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What is LinkedIn Recruiter? A Beginner’s Guide to Recruiter’s Features

LinkedIn is a B2B social platform powerhouse 700 million users strong, including 1.6 million active talent professionals.

This reason alone makes LinkedIn Recruiter an immediate contender among competing hiring solutions.

In this post, we’ll focus on clarifying how LinkedIn Recruiter works based around its three major functions:

Candidate search
Candidate engagement
Collaboration tools

Search the Entire LinkedIn Network for Your Ideal Candidates

Again, this is LinkedIn we’re talking about, arguably the most popular B2B social platform.

Having access to this massive network of professionals means that you can find the right candidates and have remarkable visibility into their work history, contact information, and so on.

Here are the most important search features in LinkedIn Recruiter:

Search the entire LinkedIn network (beyond your 3rd-degree connections)
Advanced search features, including keyword and Boolean searches
AI-based candidate search “Spotlights”
Candidate skill assessments

Search Beyond Your 3rd-Degree Connections with LinkedIn Recruiter

First, this feature is exclusive to LinkedIn Recruiter and not available to LinkedIn Recruiter Lite, which limits your ability to only search up to 3rd-degree connections.

With 700 million users, you can be confident that you’ll find the right candidate for your openings, especially with the ability to dive deep with advanced search features.

Narrow Your Candidate Pool with Advanced Keyword and Boolean Searches

LinkedIn Recruiter offers you access to over 40 candidate search filters to help you find the perfect candidate.

You can look into their spoken languages, how many years they’ve been at a company, and whether or not they’re open to contract work. And you can use Boolean operators to broaden, define, or limit your search further.

AI-based Spotlights

Spotlights is an AI-based search feature in LinkedIn Recruiter that prioritizes your most relevant candidates.

These smart search suggestions are based on insights and Spotlights can recommend skills, locations, and companies to help you determine which candidates are more likely to engage with your company.

Here are some possible Spotlight examples:

Internal candidates
Open to work
More likely to respond
Engaged with talent brand
Have company connections
Past applicants

Skill Assessments

Professionals on LinkedIn are able to fill out Skill Assessments and with LinkedIn Recruiter, you can search for candidates based on these assessments.

You can also use the “skills match” function or search candidates’ contextual skills or similar skills.

Reach Out To and Engage With Prospective Hires Easily

Finding candidates is one thing, but since LinkedIn Recruiter doesn’t offer an option to export candidate contact information (or does it? More on that at the end), the next step is outreach.

Engage high-quality candidates
Get reminders and candidate notifications
Take advantage of the mobile app
Connect your ATS to LinkedIn Recruiter

Engage Targeted Candidates on LinkedIn Recruiter

You can reach out to potential hires with up to 150 personalized InMails per month (you can purchase additional InMails). Recruiter makes it easy to bulk message multiple candidates or to create InMail templates that make outreach easier and more consistent.

Stay on Top of Your Outreach with Notifications and Reminders

LinkedIn is a fluid platform. Professionals change jobs, positions, companies, skills, and so on. As such, you can be notified when newly qualified candidates appear in your search parameters.

You can also receive reminders to reach out or follow up with potential candidates.

Use the Recruiter Mobile App on the Go

As a recruiter, you know better than anybody else that finding the right candidates is very much a matter of timing.

You won’t always be parked at your computer when the right opportunity rolls around, so LinkedIn has made a Recruiter mobile app available on iOS and Android. With this app, you can take care of quick tasks on the go from your phone, including (but not limited to):

Sending InMails
Running searches
Receive the reminders and notifications mentioned above
Attach and send documents to candidates

Connect Your Applicant Tracking System (ATS) to LinkedIn Recruiter

A common criticism of LinkedIn Recruiter is that it only practically allows for the three things discussed in this guide – search, outreach, and collaboration. Beyond that, there is little in the way of tools for tracking the interview process, background checks, screening, negotiating salary, and so on.

The ability to connect your applicant tracking system helps to bridge this gap and reduce the need to constantly switch between both programs.

Take Advantage of LinkedIn Recruiter’s Collaboration Tools

Recruiter is geared for teams who need transparency and the ability to share information across the platform collaboratively. Here are the important collaboration features:

Recruiter Projects
Connect your jobs to Recruiter
Collaborate with your team

Organize and Manage Your Work with Recruiter Projects

With Recruiter, you can manage your sourcing channels in one place in Recruiter Projects. For example, you can keep track of your candidates, search and filter through your projects, or share projects with other team members.

Connect Your Job Postings to LinkedIn Recruiter

Want to see your job postings against the candidates you’ve been searching? You can connect your job postings to LinkedIn Recruiter to easily review candidates alongside your open positions.

Collaboration Tools for You and Your Team

LinkedIn Recruiter makes it easy to share projects and source candidates alongside your team.

You can share notes and message histories with teammates, and you can send candidate profiles to hiring managers or clients whether they have Recruiter or not.

Potential Problems with LinkedIn Recruiter

While there are plenty of great functions in LinkedIn Recruiter, there are at least two notable downsides to it as a hiring solution.

It is costlier than some solutions that do more (beyond search and outreach). Smaller companies with great hiring needs may have a hard time justifying Recruiter’s cost. Curious about LinkedIn Recruiter’s pricing? You’re not alone – check out this article.

Another potential issue is the inability to export contact information. Again, LinkedIn’s vast network and granularity when it comes to candidate background, skills, and contact information are only as useful as the platform’s ability to connect you to them.

The truth is that some candidates simply aren’t responsive on the LinkedIn platform. But don’t worry – there is a way around that.

Want to Export Candidate Information Directly From LinkedIn Recruiter?

Exporting candidate leads directly from LinkedIn Recruiter is easy with Wiza.

What is Wiza, and what does it do? Wiza allows you to obtain accurate contact info from LinkedIn. All it takes is signing up for a free Wiza account, running a search in Recruiter, and then downloading verified contact data as a CSV.

Why Wiza? Wiza can find the contact information you need to reach your candidates on your own terms without being forced to use LinkedIn as your outreach platform. Wiza will also verify contact data in real time and give you access to 30+ data points. Thanks to Wiza’s live SMTP verification, you’ll even be able to know if an email address is live and active.