Recent Grad Finds Job Through Her Dad's LinkedIn Account

Deborah L. Jacobs

Rachel Abady always knew she wanted a career that involves writing and video and says she was “absolutely determined to get it.” But in the autumn of 2011, while she was in her senior year at Barnard College, she felt like she was competing against all her classmates for the same limited pool of online job postings on NACElink – a web site that connects colleges and employers. When she went home to Westchester for Thanksgiving and told her parents about her dilemma, her father suggested she try LinkedIn.


“Why would I want to do that?” she asked. “I’m not 50 years old.” An avid user of social media, most notably Facebook and Instagram, Abady, now 23, thought of LinkedIn as something that her father Samuel, a lawyer, uses to keep in touch with former colleagues and college buddies.

Today she laughs at the irony, since she found her current job, as an associate video programming manager at AOL, through LinkedIn. But it was not her own account – it was her father’s. She now describes herself as “a huge proponent” of the site.

LinkedIn won’t provide demographics, but their career expert, Nicole Williams, says it skews toward older workers, who appreciate what social media can do for their professional lives, and might be less inclined to use sites like Facebook and Twitter, which they consider entertainment. (For her advice to older workers, see my post “What To Say On LinkedIn When You’re 50+.”)


I met Abady in April when we were both on a panel about women in journalism sponsored by Barnard, which is also my alma mater. During the program Victoria Passarella, the school’s associate director for student and alumnae career education, urged students to set up a LinkedIn account – something that seemed unfamiliar to most of the audience members. Abady’s story of how she found her job gave them compelling reasons to do that.

Find out the "HOW" and the complete Forbes article

10 Tips For Finding Your Perfect Job Fast With LinkedIn

A recent survey of human resources professionals revealed that over 90% of in-house recruiters hired people from LinkedIn. Is it any wonder then that LinkedIn is now the go-to site for job seekers looking for their next great career? For many people, however, LinkedIn is confusing.

So, here are my 10 best tips that I share with my LinkedIn coaching clients to get you on your way.

1. Optimize Your Profile

What kind of job do you want? Whatever you are seeking, make sure you put those keywords in your profile. Think about it…how does a hiring manager search for candidates? He puts in the job title he is looking for into the search box. So, make sure you have your desired job title in many places on your profile so you come up high in LinkedIn searches.

2. Use A Professional Photo

I’ve worked with many job candidates looking for executive positions who have a casual photo on their profile. To me, that is a big fail! Save those shots for Facebook. LinkedIn is a professional networking site and you want to look your best. Dress according to how much you want to get paid. If you understand this, then get a professional headshot down at your local photographer studio. A pleasant smile will also go a long way. No one wants to hire a sourpuss.

3. Fill Out Your Profile 100%

By completing your profile, you are 40 times more likely to come up in LinkedIn searches. Besides that, it shows that you are taking LinkedIn and your job search seriously. LinkedIn has prompts that show you how you are doing and what you need to do to get to 100%.

4. Grow Your Network

I can hear you saying, “But I don’t want to connect with people I don’t know!” Sorry Charlie. If that is your mantra, LinkedIn will become virtually useless to you. Most job seekers come to me with about 100 connections. That means you’ll have a network of about a quarter million, and just a fraction of the 200 million people can see your profile. Do you really want a new job? Start connecting with everyone and anyone.

Tips 6-10 and he complete Careerealim article

5 Tips to Writing a Compelling LinkedIn Summary

A compelling LinkedIn summary has the potential to really set your LinkedIn profile apart from your competition. Recently I have been spending a lot more time on LinkedIn, and I really like how they have stepped up to the plate and offered a great B2B social networking platform. That being said, I'm seeing a lot more marketing mistakes made by LinkedIn users than any other social networking website, starting with the "summary" or the biography you are allowed to write about yourself.

5 tips to writing a good LinkedIn Summary:

1. Write From the 1st Person - The biggest mistake I've seen is someone writing a company biography, rather than an actual self written, down-to-earth summary about themselves.

Keep in mind, your LinkedIn profile is promoting YOU as a profession, and your LinkedIn summary should be written as such.

2. Have a Format - A successful LinkedIn summary follows a very basic, three part format

First, introduce yourself and talk about who you are. Make people see you as an interesting person, not a faceless company. Talk about how you came to where you are today.

Secondly, talk about who THEY are, meaning who do you help? Write a description of who your target client is (subtly it key here).

Finally, finish by talking about what you offer. Don't give away everything here, just talk about what you mainly do, and how people can benefit from it. Finish off with a couple of forms of contact (like a phone number and email address) people can reach you on.

3. Multiple Businesses? Have a Different Structure - If you are involved in multiple things, use the same method as above but separate your businesses when you get to step two and three. A very basic, paragraph style layout is clutch.

Tips 4,5, and the complete article

Jerry Nihen is a Social Networking Consultant that has worked a wide variety of businesses and individuals that have launched successful social media strategies and campaigns.

5 Tips on How to Grow Your Brand on LinkedIn

Francis Rey Balolong

In the small business industry and free enterprise, the demarcation line between corporate and personal branding is nonexistent at times.

Accomplishment and triumph mean continually exhausting personal networks to reach new customers, partners, and talents for the company.

Meanwhile, you keep on handling the online presence of the company to establish a clear, reliable identity for the brand.

People nowadays search for your company through its LinkedIn profile and the user profiles of your team members.

In reality, the notions of brand and identity are entwined, and to deal with that dual identity is quite a challenge, but when done properly and well, this bond can provide opportunities for breakthroughs.

To have a good grasp on how small businesses find success in this area, here are tips on how to use LinkedIn to grow your brand:

1. Link LinkedIn to your official website and online accounts to increase presence. 

There are numerous methods for prospective customers to look for your company, such as the official website, Facebook, Twitter, and so on, but these people may not always be acquainted with the direction or path they should follow.

Link all of your online presence to open more doors to the right customers, so they may successfully find your brand.

2. Encourage the team to be active on LinkedIn. 

Activate the combined network of the company by encouraging your employees, apart from the marketing department, to get involved with the LinkedIn Company Page.

Besides the increase in visibility to prospective hires and new customers, it will start an ethos wherein your employees continually engage or interact with the brand and contribute to a unified goal.

The initiative may start with a colleague or associate adding the company to his or her profile to make sure he or she has an up-to-date and convincing profile, or sharing the updates of the company’s LinkedIn page to his or her network.

3. Take advantage of existing content streams. 

Use successful and popular posts on other social networks to build a good content stream on your LinkedIn company page and user profile.

For example, use Twitter history to select, organize, and present relevant content to your LinkedIn presence and identity.

Tips 4,5, and the complete article

10 Little Known LinkedIn Features That Can Make A Big Difference

by Wayne

I thought I would give you a vacation from deep strategic thinking and share with you a quick checklist of ten great LinkedIn features that you may not have discovered just yet. 2.  Download a list of your entire 1st degree network You can download into a spreadsheet (in either .CSV or .VCF format) a full list of your connections, including their name, current title, current company name, and email address. There are two ways to access this. If you have upgraded to LinkedIn Contacts (it’s free and I highly recommend it), go into your settings (top right) and click Export LinkedIn Connections. If you have not upgraded yet, go to your Contacts and on the bottom right 4.  Find other people with similar outside interests or organizations If you click a single word (Interest Section) or name of an organization (Organizations Section), you will then be sent to an Advanced People Search page showing you all the folks on LinkedIn who have that same interest or organization on their profile. You can further narrow your search by using any or all of the advanced searching filters. 6.  Reorder your recommendations Because only two  recommendations for each job or education entry are shown in the main part of your profile, you want to make sure they are your very best. In Edit Profile, go down to the Recommendation section and click the pencil. You’ll then see the up-down arrow that enables you to move the recommendations. You can only move them within that specific job section. You can’t move them to a different job section. See all 10 features and the complete article

The Stealth Job Search: How to Job Hunt Privately on LinkedIn

Lindsey Pollak

One of the benefits of being a LinkedIn member is the opportunity to create a public professional presence. Your profile is a great place to highlight your marketable skills and is your vehicle for getting found by recruiters and hiring managers all over the world.

But, what if you need your job search to stay confidential, perhaps because you are currently employed? Never fear! I’ve got you covered, and rest assured there are still many ways to attract attention, tap your network and connect with recruiters on LinkedIn while maintaining your privacy. Here’s how.

1. Hide your activity updates

One way to become more findable by recruiters is to add keywords and phrases to your LinkedIn profile that are relevant to the jobs you seek. However, frequent or abundant changes to your profile may indicate to others that you are considering making a move. To minimize the likelihood that your connections will notice your profile improvements, head over to your Privacy & Settings area, which you can find by clicking on your headshot in the top right corner of LinkedIn, and click on the “Turn on/off your activity broadcasts” link. Uncheck the box that pops up here so your connections will no longer receive updates about changes to your profile or other actions you take on LinkedIn, such as posting in a Group discussion.

While you are keeping your activity private, you can still have visibility to recruiters and networking contacts. One way to attract positive attention while keeping your job search private is to regularly update your status. Post interesting articles related to your industry if you are job hunting in your current field or, if you are are a career changer, post articles and updates about general topics such as leadership, communication or technology trends.

2. Remain private while viewing others’ profiles

Whether your job hunt is public or private, I recommend exploring the LinkedIn profiles of people you admire professionally. Looking at those individuals’ profiles can give you a sense of what experiences, skills and groups could be most valuable to your own career. If you find someone you particularly admire — ideally someone with no connection to your current employer — you might even reach out to that person through an InMail to express your admiration and ask if that person might be willing to share some career advice with you.

However, if you are viewing the profiles of people who know your employer, and you are concerned they will discover you’ve viewed their profiles often and connect back with your boss about it, you have options. In the same Privacy & Settings area, click on the “Select what others see when you’ve viewed their profile” link. Here you can change the way you appear in others’ “Who’s Viewed Your Profile” area so that you will remain anonymous. Note: Unless you are a Job Seeker Premium subscriber, when you switch to an anonymous status you will no longer be able to track “Who’s Viewed Your Profile” and Profile Stats for yourself, so carefully consider this option and switch out of it as soon as your research is done.

Tips 3-5 and the complete blog post

6 Places to Keyword Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile

By: Leslie Truex

Whether you’re looking for a job, searching for freelance clients or promoting a business, LinkedIn is an ideal place to start. Some people, myself included, have neglected LinkedIn for the more popular social networks, such as Facebook and Twitter. But recently, I’ve started spending more time at LinkedIn and have been kicking myself for not recognizing it’s potential for reaching my market sooner.

LinkedIn offers something most other social networks don’t and that is room to create fleshed out profiles with a focus on building professional connections. But like other social networks, the number of connections can get unwieldy fairly quickly, making it difficult to find people unless you search them specifically. That means, if someone is looking to hire in your industry, he might miss you if he doesn’t know your name. Fortunately, employers can also search connections by industry and job, which means they can easily find you through a search if you’ve optimized your profile with keywords related to your job and industry.

Optimizing your LinkedIn profile starts with knowing the keywords potential employers and clients use to find people who do what you do. If you’re a freelance writer, then “freelance writer” is a keyword. But if you specialize, such as freelance copywriting or freelance web writer, then you want to use those words. If you’re stuck, use a keyword tool to help you find the popular words and phrases used by your market. Google has recently terminated its free tool, but you can try SEO Book Keyword tool, which requires registration, but is free.

Once you have a list of keywords and phrases, you want to use them in your profile on LinkedIn. Here are the best places to use your keywords.

1) Headline: The headline appears right after your name. Some people write a tagline, but you can get more mileage out of the space by using keyword descriptions. For example, “Freelance Copywriter, Direct Mail Expert, and Online Marketing Strategist.”

2) Summary: You get 2000 words to entice potential employers, clients and customers. It’s a lot of space, but don’t waste it with a list of your accomplishments. Instead, weave your keywords and phrases into a summary that shares your brand value and benefits.

3) Current Work Experience: Like a resume, your LinkedIn profile offers potential employers and clients the opportunity to see what you’re doing now. If possible, use your keywords in the headers and text areas of your work experience. Instead of just providing your current employer or client name, also include a keyword. For example, “Acme Business Co: Freelance Copywriter and Direct Sales Consultant”

Places 4-6 and the Personal Branding complete article

4 Essentials For Reaching Out To Strangers On LinkedIn

Last week, I received an info interview request from a total stranger as a direct message on LinkedIn. And despite my very busy schedule, I decided to take his call. Over the weekend, I asked myself, “Why did I agree?” 

Let’s take his e-mail apart and put it into four essential elements so you can use them in your own LinkedIn networking communications.

First, here’s the e-mail I got over LinkedIn from J.: 

Hi Joshua, I noticed we are both connected to M. F. – how do you know M.? I first met her at J.P., and she actually photographed my wedding. Small world.

I wanted to touch base with you because I saw an open position at J.R. I thought would be a great fit for me. I’m located in Portland now, and do social media strategy for a digital marketing agency here in town. 

It’s a fun role, but you know how agencies are – fingers in a lot of different businesses, but no ability to truly own a marketing program. It looks like I would be able to do that with the Marketing Communications Manager role that is posted. 

Would you mind if I called you some time this week to hear about your experience at J.R. and your perspective on the marketing organization there? I’d really appreciate it. 

1. Lead With Something In Common My interviewee, J., began his e-mail by pointing out our mutual friend M.F., and although I know M.F. from my sister’s college days, what really got my attention was M.F. was the photographer at her wedding. 

Now, with LinkedIn, there is a danger the first degree connection isn’t really a close friend. I went through an Open Networking phase and about 100 people in my LinkedIn network are complete strangers to me. 

So don’t assume just because they’re connected, they know each other. 

J. took a calculated risk. However, he mitigates that risk by further sharing a personal tid-bit…he’s married. And as another recently married guy, I can very much relate to his situation. (i.e. He has my sympathy.) 

2. Get To The Point – Fast J. wastes no time for BS or apologies. He’s writing to me because he saw an open position at a company I have a relationship with and thinks he’d be a fit. 

Notice he says, “I saw an open position.” He doesn’t assume I know anything about this position. In fact, it was news to me. And so I can infer he’s not assuming I’m any kind of decision maker. I know this is going to be a purely informational interview. 

Furthermore, he concludes the e-mail by re-affirming that he’s just looking to hear about my experience with J.R., the company and my perspective on their marketing organization. 

My guard goes down because I know he’s not going to put me on the spot or ask me for more than just my opinion.

Read essentials 3,4, and the complete Careerealism article

Author of Job Searching with Social Media For Dummies, Joshua is recognized as the authority for helping people find work using social media. His blog, Careerenlightenment.com, won the 2013 About.com Reader's Choice award for best career blog for original content.

Get Organized: 5 Tips for Getting the Most from LinkedIn

By Jill Duffy

I'm a huge fan of the overall service that LinkedInprovides and sincerely believe that all professional adults should set up an account on that social-professional network. That said, I don't spend a lot of on the site. Quite the contrary. A LinkedIn account can pretty much run itself—if you take a few steps to set it up that way.

With these five tips, you can trust that your LinkedIn account is doing its job for you, letting your name, skills, and expertise be known to everyone in your network, as well as new potential new connections who might be interested in finding people like you.

1. Use a Professional-Looking Headshot
One of the most important aspects of your LinkedIn account is the profile picture. You really have to have one. (That advice is true, really, of any online profile, whether it's a dating website or a business project management platform. You need an image, and ideally, it should be a headshot.

The headshot should be of your smiling face and a little bit of your shoulders. And it should look like you. We are often our own worst judges of our appearance, so ask your friends and colleagues their opinions in picking your best pic.

Depending on your career, you may be able to get more creative and expressive with your profile picture, but it depends on your field, level of experience, and reputation.

Sometimes there are complications, though. I once worked with a woman who could not use a headshot due to religious reasons in her country, and her creative workaround was to use the logo of the university where she worked, instead. Her solution worked well because she was still able to associate a professional "identity" with her name. The point is, a headshot is ideal, but there are other possible solutions, all of which are better than no picture, a picture of your cat, a picture of your kid—you get the idea.

I have a few other tips for updating your profile picture, including the fact that you should not update your picture more than once a year. You want to keep one image long enough to develop a strong association between your name and photo.

2. Think in Keywords
In filling out the text of your LinkedIn profile, think about the keywords people might enter into a search to find someone like you. For example, my actual job title is technically "software analyst," but what I really do is write. I think of myself as a writer. So my LinkedIn profile uses terms like "writer" and "tech writer."

Load up your profile with straightforward search terms—not a bunch of synonyms. If you're unsure of which words to use, look through the jobs section of LinkedIn to find ads for open positions that are similar to your own job. What keywords turn up there? Reuse the relevant words and phrases in your own profile.

3. Add Videos, Images, and Links
Your profile doesn't have to be all plain old text. Earlier this year, LinkedIn added a new multimedia feature to the profile section that lets you add graphics, slideshows (using Slideshare), documents, and links to other online content, such as your online portfolio.

To be honest, this feature doesn't work as well as I had hoped. You can't simply add an image from your computer; you have to link to a Web page, and LinkedIn will choose a default image from that page without giving you any choice in the matter. Sigh. Still, having something visual to break up the text goes a long way toward improving a profile.

To add a graphic, log into LinkedIn, go to your profile section, and click "edit." Then you have to select a sub-section, such as Summary or Experience, and look for the rectangle-with-plus-sign icon. That button lets you add new

Tips 4,5, and the complete PCMag article