concise, and accurately describes the position. It should also include relevant keywords that potential job seekers may search for on the platform.
- Write a detailed job description: Provide a thorough and engaging job description highlighting the role's key responsibilities, qualifications, and benefits. Use bullet points, subheadings, and bold text to make it easy to skim and read.
- Use relevant keywords: Incorporate relevant keywords throughout the job posting, including in the job title, job description, and requirements. This will help your job posting appear in relevant search results.
- Utilise rich media: Add images, videos, or other visual elements to make your job posting stand out and capture job seekers' attention. This can help increase engagement with your job posting.
- Leverage LinkedIn features: Use LinkedIn's built-in features, such as the "Easy Apply" option, to make it easier for candidates to apply. Also, consider using job posting enhancements like Sponsored Jobs to increase visibility.
3. Building and managing talent pools
Recruiters can create talent pools by saving profiles of candidates who may be a good fit for future job openings. They can organise these pools into different categories or tags and use them to quickly find suitable candidates when new positions become available.
4. Networking, relationship building and referrals
Recruiters can engage with professionals through LinkedIn Groups to build and maintain relationships. They join relevant industry groups, participate in discussions, and share valuable content to establish themselves as thought leaders and expand their network of potential candidates.
Recruiters can also utilise the LinkedIn 'Ask for a Referral' feature to further enhance their candidate sourcing efforts. This feature allows recruiters to directly contact connections and request referrals for specific job positions. Recruiters can use this tool to access the networks of their connections and improve their chances of finding suitable candidates who may not have known about the job opening.
5. Researching companies and candidates
Recruiters can gather information about companies and candidates before engaging with them. They can review company profiles to learn about their size, industry, products, and recent news. Similarly, they can gather insights about candidates' backgrounds, skills, accomplishments, and interests to tailor their approach.
6. Leveraging recommendations and endorsements
Recruiters can view recommendations and endorsements on candidates' profiles as they provide insights into their skills, work ethic, and character. Positive recommendations and endorsements from credible sources can strengthen a candidate's profile and make them more appealing to recruiters.
7. Showcasing your company's culture
Recruiters can attract the attention of passive candidates by maintaining an engaging and informative company page. Recruiters can attract potential candidates who may not have been considering a career change by sharing company updates, industry insights and showcasing the company culture.
Here are some ways recruiters can utilise LinkedIn Company Pages to attract talent:
- Highlighting employee testimonials and success stories
- Building a strong employer brand
- Sharing thought leadership content and industry insights
- Engaging with technical talent through personalised messages
8. Leveraging Boolean Search
Recruiters can utilise boolean search to refine their search results by combining keywords and operators. This technique helps to produce more specific and accurate results. The technique is based on Boolean logic, which uses operators such as AND, OR, and NOT to refine search queries.
Here are the basics of the Boolean search for LinkedIn:
- AND operator: Placing the word "AND" between two words or phrases narrows down the search results to include only profiles that contain both terms. For example, searching for "developer AND devOps" will only display profiles that mention both.
- OR operator: Using "OR" between two words or phrases broadens the search results to include profiles that mention either term. For example, searching for "backend OR full-stack development" will display profiles that mention either or both.
- NOT operator: Placing the word "NOT" before a word or phrase excludes profiles that contain that term from the search results. For example, searching for "engineer NOT mechanical" will display profiles of engineers, excluding those related to mechanical engineering.
- Quotation marks: Enclosing a phrase within quotation marks allows for an exact match search. LinkedIn will only display profiles that contain the exact phrase in the search query. For example, searching for "Software engineer" will only show profiles that mention the exact phrase.
- Parentheses: Using parentheses helps to group terms and operators together, especially when combining multiple operators. This allows for more complex and precise search queries. For example, (Fronted developer OR Full Stack developer) AND senior will display profiles that mention either Fronted developer or Full Stack developer and also include the term senior.
9. LinkedIn Premium: A game-changer
LinkedIn Premium provides recruiters with powerful tools and insights that can help them streamline their hiring process, identify suitable candidates, and build strong professional networks. It enhances their capabilities and efficiency, making it a game changer for recruiters in today's competitive job market.
For example, LinkedIn Premium allows recruiters to send direct messages to anyone on the platform, even if they are not connected. Here are a few other benefits of LinkedIn Premium:
- Advanced Search Filters
- The “Who's Viewed Your Profile” feature
- LinkedIn Learning
- Salary Insights
- In-depth Analytics
10. Utilising LinkedIn Recruiter
LinkedIn provides a specialised recruiting tool called LinkedIn Recruiter, which offers enhanced search capabilities, expanded access to profiles, and advanced messaging features. Recruiters can use this tool to manage their entire recruiting workflow, track candidates, and collaborate with their hiring team more efficiently.
Want an easier option?
LinkedIn is home to more than half a billion members, which can make recruiters feel overwhelmed when it comes to finding the right tech candidates. Luckily, platforms like WeAreDevelopers are specifically designed to simplify the hiring process for tech professionals and developers. These platforms provide a space for recruiters, employers, and job seekers to connect and collaborate, effectively removing the stress from the hiring process.
