What should I put on my Linked In profile?

If you are unemployed or 'between jobs' what should you put on your Linked In site profile? Is it better to announce you are actively looking for work, or could it potentially damage your 'online image'?

If you are looking for work, it is best to state that on Linked In, because social media recruiters regularly use the profile for candidate searches using keywords, and some that they apply are ‘looking for’, ‘aiming to’, ‘targeting’ etc, so they know that the person is ready to move on to a new work role.

It’s best not to say unemployed, as that sounds like you’re not doing anything, when actually you are – your job is looking for a job!

There are two provisos to stating your career direction online – 1) you have to be clear what it is, and 2) it has to be broad enough in terms of scope, yet contain the relevant key words to attract an online recruiter. If you can find an online recruiter, I’d be tempted to ask him/her what they’d search for online if they were looking for you in Linked In, and then make certain that these key words are in your profile. Being unclear, or untargeted, will damage your online image more than being known to be ‘searching for’ a new career move.