1) Review Your LinkedIn Recruiter Profile and Set Your House In Order
By far the most important thing for you to do on LinkedIn is to improve your own profile as much as possible. That means everything, including…
- A professional looking photo/logo
- A 120 character tagline that perfectly encapsulates what you do
- A bio for jobseekers to read that’ll convince them you’re the right recruiter for them
- Regular posts and content
It’s absolutely vital that everything is as keyword rich as possible, so that you’re more visible in search. And there’s no point trying to improve your outreach if you don’t have anything in your profile for candidates to engage with. So before you go about trying to reach more people, make your profile as appealing as it possible can be!
2) Direct CRM-LinkedIn Integration
The absolute central part of any outreach campaign is your content, and how you share that across the internet. LinkedIn is no different to Facebook or Twitter, in that you want your posts to reach as wide an audience as possible. With a CRM that integrates directly with LinkedIn, you can do all sorts of interesting things that help you do just that.
You can post directly through your CRM, on as many platforms as you like, all at once. If you still want to run the accounts separately, you can also share Twitter or Facebook posts on LinkedIn, again through your CRM. This will help you reach more people on the platform that really counts when it comes to recruitment.
3) Have You Gone Premium?
A little change of pace here, with a tip that’s not necessarily linked to CRMs! LinkedIn Premium is a tool that anyone can make use of, and that helps you get more out of the LinkedIn experience. With LinkedIn Premium’s recruiter account, you can filter for talent, as well as save previous searches. Just as important is the ability to see who’s been looking at your profile. You can get a better idea of who’s interested in what you’re posting, and reach out to them proactively if you’d like through InMail, even if you’re not connected to them.
4) Use A/B Testing To See What Boosts Outreach, And What Doesn’t
When you have your content in place, it’s crucial not to stop there. Once your content is finished, you have to use A/B testing to see what works, and what doesn’t. Let’s say you want to use two different approaches. It could be long form content versus short snippets, or listicles versus guides. It doesn’t matter. What does matter is that you can use your CRM to see how people interact with the posts, and which engages with users better. Better content means more outreach!
The same goes for your messages. Whether you’re using InMail to contact anybody you like, or if you’re only messaging users you’re already connected with, getting your initial contact right matters. You can use A/B testing again to see which scripted messages get the most responses, and which get the most positive responses. Again, you can fine-tune your approach over time until you have it perfect. That’s guaranteed to net you more hires.
5) Connect Wisely
LinkedIn is all about your connections. If yours is a small firm that would rather not pay for LinkedIn Recruiter or LinkedIn Business Plus (and therefore you can’t use InMail), you have to connect to as many people as possible. But it’s not just about spamming connection requests left right and centre. You have to connect to the people that matter: the influencers, the ‘thought leaders’ and ‘gurus’.
Why? Because through these people, you have access to thousands of connections. If you connect to a random person with ten connections, that’s not so useful. Through users who have thousands of connections, you can potentially access thousands more users and try to connect with the people that matter.
6) Clip And Collect Info On Candidates
Finally, you can start thinking about the candidates you’re considering for a position! There’s no point connecting to hundreds and hundreds of LinkedIn users if you don’t know anything about them. With a CRM, you can remember more about each and every candidate you connect with or interact with. When you browse the internet through your CRM, you can highlight, copy and save snippets of information to store for later. You can use that information during the hiring process, or save it for later and consider that candidate for a future position. You can do the same with messages sent between your account and another LinkedIn user’s account, too. Just make sure to keep compliant!
So there you go! There are plenty more tips to be had out there: etiquette, creating or joining groups, analytics and more. But if you start off with these six tips and a trusty CRM by your side, you’ll be increasing your outreach in no time.