Having endorsements on your LinkedIn profile can be a great way to showcase your skills and build your professional brand. However, there is no definitive number for how many endorsements are considered “good”. The value of endorsements often depends more on who is endorsing you rather than how many endorsements you have overall.
What are LinkedIn endorsements?
LinkedIn endorsements allow your connections to endorse you for skills that you have added to your profile. When someone endorses you, it appears on your profile and helps verify that you have that particular skill or expertise. Endorsements essentially serve as peer recommendations for your skills.
Endorsements are different from written recommendations. Recommendations allow connections to write more detailed testimonials about working with you. Endorsements are a quicker, one-click way to validate skills.
Why do LinkedIn endorsements matter?
Here are some of the key benefits of getting endorsements on LinkedIn:
- Boosts your credibility – Endorsements help back up the skills you’ve listed with social proof.
- Supports your professional brand – They reinforce the personal brand you’ve built on your profile.
- Increases discoverability – Endorsements can help you come up in searches for your skills.
- Shows off breadth or depth – They illustrate the range or specificity of your expertise.
In summary, endorsements act as credibility boosters that amplify your skills and expertise to connections and recruiters.
What makes an endorsement valuable?
While any endorsement is a positive, endorsements from certain people lend more weight than others. Here are factors that make an endorsement more valuable:
- Who it’s from – Being endorsed by prominent professionals and subject matter experts gives great credibility.
- Their familiarity with your work – Former managers or colleagues who have seen you in action.
- Level of specificity – Endorsements for niche skills carry more significance.
- Recentness – More current endorsements show ongoing skills.
Conversely, generic endorsements from people you don’t know well or haven’t worked with directly provide less value. The key is getting endorsements from reputable sources who can directly vouch for your abilities.
How many LinkedIn endorsements are good to have?
While there is no ideal number of endorsements, here are some benchmarks to aim for:
- 5-10 endorsements per skill – This shows more than a couple people endorse you.
- 15-25 endorsements in total – Enough to appear well-validated overall.
- 30+ endorsements in total – Illustrates breadth of endorsements across skills.
However, quality trumps quantity when it comes to endorsements. Even two to three endorsements from respected professionals are better than generic endorsements from dozens of casual connections.
Focus on building meaningful endorsements
Instead of fixating on getting to a certain endorsement number, focus on cultivating meaningful endorsements by:
- Making authentic connections who know your work.
- Engaging with influencers and thought leaders in your industry.
- Joining LinkedIn Groups to connect with experts.
- Adding niche skills to your profile.
- Endorsing connections for their relevant skills.
This organic relationship building makes endorsements feel more significant vs. randomly amassing volume.
Quality over quantity
A handful of sincere endorsements from people who know your work well outweigh lots of superficial endorsements.
Selectively add skills
Only add skills you’re truly qualified for so endorsements accurately reflect expertise.
How to get quality LinkedIn endorsements
Here are some tips for getting meaningful endorsements on LinkedIn:
Craft a strong profile summary
Showcase your value proposition and skills in your summary to provide context for endorsements.
Be judicious adding skills
Only include skills and expertise you can genuinely be endorsed for to maintain credibility.
Engage with your network
Comment on posts, share content, and endorse connections to organically interact with your network.
Join industry and alumni Groups
Participate in Groups related to your professional and academic background to connect with peers.
Connect with former colleagues
Previous coworkers who have seen you in action make great endorsers.
Endorse others
Proactively endorsing connections for their skills encourages reciprocal endorsements.
Thank endorsers
Show gratitude by messaging or endorsing back those who endorse you.
Suggest endorsements
Some find it helpful to politely ask close connections to endorse them for certain skills.
Potential pitfalls of too many endorsements
While endorsements are largely positive, getting too many endorsements can sometimes backfire by:
- Looking disingenuous if skills seem unrelated to your experience.
- Appearing to endorse skill spam if you endorse connections back indiscriminately.
- Devaluing endorsements from your strongest supporters.
- Allowing endorsements from questionable sources to appear credible.
Maintaining a high bar for adding skills and being selective with endorsements preserves the value of each one.
How to manage and curate endorsements
To keep your endorsements intentional and impactful, utilize these management tactics:
Decline irrelevant endorsements
Politely message connections if they endorse you for skills that don’t apply.
Remove outdated or redundant skills
Keep your skills current and avoid endorsements for similar skills splitting impact.
Hide skills with sparse endorsements
Skills with only one or two endorsements look stronger if temporarily hidden until more endorsements come in.
Group skills by job or project
Categorizing skills provides context on where they were applied.
Thank influencers publicly
When endorsed by someone respected, thank them in a comment to showcase it.
Key takeaways
In summary, here are some key points on maximizing the impact of your LinkedIn endorsements:
- Strive for quality over quantity – a few meaningful endorsements are best.
- Focus on building authentic relationships vs. chasing endorsements.
- Be selective in which skills you add and endorse others for.
- Curate endorsements periodically to keep them current and relevant.
- Publicly thank connections who provide valuable endorsements.
Rather than fixating on a number, nourish genuine connections and endorsements will organically follow. A few thoughtful endorsements from people who know your work trump lots of superficial endorsements.
Conclusion
LinkedIn endorsements can greatly enhance your professional brand and support the skills listed on your profile. But the value comes more from the source and context of endorsements versus the sheer volume. Fostering authentic relationships and gaining endorsements from respected professionals in your network are the keys to making endorsements work for you.
Rather than endorsing others indiscriminately or making endorsements a numbers game, be judicious in building up relevant endorsements that reinforce your personal brand and expertise.