When you’re looking for your next opportunity, which is more important: optimizing your resume or your LinkedIn profile? Ideally, you’ll do both, but if time is of the essence, here are some tips to help you choose:
Advantages Of LinkedIn
Flexible
LinkedIn allows you to add attachments, video and hyperlinks, so you can let employers see samples of your work and media or speaking clips, and drive people to your website. And because it’s online, you don’t have to worry about fitting it on one or two pages, so feel free to add details of your volunteer activities, testimonials, and so on.
Dynamic
Unlike a resume, your LinkedIn profile is dynamic, meaning you can make posts, comment, contribute to group discussions, share insights on your area of expertise, and message other users to share information they might be interested in, making it an invaluable networking tool.
Shareable And Searchable
Putting your LinkedIn URL in your email signature will share your profile with everyone you email. As recruiters and employers often look for passive candidates on LinkedIn, this could bring you opportunities you would otherwise never have known about.
To reap the benefits of this, ask yourself the following questions:
Is your LinkedIn updated for your latest role and responsibilities?
Does your Summary highlight your expertise and tangible accomplishments, and include keywords that are relevant to your target market?
Are you taking advantage of special features like attachments, video, extra sections, social features like Groups and Following?
Do you curate your expertise through posts, comments, and group activity?
Is your contact information up-to-date? Do you get notified if recruiters are trying to reach you?
Advantages Of The resume
Private
LinkedIn’s broad reach may be a little too broad: your resume doesn’t rely on your posting it in public, so you can be more specific about project sizes and other metrics you’ve achieved. Most recruiters and employers will want to see your resume even if they’ve already seen your LinkedIn.
Tailored
You can and should rework your resume, not only for each different type of job you’re applying for but also for each different job. On LinkedIn, you only have one profile, so it has to be the same for everything.
Free
It’s free to create and distribute your resume, while many features of LinkedIn are paid, such as researching profiles and contacting people. If you’re in between jobs and on a tight budget, it’s worth maximising what you can do for free.
As with LinkedIn, ask yourself these questions to check if your resume is up to scratch:
Is your resume updated for your latest role and responsibilities?
Does your Summary highlight your expertise and tangible accomplishments, and include keywords that are relevant to your target market?
Is it easy to read?
Is there enough detail?
Is your contact information up-to-date?
You’ll need your resume and your LinkedIn optimized, but at the start of your search it’s best to focus on the more detailed one, the resume. Much of that can then be carried over to LinkedIn.