Nowadays, we are all passive candidates. The time when job seekers had to find roles and pitch their CVs to managers so they can get the job is gone. Now, it’s all about building connections/ networks that allow us to promote our experience and skills in ways that ensure the right position finds you too.

In many ways, the rise of social networks, especially professional ones, has made us far more eagerly available to a job market that offers more diversity, as well as less stability.

Everyone can find and go through entire work history, experience, and skills professionally published content and referees of any member of a certain social network. It’s very important to know how to manage it adequately and look at it as a natural amplification of marketing ourselves in the new world of job marketing that is global and underway change.

Both companies and candidates need to make this passive talent and job market work to their advantage and figure out the ways to find each other. The best way of doing that is by becoming members of the largest professional network called LinkedIn and all the features they provide.

Here are few actionable steps that every job seeker can take if he/she wants to do passive job search in the right and effective way:

Create Great Profile on LinkedIn

Having an eye-catching and professional LinkedIn profile can be an excellent way to make yourself easy to find by the right people at the right time. When filling our profile, you should make it as powerful as possible.

Start with a professional photo. That photo may be your first impression with a potential employer, so make sure to have a professional headshot

Make sure that your headline is standing out. Most LinkedIn members put information about their current company and job title. You don’t have to be like others. If you want your profile to be searchable, you should consider including important keywords-use your industry jargon to stand out because there are many recruiters who use special sourcing tools that detect those words.

Fill out the “summary” field with few achievements that you find the most important. Consider using bullets to make your target reader's life easier.

Fill out your profile including your skills, volunteer associations, working experience, and education. This is the place where you can also put all the interesting stuff about you and didn’t had a place for it in your resume and paint yourself as a well-rounded individual.

Make sure that your work history is relevant. Don’t list every single job you had in the past, but only the jobs that are important to your current career ambitions.

Ask your past associates, colleagues, and managers, to write you a recommendation.

Build a Digital Portfolio

If you want to stand out of the crowd and make recruiters notice you, consider demonstrating them that you follow new trends and build a digital portfolio. The digital portfolio will help you expose your “brand” through your own website. That way, every person can find your website in the search result and see what you’re passionate about and driven by. It can be the best way to show potential employers that you can do all the things you say can in your CV.  

Create Video CV

Besides about me websites or digital portfolios, you should consider launch yourself a different kind of CV-Video CV that helps you to introduce yourself demonstrate why you’re good at your job. That way you will certainly get so much wanted the attention of the recruiter or an employer you want to work for. The video doesn’t even have to be professionally done, just to show that you are able to make something different than your competition and simply raise the bar a bit higher. If you make a special effort to create a good video content in which you will explain what you can do and posting it to your profile it will definitely help you get noticed by the right people and shared.

Follow the Situation in Your Industry

If you want to be the great passive candidate and get real chances to get the job you want, you must follow the companies from your industry and find the way to connect with them. Make sure to pay attention to what’s posted by the companies you want to work for and stay informed. This should get you greater chances to be invited to an interview for a position you like.

You should also become part of the active groups in your industry. There many groups like that on LinkedIn that will provide you networking and knowledge-sharing benefits.

Use your status updates to share good content relevant to your field. This can be the great way to show recruiters that you are focused and in-the-know in your industry.

Keep in Touch with Recruiters

When you do all the steps mentioned above and manage to get in touch with some recruiters, you must stay connected and chat from time to time with them even if you’re not the active candidate. That is the best way to keep yourself at the forefront of recruiters mind and maybe a great job that is suitable for you will pop up. Likewise, that way you can ensures yourself the opportunity to see their jobs feed first.

Become Mobile Friendly

For most job seekers, mobile devices are now the primary devices for job hunting worldwide. When people started to connect their smartphones to the Internet and started to use applications for every possible task, we changed the way of accessing the information forever.

This is why you should have your CV in the cloud. You can use you "in between" time and keep searching for a job while waiting in the line for coffee or during your daily commute. That is why you must have everything you need on your phone or deposited somewhere online in order to apply whenever you want and from any place. So, make sure you use  a cloud-based directory like DropBox with you CV and cover letter on it that you can easily  attach to an email.

You can engage in other people’s content which may be a good way to post comments and/or ask some questions about the content from people that are connected to you and share the same interests. Don’t be afraid to like and start any kind of conversation with people and companies that you already follow. Just show you’re interested and it would help you to be noticed by recruiters.

Also, you should use your smartphone for posting updates and be active in social networks. It takes time, so you can do it in spare time and share some interesting content related to your area of expertise.