Optimize Your LinkedIn By Tweaking Your Headline

The headline for your LinkedIn Profile is arguably one of the most important parts when we’re talking about optimization.

It’s important because it helps your profile stand out against a sea of thousands of other profiles, helps “stop our scroll”, and even helps your profile show up in candidate searches easier.

Most people don’t realize that we don’t use the same LinkedIn website you use when we’re sourcing for candidates.

We use a completely different site called “LinkedIn Recruiter”, which essentially mimics a job board like Dice, Monster, Indeed, etc.

The point of this is thinking of your profile like a small business on google. Let’s say you’re looking for a plumber in your area. You’re not going through dozens of pages to find the absolute best, you’re going through them in order until you find a few that can do the job and go from there.

That is exactly how recruiters view linkedin. And what I want to do is help you make sure your profile shows up on the first page.

So essentially, the more info you put on your profile - like a resume on a job board - the more likely your profile will show up earlier when we’re running our searches.

And it all starts with the headline.

The perfect headline formula is this:

What you do | With what tools | Impact or Expertise

I’ll show you exactly what we see on the other side.

1: Let’s start with a basic “Software Engineer” search.

Software Engineer can mean 100 different things. Front end, full stack, backend? What technologies for each?

I ran a quick search for a “software engineer” in Dallas. Well over 30k candidates show up in our profile.

The first one that pops up is a full stack developer with java & react. The 2nd one is a Python Developer. The third is C++.

So if you just have “Software Engineer” in your headline, you’re not only being hidden with candidates in your tech stack, but a bunch of others as well.

2: Let’s add technology to your profile

So in our generic software engineering search in Dallas, we came up with Java, Python, and C++. Maybe you’re lucky and pop up first.

But chances are, you’re not. Let’s say you specialize in angular, typescript, and AWS. What we want to do is add that to your headline.

If I’m looking for someone like that, I’m adding those technologies to my boolean search. I want to narrow down those 30k candidates as much as possible, so I don’t waste any time and find the best matches quickly.

Here’s what the search looks like below. No surprise that people who have “angular” in their title pop up first, and no surprise that once we add some technologies to our search outside of “software engineer” we go from 30k to 200.

Here is what I’d suggest you make your title to show up quickly.

“Software Engineer | Angular, Typescript, AWS”

“Angular Developer + Typescript + AWS”

“UI Developer | Angular, Typescript, AWS”

Or some variation that has tech in the headline.

3: Let’s take it a step further by adding a personal touch.

Adding the tech to your headline helps you show up in our searches, but now we want to stand out and “stop the scroll”.

Sure, a lot of recruiters are going to send an inmail to every candidate that’s a match, and wait to see what top 3-5 candidates go back into their inbox.

But we want to take it a step further - let’s create some attention to your profile so not only do they send you an inmail, they’re seething to get in contact with you.

Here’s a great example of what I’m talking about:

Who wouldn’t want to try to get in contact with her? She’s showing tangible, direct, quantifiable impact in her headline! She is still coming up in my search because she has “angular” in her titles in the work experience section.

So while I may be reaching out to other candidates too, I am prioritizing trying to get in contact with her before I move onto another role.

Which means, she is increasing her odds to work with someone who can land her an interview, which increases her odds of landing a job offer which is what it’s all about.

Now, I think she went a little overboard but still she “stopped the scroll”.

What I’d do is this:

“Software Engineer | Angular, Typescript, AWS| Completed Projects on average of 10% before deadline”

You can replace the 3rd piece with anything else that helps pop out. It can pertain to performance, or industry specifics “Building out / Has expertise in Consumer Facing Products”

“Building best-in-class financial products”

So make these changes to your LinkedIn headline and let me know if you receive more inmails over time. This should definitely help increase your odds of success.

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