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The One LinkedIn Mistake Every Sales Job Seeker Makes
There is one LinkedIn mistake so common and so costly that it deserves its own article. It is not a complicated mistake. It does not require a complete profile overhaul to fix. It takes about four minutes to correct. And fixing it will immediately increase the number of times your profile appears in recruiter searches.
The mistake is using your current job title as your LinkedIn headline.
Why This Is A Problem
When a recruiter at a SaaS company opens LinkedIn to search for BDR candidates they do not type retail associate or customer service representative or operations coordinator into the search bar. They type business development representative, sales development, outbound prospecting or similar terms into the keywords field.
If your headline says your current job title and that title contains none of those keywords your profile does not appear in their search. It is not that they saw your profile and were not impressed. They never saw it at all.
LinkedIn's algorithm treats your headline as one of the most important signals for determining when to surface your profile in search results. A headline that contains the words recruiters actually search for appears in more searches, gets more views and generates more inbound messages.
The Fix
Change your headline from your current job title to a combination of the role you are targeting and the relevant skills and keywords that recruiters search for.
Career Changer Targeting A BDR Role
“Aspiring BDR | Outbound Prospecting | Pipeline Generation | CRM | Open To Opportunities”
Currently A BDR Targeting An AE Role
“Business Development Representative | Consistent Top Performer | Seeking Account Executive Opportunities”
Recent Graduate
“Sales Development | Business Development | New Grad | Open To BDR and SDR Opportunities in Tech”
Each of these headlines does the same thing. It tells LinkedIn's algorithm and the recruiters using it exactly what you are looking for and surfaces your profile in the searches that matter most to your job search.
The Bottom Line
The four minutes it takes to make this change will produce more inbound recruiter activity than weeks of additional applications. Your headline is the single highest leverage element on your entire profile. If it is not working for you it is working against you.
Make your LinkedIn work for you.
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