Do you have a profile on LinkedIn? If not, now is probably the best time to get on creating yourself one! With technology and social media becoming much more prolific, employers are starting to rely more on a well built up LinkedIn profile than traditional resumes.

The benefits to employers include your previous job history with references, your skills and experience and endorsements by others within your network, as well as eliminating the need for paper copies of resumes that mount up in a pile with everyone else’s.

• Once you’ve got your account up and running, make sure to add a professional photograph to your profile, to help match your name to a face for when they meet you in person.
• Add a profile headline to give a broad description of who you are, including keywords that a potential employer may use to search for you!
• Use the text fields on your profile to help get across your accomplishments (in measurable amounts).
• Ask for ‘recommendations’ from any former colleagues or managers.

Also, remember that your LinkedIn profile will always be live (unless you delete your account) and will be seen as a representation of what you’ve achieved and are capable of, so if you learn a new skill, remember to add it!

Whilst LinkedIn won’t be used for chatting to friends and planting crops in FarmVille, it is still a very useful tool and shouldn’t be forgotten about!

Tags: career, cv, free job search, job, job search, linkedin, resume