Читать книгу LinkedIn Profile Optimization For Dummies - Donna Serdula - Страница 44

Once you have skills listed on your profile, LinkedIn allows people to endorse you for those skills. By allowing others to endorse you, the Skills & Endorsements section provides credibility and validity that isn’t available anywhere else. Sure, you can list your core competencies on your resume, but it’s only on your LinkedIn profile where your first-degree connections can endorse you and prove that you really do possess that skill. The more endorsements you have for a skill on your LinkedIn profile, the more credible you appear.

As I explain in Chapter 2, LinkedIn search is driven by keywords, and LinkedIn wants its search results to be relevant and valuable to the person searching. By allowing connections to validate skills through endorsements, it allows LinkedIn a way to determine search result listings via a manner that is independent of the owner of the profile. At one time, LinkedIn’s search results rankings were based solely on keyword density. As long as you stated your keyword more than anyone else did in their profiles, your profile showed up first. Clearly, this was an easy way to hack and skew the search results in your favor. By providing the ability to endorse others and basing search results on an area that is outside the control of a user, results ranking is harder to hack, thereby creating a better search result.

There is no maximum limit to endorsements (although you are limited by the number of first-degree connections within your network); however, LinkedIn only shows up to 99. After 99, LinkedIn displays 99+. To display the total number of endorsers of a particular skill, just click the 99+ icon to see the full number and a list of endorsers.

Most people confuse endorsements and recommendations. I like to call endorsements “Recommendations Lite.” Endorsements occur with a single click of the mouse. Recommendations on the other hand are a written testimonial from a connection and require much more energy and thought.

When torn between providing a person with a recommendation or an endorsement, determine how much time you have allotted and what you want to convey. If you only have a few seconds, endorsements work just fine. If you want to say more than just one word and truly convey a message about the person, a recommendation is in order.