Resume Sourcing Tip: Utilizing LinkedIn to Find Candidates

This article teaches you how to utilize LinkedIn as a very effective resource for resume sourcing and recruiting. Since the advent of social media and job boards, it is now much easier to search for candidates online. You can now search for candidates using specific keywords and then you can call and email those candidates in order to strike their interest in your open position.

The first thing you should do if you are a recruiter or HR manager is to create a company LinkedIn account/profile. If you already have a company LinkedIn account, great! You are already on your way.

The next step is to create your own individual LinkedIn account. This should include your name, your company, and your position. Once you have all of this done you are on the right track! Your next step is to build your network.

In order to build your network, it is important to connect with everyone you know. This is anyone who is a friend, acquaintance, or business associate. Buy LinkedIn Profiles You can even start to add people who you have things in common with and people who you share groups with. This goes into the next part about adding/being a part of as many groups as you can.

To add groups you will want to search for groups related to your position and industry. You can only have ten pending groups at a time but you are allowed to have thirty groups total. You definitely want to have your groups maxed out.

Once you have built up your groups and network, it is time to start searching for candidates for your open position. In order to search you will go to people and advanced search on the top right of LinkedIn. You can search by location, title, keywords, postal code, and company. You can have the search as narrow or as broad as you would like. Once you are done searching and you have found all of the candidates you are going to contact, you then need to send these people in mails to get them interested in the position. In order to send in mails you must purchase them through LinkedIn. You will most likely want to buy a LinkedIn package to do this. A trick I have also found is if you are in the same group with someone, you can send them a message for free through the group. This can save you a lot of money and help you reach prime candidates.

This is how you go about messaging potential candidates on LinkedIn:

First, you join the same group as the person you would like to send a message to.

Second, you go into the group and click the members' tab.

Third, you type in the person's name of which you would like to send the message to.

Fourth, the person's picture will come up and on the right side you click send message.

Fifth, a message box will pop up with a subject and a content section and you can then write whatever message you see fit.

Sixth, if all works out as planned, the person will respond to your in mail and you can further engage them in your open position.

Altera Staffing provides low cost, high end staffing solutions. We partner with all levels of management within companies helping them at various stages of their growth; addressing their human capital needs across the organization. We specialize in Resume Mining and Resume Sourcing.