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Are you waiting for that recruiter to call?[/caption]Why is it that some people seem to hear from multiple recruiters in a single day, while others are all but non-existent? Here’s the two main reasons why recruiters aren’t contacting you and what you can do to change that.

Reason #1: Your Online Presence Needs Improvement

If you’re solely relying on filling out an application or submitting a resume as the only means for capturing a recruiter’s attention, you’re missing out a huge opportunity to market yourself. While completing online applications and having a polished resume are important for candidate visibility, having a presence online is absolutely imperative for increasing awareness of you as a potential candidate.LinkedIn is still the go-to standard for representing yourself professionally online. Completed profiles with recommendations, verifications of skills, and a well-crafted headline and summary rank higher than profiles that lack this information. But don’t just stop at LinkedIn! You can easily set up a (free) About.Me page or use a website builder to set up you own personal website. There are also numerous opportunities to drive awareness about you online using a few, or dozens of social media tools that are available. The important thing to remember that with any of these recommendations, you must be active! You get out what you put into it.

Reason #2: You Lack the Skills and/or Experience

Remember that summary section for LinkedIn we listed above? A LinkedIn summary allows for 2,000 words. That’s quite a bit of room and prime real-estate for you to list the skills you have. Most people include them as a bulleted list at the bottom of their summary as “skills” or “specialties” much like you would list them on your resume. Review job descriptions for the positions that interest you. If you’re lacking certain skills, learn them! There are lots of online tools (many of them free or low cost) for you to gain the skills needed that you can do from anywhere. In addition, colleges and other institutions, such as community works programs offer online and in-person classes to help people further their education and develop skills employers want.If you believe your lack of experience is the issue, the only way to change that is by doing. But if you’re not being hired because of a lack of experience, how can you get hired to gain more? Consider working as an intern, freelancer, or even volunteering. Many people do this as a way to get more hands-on experience when being hired isn’t happening fast enough, or at all.If you’ve done what you can and still aren’t hearing from recruiters, ASK! Reach out to your network and ask them for the names of recruiters they’ve worked with before, or would recommend–and follow up! Email that recruiter and let them know how you found them and solicit their feedback directly. If they offer you suggestions for improving your visibility to other fellow recruiters, listen! Although recruiters can be a great resource for assistance in conducting a job search or advancing your career through non-listed opportunities, they should not be the only resource you rely upon.

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