Importance Of Building Your Brand As An IT Recruiter
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IT Jobs and Recruitment Insights
Here we go again, another blog full of amazing insight from yours truly, your friendly recruitment consultant. “How do I know you’re friendly” you may be asking, or more like “who does this guy think he is, thinking he’s friendly, pffft, get a load of this guy and his delusions” LOOK, whether either of those thoughts come to mind or neither of them, personal branding helps shape those perceptions and thoughts from a professional point of view.
Although you may be thinking I’m crazy for making fake thoughts for a fake person in my head to get a point across, I still think you may find the advice I have to give useful and you guessed it, we’re talking about the importance of personal branding as a recruiter, although any profession could probably get some useful information from this I hope.
What is my personal brand?
You know the generic scene of a flashback to when a character was a kid and they wanted to be an astronaut and their mother tells them “you can be whatever you want to be, honey”? Well, in this instance, it is currently the present day and I’m telling you that you can be almost whatever you want to be in terms of your personal brand.
I’m not saying go crazy, although maybe I’m pushing it a little bit, but what I mean is you are simply trying to convey to people what you would like to be perceived as. Your personal brand does generally tie in with your personality, so maybe avoid recreating a Hannah Montana situation.
If you want to be a source of accurate information for your candidates, regularly share those insights! If you want to be considered as an approachable person, a person candidates can relate to, can trust, can be friends with, and can have a laugh with, these are all well within your control as part of your personal brand. Your personal brand is just the professional side of your personality, just like you want to show your personality or amazing looks on a dating app or Instagram, you can show the insights you’ve gained, the work you’ve done and the achievements you have achieved.
I know that I personally have found it fun showing off my knowledge of the IT contracting space and the podcast I have been hosting, so why not get a sneaky plug for it in this blog?! These efforts will always help you get your name out there, and for me, I’ve been consistently posting twice a week to maintain a good personal brand, so maybe you can try it and see how it goes.
Where do I even start?
As a recruiter, we spend a lot of time on LinkedIn, because wildly enough, candidates looking for jobs are generally on LinkedIn too. Since I’m talking about recruiting and maybe not being a celebrity boxer, I think it’s safe to say that we can start at LinkedIn.
LinkedIn offers so much in terms of customisation of your profile to really convey your experience, expertise and achievements. As far as your personal brand goes, definitely make sure to go through each section and take some time to fill it in and include the keywords of your role, because the candidates looking for a good recruiter will use the keywords to find you! There is the LinkedIn SSI score, which basically rates how good your personal brand and presence are on LinkedIn. I could talk a lot about this tool, but let’s not get sidetracked. Here’s the link: https://www.linkedin.com/sales/ssi
Setting up your personal brand on LinkedIn does take some time, but it is so worth it, based on what I’m going to be talking about next.
Why bother?
Because I said so obviously. I only speak the truth, of course. In all seriousness, there are so many reasons to be more conscious about developing and growing your personal brand as a recruiter. More candidates are drawn to you and your profile because they clearly see you, and know what you’re talking about, especially compared to the blank profile of some other recruiter that has no content of any sort and for all the candidate knows, they could be a bot.
People deal with people, so make sure you show you’re a person they can talk to and approach and help with an opportunity. Personal branding as a recruiter is simply a win-win situation. You’ll find it easier to connect with candidates because they come to you, and you’ve made it easier for the candidate to find an amazing recruitment consultant to get them their next role.
A candidate will want to work with someone that has a strong brand and is respected in their area of expertise because they can be more confident in the recruiter to be able to help and proud to be working with someone who is of such a high calibre in their field to be the one to help. Imagine a candidate being proud or happy to be working with one particular recruiter or is very interested in a role because it is being managed by a recruiter they like. That’s the level that a good personal brand can get you!
Very cool
Very cool indeed. I work with IT companies in Dublin, I work in IT/Tech recruitment and I tend to always have a good few tech jobs in Dublin ready to be filled, and personal branding has helped me in the past and will continue to do so moving forward.
I’ve always enjoyed personal branding as a way to differentiate myself from the generic formalities that sometimes come within the business world, but having a good personal brand in my niche has helped me massively in finding great candidates for roles and is something every recruiter should be aware of and showcase their personality to have those fun conversations along with the serious ones! If you do have any questions as well, please don’t be afraid to get in touch. Hope you enjoyed this! Get working on your brand now.
