Your colleagues are getting excellent results from LinkedIn recruiting while you’re being ignored by prospects left and right. So it’s time to ask yourself—what am I doing wrong?
Recruiting on LinkedIn may sound easy, but a few wrong moves can quickly turn off potential talent, especially with today’s talent shortage.
But what are those recruiters doing differently who are getting a ton of leads through their LinkedIn recruiting process?
They avoid the most overlooked mistakes made by recruiters—which is what we’ll cover.
Top 5 Mistakes to Avoid for LinkedIn Recruiting
We all make mistakes, but often we don’t realize their implications. If you expect to improve your LinkedIn recruiting process, recognizing certain faults is the first step.
1. Sending Impersonal Messages
With recruitment automation making life easier, recruiters heavily rely on automated candidate communication. This may seem the easiest way to go about recruiting, but it won’t necessarily bring the best results.
If you’re communicating with candidates through LinkedIn, you’ll be surprised to know that personalized InMails perform 15% better than generalized messages.
The trick is to show candidates that you’ve been through their profiles and are genuinely interested in them for future prospects. In fact, 58% of professionals state that generic messages are one of the top reasons for ignoring recruiters.
If you want to grab a prospect’s attention, mention something that would interest them instead of just trying to sell a role to them.
2. Having a Complicated Application Process
In recent years, there’s been a 20% increase in candidate drop-offs from the hiring process, and a complicated application process is one of the biggest reasons for this.
Job seekers today are busy more than ever before, so respect their time by keeping your application process short and to the point. No one wants to sit through an application with countless questions.
If you can keep your process under 5 minutes, you’re looking at a 350% increase in candidate application rates!
Ultimately, you should save the complex questions for the later hiring stages. Your application should be as simple as possible to ensure a satisfying candidate experience.
3. You Don’t Have an Optimized Profile
If your LinkedIn profile hasn’t been updated since 2010, and you’re expecting to attract top talent—you’re in for a rude awakening!
Think of it this way, when you send an InMail or post a job, what is the first thing a candidate will do to learn more about you? Of course, they’ll be checking your LinkedIn profile.
Your LinkedIn profile is the first thing candidates will base their judgment on. So a compelling profile is a must for attracting candidates.
You can optimize your LinkedIn profile by—
- Adding a professional profile picture & banner
- Crafting an elevator pitch
- Highlight your occupation, skills, and experience
- Show that you’re open to hiring
As simple as it sounds, many recruiters neglect this straightforward from their LinkedIn recruiting process. An attractive LinkedIn profile will make you come across as someone with more credibility and help you differentiate yourself from competitors.
4. You’re Not Engaging Enough
Successful recruiters focus on building long-term relationships, not just the immediate gain.
To build engaging relationships for your network, you need to offer value to your target audience. Simply creating an account on LinkedIn and sending cold messages and connection requests will not cut it.
The key is to put yourself in the shoes of a subject matter expert, not a recruiter. When was the last time you contributed to a group, answered a question, or shared valuable ideas?
Here’s how you can effectively engage with your target audience on LinkedIn:
- Build a community to acquire followers
- Keep followers engaged by sharing and posting content
- Establish your presence
- Analyze your metrics and optimize
If you frequently share your insight on LinkedIn groups, job seekers are more likely to value your opinion, check out your profile, connect with you, and eventually pursue your opportunities.
5. Inaccurate Job Postings
Recruiters often include unnecessary information, unclear details, and complicated language in job postings.
When this happens, job seekers are thrown off and dismiss these postings altogether.
If you don’t want to miss out on this talent, make sure your job postings are optimized to appeal to a wide range of candidates.
Here are some tips for crafting the best job posting on LinkedIn:
- Keep it straightforward and concise
- Let candidates know what’s in it for them
- Clearly define the responsibilities and requirements
- Use inclusive language for greater diversity
- Make your job postings keyword-rich for easy searchability
The more tailored your job postings are to your ideal candidate, the better the results you’ll receive from LinkedIn’s algorithm.
To streamline this process even further, some of the best applicant tracking systems automatically post job postings simultaneously to multiple platforms in just a click!
Key Takeaways
LinkedIn recruiting doesn’t have to be complicated!
Despite the raging competition and shortage of talent, you can make LinkedIn work in your favor by avoiding certain mistakes and understanding your demographics, requirements, and candidate expectations.
Ultimately, the most effective LinkedIn recruiting tips boil down to—
- Personalized candidate communication
- Simplifying the application stage
- Optimizing your LinkedIn profile and engaging with the community
- Crafting accurate job postings
Are there any other mistakes you see recruiters making on LinkedIn? Leave a comment, and be sure to share these tips with them!
Ellen Holington