Many people get recruited directly from LinkedIn based on their career expertise and their profiles that seems attractive to the employers. LinkedIn is presently considered to be a tool for a job seeker. You may have also updated your profile, your work history, your experiences, your achievements in LinkedIn and found that no one called up. Is there something missing or something that is not attractive to the employers?
No, you have committed the same mistakes as other profiles. You haven’t adjusted the headline for optimum keyword. It’s a fact that many people struggle to write effective headline in their LinkedIn. It’s a mere set of words that are being copied from others which may not have meaning which is being evident in many contents again and again. The headline is the space in LinkedIn wherein employers would be knowing what you have to offer. Hence great care must be taken to use specific keywords that will make you prominent. Let’s find out what needs to be taken out then.
1) “Experienced”:
Being a professional and having worked for long period it is very obvious that you are experienced in your chosen field. Your career history and job titles that you were holding surely would emphasize that you are adept in your field. By using this word you are not displaying any specific skill. If you are a student and embarking on the journey then you can’t use this word. Hence, try to rephrase your headline with format as ‘Job title, department /section’. The job title could be current one or a mixture. While the department or section could be replaced by “short description of your achievements”.
2) “Results Driven”:
Many of the job descriptions and assignments are always result driven. No one comes to work or gets employed by the company to do tasks. Recruitments are done to make the job being done in a better way and of course to get to the goal. Companies perform to get results. It’s obvious that every professional would have been working towards a goal and driven to given results. Instead of using this word, it’s better to describe the result. You could rephrase as ‘have consistently delivered business results’.
3) “Top 5% (1%,etc) viewed profile”:
When you make a short phrase as given it does not show anything about your skill or what you intend to say. It does not make any sense. You could use other words that describe your authority, achievements that can be searched easily by recruiters. Any recruiter who is in search for the type of work/project executed would not pay attention to this phrase. They are more interested to recruit people having the necessary skill or certification. Better to remove that phrase and instead rewrite describing your achievement.
4) “Unemployed”:
No recruiter would be using this as search word. Their aim is to search for the specified skill or experience. Hence instead of directly indicating your desperation, you would need to highlight your past experiences and achievements. Modify this context to describe about your experience or accomplishment indicating a positive nature. The way it is depicted will catch the attention of the recruiter. If you are in search for job then make it look a little bit professional rather than being desperate.
5) ‘Husband”, “Wife”:
Mentioning relationships in headline is not appropriate. No one would not like to know whom you are associated with. They are on lookout for the specific characteristics in you. LinkedIn is a site of professional networking and hence to keep up to the level you will need to indicate your strengths and achievements.
6) “Exceptional Communicator”:
Making use of this phrase it’s quite difficult to prove that you will be able to communicate in exceptional way. Many of us do communicate in our own style. Even writing is part of communication. Hence through this phrase you are not indicating whether it is writing or speaking. Moreover from your resume and keywords used, it would indicate how your communications is.
7) “Strategic Visionary”, “Magical Marketer” , “Social Media Superstar”:
No one can be ‘superstars’ or magical in any way of their work. This is over emphasizing and making your headline glittery is not going to catch into the traffic of search engines. The word ‘Strategic” can be rephrased as ‘Significantly”. Better to describe your achievements in a short phrase making it clear for the reader to know how you had achieved.
Example: As Senior Manager and Director for Sales, I have built trust among stakeholders and captured market trends in retailing of…
8) “Motivated”:
Everyone works toward their goals with motivation and have some level of motivation within themselves. It is not possible to get work accomplished without motivation. Hence instead of using this phrase, you could rephrase as ‘compelled’, ‘determined’, or ‘ambitious’.
9) “Proven Track Record”:
Mostly track record does not signify what is your achievement and how it was achieved. Track record actually emphasizes record of actual performance or accomplishment. There could be a year in your performance when the particular production or sales exceeded targets. This would not imply that you had done that alone. It is because of other team as well. Hence, you would need to rephrase as “Demonstrated success…”
10) “Expertise”:
It’s impossible for anyone to be able to an expertise in a field. There could be some subjects or topics that you may not be familiar with. Using this phrase can be avoided as it will imply that you are aware about the field thoroughly.
It can be rephrased as “extensive experience in software development or mergers and acquisition”.
11) “Innovative”:
Innovation refers to changing processes or creating effective processes or products to make the business successful. For a business it requires implementing new ideas or improving your existing services or process. It helps to carry out the work more efficiently and hence create better productivity. Everyone innovates when they are encountered with the work that keeps dragging or when the work slows down. Hence, you could rephrase it as “Acknowledged for creating new and alternative ideas”.
12) “Team Player”:
In any organisation or company, any work process includes a team to get to its destination and you would have been part of the work process. Hence you are part of the team. Being in a team, you would probably know how to move with different members, how to speak to them, how to manage the situations that might arise and how to handle each of them. Hence rephrase as “Adapting to ever changing situations”.
13) “Problem Solver”:
Haven’t you been encountered with a difficult situation at work? Definitely you have and you might have gone through the fine details to know how to come out of it. Everyone would be facing such situations either every day or once in a while. It does not mean that they don’t arrive at a solution immediately or figure out how to solve it. Practically, everyone does solve a problem in everyday life! So rephrase to “demonstrated ability in identifying and troubleshoot critical issues.”
14) “Dynamic”:
Being dynamic emphasizes about a person having a positive attitude and bursting with energy and new ideas. By reading this term you will be able to understand what your nature is. If you are not completely of this nature then depicting in the headline is not advisable. If you are having the ability to influence and make the change then you could rephrase as “Possessing strong influencing skills”.
15) “Organizational skills”:
Being in an organisation or company will definitely make you to learn those skills and it would be part of your work. In other words, it’s like you set up a goal and the way you carry out the task using your methodology is said to be organisational skills. Each individual use different styles to approach. Its no use of depicting this phrase in the LinkedIn headline.
These are commonly used phrases that is underwhelming and ineffective to employers as they are more generic and vague. Instead you will need to focus on your accomplishments and use specific examples to highlight your talents. You will need to showcase your talents and accomplishments through specified words which can be picked up using dictionary. Write them on your own by utilising these suggestions given and make the necessary changes to the headline in your LinkedIn profile. After all, it’s your work and your experiences that commonly available words or phrase would not be able to describe about you. Hence to bring your attitude and nature out you will need to find out the correct phrases or words that employer would understand. This will compel the reader to scroll down and read through the work history.
From this you would probably know that LinkedIn headline is the first and foremost information that users see. It’s usually displayed in search list and prominent places on the site. Hence, it’s best to review your profile and make those modifications
