How I outsmart LinkedIn to get more view/visitors

All social media services have an algorithm to determine how it connects with friends you never seen, provide you with information of interest or establish professional opportunities. Of course these algorithms are top secret and they make each social media outlet unique.

I want to talk about LinkedIn as someone who is always looking for better opportunities and increase traffic to my profile. Through my trial and errors of figuring out how to make my LinkedIn profile appealing to recruiters and professionals. I learned little by little how LinkedIn works behind the scenes.  Below I will list some good tips to make your profile show up in people's searches and recommended connections, all in hopes to increase search pop ups.

1. Keep a word document resume, a given to everyone, but this should be your unabridged version. Don't limit your resume to just one page instead it should be several pages of different skills and strong points. Majority of us tend to deviate our professional route so its good to have everything you done instead of certain field skill sets. More is better since you can always cut down. The worse situation is trying to add to your resume for a job you did way back in the past.
2. For young professionals its best not to date yourself, I had cases where recruiters thought I was much older based on how I presented information and never lying my skill sets.
3. Now this area is where we begin playing with the algorithm of LinkedIn. Most professionals and recruiters tend to begin their search on Mondays and increases as the week goes on and dies out by Friday, so think as Wednesday the peak. Here is the secret about LinkedIn algorithm it shows users names in searches based on how active the account is after it determined you fit the searcher’s criteria. Make updates early in the week so ride the wave of the week.

LinkedIn is a good tool to build professional growth and knowing these tools it will help grow your opportunities in the future.

For me I try to keep professional and personal online connection separate. I had experience when my Facebook acted as LinkedIn at a former employment and it made it difficult to express myself with my close connections. Also its not healthy having work invade your personal space, there is always a clear division between work and life. I really recommend a professional Facebook account since we are seeing it become informal resume. With that future MLIS implementing these to their personal social media accounts will help them learn how to use these tools. As students when come into the workforce already having a foundation of best practice in social media to use for the library.

There is a need for libraries to have a social presence and learn not just getting followers, connections or friends but knowing how to build engagement. What are you doing to make people following you want to talk about with you or their own friends? This is key to building a successful social platform for libraries.