LinkedIn’s applicant insights tool provides recruiters and hiring managers with valuable data on candidates who have applied for jobs at their company. This feature gives insights into applicants’ backgrounds, skills, and interests to help inform hiring decisions.
What data does LinkedIn provide with applicant insights?
There are several key data points that LinkedIn’s applicant insights tool surfaces for each candidate that has applied for a role:
- Profile strengths – An overview of the candidate’s top skills, accomplishments, certifications, education, volunteer work, languages, etc. as listed on their LinkedIn profile.
- Skill assessments – Any skills assessments the candidate has completed on LinkedIn, along with their scores.
- Groups and interests – Professional groups the candidate has joined on LinkedIn and other interests they have listed on their profile.
- Company insights – The candidate’s current and previous companies, titles, tenures, promotions, etc.
- Education – Schools attended, majors, degrees obtained and dates.
- Mutual connections – Any 1st, 2nd or 3rd degree connections the recruiter or hiring manager has in common with the candidate.
- Engagement stats – The candidate’s profile views, post likes, comments, shares and other engagement on LinkedIn.
In aggregate, this information paints a robust picture of who the candidate is, their professional background, capabilities, interests, and how active they are on the LinkedIn platform.
How can recruiters use applicant insights?
There are many ways recruiters can leverage LinkedIn’s applicant insights to enhance their hiring processes:
- Quickly vet candidates – The at-a-glance overview screens allow recruiters to quickly evaluate candidates’ skills, experiences and cultural fit.
- Identify strongest prospects – Applicant insights make it easy to identify which applicants may be better suited for a role based on their credentials and engagement.
- Prepare for interviews – The insights provide talking points and areas for deeper discussion that recruiters can use during screening and interviewing.
- Sourcing contacts – Mutual connections revealed in the tool can be tapped to gather referrals and more context on candidates.
- Simplify background checks – Education, company details, employment dates and more are readily available, reducing the effort required for vetting.
- Engage passive candidates – Recruiters can use applicant insights to identify and engage with passive candidates even if they’re not hired for a specific role.
What are the benefits of using applicant insights?
Here are some of the key ways companies and recruiters can benefit from leveraging LinkedIn’s applicant insights:
- Faster hiring – The tool allows recruiters to quickly screen, evaluate and advance the best candidates in the hiring funnel.
- Better candidate matching – Insights on skills, interests and connections helps align candidates with open roles they may be a great fit for.
- Reduced bias – Viewing standardized insights for each applicant can help reduce unconscious bias during the hiring process.
- Higher quality hires – Applicant insights allow recruiters to assess candidates more holistically to hire those with the best qualifications and potential.
- Passive candidate recruiting – Uncovering more details about applicants that aren’t the right fit today enables better passive candidate recruiting.
- More informed decisions – Recruiters can make data-backed choices on candidates using profile strengths, skills assessments and other insights.
What types of insights are available to recruiters?
LinkedIn provides several different categories of insights on applicants as part of its recruiter-facing platform:
Profile summary
This section provides the candidate’s location, headline, current position and an overview of their top skills, accomplishments, education, volunteering, languages, publications, licenses, certifications and more.
Skill assessments
Any skills tests or assessments completed by the candidate on LinkedIn are shown here along with their scores. This provides validation of proficiencies.
Work experience
Details on the candidate’s work history including company names, positions, dates of tenure, promotions and key achievements are outlined in this section.
Education
The candidate’s degrees, fields of study, schools attended, graduation dates, grades, test scores and honors are listed in the education portion of the applicant insights.
Groups and interests
This area shows professional groups and communities the candidate has joined on LinkedIn along with other interests they have indicated on their profile.
Connections
Shared LinkedIn connections in common with the recruiter are shown here. This can reveal colleagues, classmates or associates that may be tapped for referrals.
Engagement & activity
Statistics on the candidate’s profile views, post likes, comments, shares and other engagement on the LinkedIn platform is provided in this section.
Company details
For the candidate’s current and past employers, LinkedIn displays details like company size, industry, type, headquarters location, and stock status (public vs private).
What privacy controls exist for applicants?
LinkedIn does allow applicants some level of control over the insights visible to recruiters:
- Profile visibility – Candidates can choose to exclude their current employer from their profile to maintain discretion in their job search.
- Profile content – Applicants can opt not to include certain details like volunteer work, education, skills and other profile content.
- Assessments – Completing skills assessments is optional and results can be made private.
- Activity – Users can limit activity broadcasts to connections only rather than the entire LinkedIn community.
However, most of the core profile details and work history remains visible to recruiters even when applying for a job. Candidates should be aware that while privacy controls exist, applicant insights give recruiters significant visibility into an applicant’s background and credentials when they choose to apply for a role.
How can candidates put their best foot forward with applicant insights?
Here are some tips for how job seekers can make sure their LinkedIn presence and applicant insights showcase them in the best possible light when applying for roles:
- Completely fill out profile – Provide details on skills, experience, education, certifications, volunteer work, languages and more.
- Perform skills assessments – Completing LinkedIn’s skills quizzes can validate capabilities to recruiters.
- Join key groups – Align with relevant professional communities for the industry and role.
- Engage actively – Commenting, liking, sharing and posting can demonstrate engagement.
- Check for errors – Proofread the profile to check for typos, formatting problems or inaccurate details.
- Update regularly – Keep the profile updated as new skills, roles, projects and accomplishments are achieved.
- Expand network – Growing connections expands visibility and surfaces mutual connections with recruiters.
- Control notifications – Adjust settings so that career changes are visible to maximize insights.
Taking these steps will help ensure your LinkedIn profile and activity provides positive signals to recruiters who are evaluating you as a candidate through the applicant insights tool.
Conclusion
In summary, LinkedIn’s applicant insights feature provides recruiters with a valuable data-rich overview of candidates who apply for open job postings. The various categories of insights on skills, work experience, education, engagement and connections can inform hiring decisions and help assess applicants. While candidates do have some privacy controls, recruiters gain significant visibility. Therefore, job seekers should optimize their LinkedIn presence to put their best foot forward with applicant insights.
