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LinkedIn Profile Setup For Freshers
Priya has six SDE openings in Pune. She opens LinkedIn Recruiter, types "React Node 2026 Pune" , ticks "Open to work", and gets 2,400 profiles. Aarav is not one of them. His headline says "Student at XYZ College of Engineering". His About is empty. His top skill is Microsoft Word.
9 min readFree, no email neededUpdated 11 September 2026
Why Priya cannot find you
Priya has six SDE openings in Pune. She opens LinkedIn Recruiter, types "React Node 2026 Pune", ticks "Open to work", and gets 2,400 profiles. Aarav is not one of them. His headline says "Student at XYZ College of Engineering". His About is empty. His top skill is Microsoft Word.
LinkedIn is a search engine. Recruiters do not scroll; they search. The search reads four things: your headline, your About, your skills list, and your Open-to-work settings. If the words are not there, you do not exist.
This guide sets up all four, plus the things Priya checks after she finds you: photo, banner, Featured, projects. About 90 minutes once, then 15 minutes a week.
- 1Headline: five formulas, pick one
- 2About: four lines, with a filled example
- 3Photo, banner, custom URL
- 4Featured, projects, experience
- 5Skills, Open to work, the weekly routine
Headline: five formulas
220 characters under your name, shown in search results, comments and requests. "Student at XYZ" gives Priya nothing to search for. Pick one formula, fill it, and keep the searchable words in the first 60 characters.
Rules: one separator (· or |), used two or three times. No emoji train, no "Fresher" alone, no "Seeking opportunities". Every number must be true; Priya will ask about it.
About: four lines
Only the first two lines show before "see more". So the stack goes in line one or two, never line four. First person, plain sentences, no adjectives about yourself.
Length: 600–900 characters is right. The limit is 2,600; nobody reads past 900. Delete "passionate", "hardworking" and "quick learner" wherever they appear.
Featured, projects, experience
Featured: pin exactly three
- 1Your best project's live linkAdd featured → Add a link. LinkedIn pulls the preview image from the site, so make sure the site has a title and a screenshot image set.
- 2Your GitHub profile, or the best repo's READMEThe README needs a screenshot, a live link and a "how to run" section. Priya clicks this one.
- 3Your resume PDF, or one post that did wellAdd featured → Add media → the PDF. Not certificates; those go nowhere near Featured.
Projects: how to add one with links
Add profile section → Recommended → Add projects. Fill it like this:
Experience: internships, freelance work, club tech roles and TA work go here, with a title, dates and two result bullets each. Do not add "Student" as an experience entry.
Skills: the 15 to list
Recruiter search filters on the skills list. Fifteen real ones beat fifty. This is the full-stack fresher set; blue means one of your three Top skills.
Swap for your trackSame 15, different words
- Java track: swap React.js, Node.js, Express.js for Spring Boot, Hibernate, MySQL
- Python track: swap for Django, Flask, Pandas
- Android: swap for Kotlin, Android SDK, Firebase
- Delete: Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Leadership, Time Management, Communication
Get endorsedThree moves, one week
- Endorse ten classmates on skills they truly have. Most return it within a day.
- Message three project teammates: "Can you endorse me for React, Node and PostgreSQL? I'll do yours."
- Ask your internship mentor for one endorsement and one recommendation, on the last day.
Open to work: what recruiters see
Profile → the "Open to" button → "Finding a new job". The last question is visibility. It has two answers, and they are not the same thing.
Green #OpenToWork frame on your photo. Everyone sees it, including Priya's Recruiter filter. For a student with no job to protect, this is the right setting.
No frame. Only people paying for Recruiter see the tag; your current employer's recruiters are hidden from it. Switch to this the day you join somewhere.
Priya's filter matches your titles and locations word for word. "Web Developer" alone does not match "Software Engineer". Five titles, the ones on the job posts you want.
The 15-minute weekly routine
A finished profile that never moves sinks in search. Fifteen minutes, three days, same time each week. Set a phone alarm.
Comment on three posts by engineers or recruiters at your target companies. Two sentences that add something, never "Great post!" or "Interested".
Five connection requests with a note (200 characters max shows fully). Seniors placed last year, recruiters at companies you applied to, people who replied to your comments.
One post about what you built or learnt this week. Shape: one-line hook, what you did, one number, one link, one question. Four to six lines. No hashtag wall.
Monthly, 10 minutes: update the number in your headline, add any new project, check Open to work is still on. Four weeks of this is 12 comments, 20 connections, 4 posts. Aarav's first recruiter message arrived in week six.
Done when: 12 ticks
Go further, on the store: ATS Resume Template + 100 XYZ Bullets ATS · 30 Referral Scripts, for the DMs after they accept REFER · Placement Kit, all eight guides KIT. Comment the keyword on any Pwscoding reel.
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