It’s important not to consider your LinkedIn profile as an online version of your resume. Our Best Words Career Development Instructor Daniëlla Frost recommends 7 important differences between your resume and your LinkedIn profile.
- Length
First of all, a resume and LinkedIn profile differ in length. Where a resume should preferably have one page and in any case no more than two, your LinkedIn profile has no maximum length. Less is more? Not on your LinkedIn profile!
2. Targeted vs. rounded view
Your resume should be a targeted document, targeted at recruiters. So how do you create targeted resumes?
You can do this by creating different resume versions that focus on different skill sets and are tailored to specific jobs. Each resume version should (at least) have a focused job title, summary and skills section.
However for your LinkedIn profile, it’s best to offer profile viewers a rounded view. You want your profile to be findable by anyone, not just by recruiters who might have a specific job for you.
3. Your Photo
My advice is not to put your photo on your resume. Employers want to be protected from allegations of discrimination and a lot of them consider including a photo is unprofessional or even inappropriate.
Adding your photo to your LinkedIn profile on the other hand, is simply a must. A profile picture builds more trust and just having a photo makes your profile 14 times more likely to be viewed by others.
4. Formatting
If you want to beat resume screening software, you should use simple formatting in your resume. That means it’s all about text and therefore best to avoid using colors, images and graphics.
On LinkedIn however, you should try to make your profile a visually attractive one.
How? By adding a cover photo as well as media (documents, photos, videos, presentations). Also make sure you link company pages to your work experience, so that you have company logos on your profile.
5. Relevant Work Experience
On your resume, you should leave out responsibilities and achievements, and in some cases even your entire work experience, when a position isn’t relevant for the application in question.
On your LinkedIn profile it’s ‘the more the merrier’. You can include every position – including job titles, company names, dates, responsibilities and achievements. This way, you’re providing the rounded view which I discussed earlier and it will help you rank better in search results.
6. Multiple Skills
On your resume, your skills section should be a short section with up to 10 skills. Do make sure you include both hard skills (what you can do) and soft skills (how you’ll do it).
On your LinkedIn profile you can add more skills. My advice is to add up to 50 skills, which is the limit. They are great ‘social proof’ and will also increase your LinkedIn Search Engine Optimization / SEO (again!).
7. References vs. Recommendations
While you don’t have to include references in your resume, it’s great to have recommendations on your LinkedIn profile. Ask (former) customers, colleagues and employers to recommend you.
Social proof? Check. SEO-proof? Check.
So there you have it, 7 ways your resume and LinkedIn profile should differ. I hope you can use these tips to optimize both of them!
Daniëlla Frost is Our Best Words’ Career Development Instructor. She began her career as an IT Recruiter, and she loves teaching entrepreneurs, job seekers and recruiters how to find candidates & get found on LinkedIn.
Connect with Daniëlla Frost on LinkedIn or visit her website www.sociablelift.com