I started my new career search in earnest seven months ago. I have learned that opportunities for senior managers are hard to find – even for terrific ones like me! But that’s not the only thing I have learned. Today, I am going to drop some of that wisdom with my best practices for using LinkedIn as a job search tool. Ready? OK, let’s go.

Best Practice 1) Only apply for positions within firms where you have a first level connection. As easy as it is, searching for open positions that match your title and salary needs will not work. Instead, start with your first level connections and look for openings in their companies OR find companies you like and see if you have there a first level-connection – or a second level connection that can be promoted to first level.

Note: For LinkedIn beginners, here are some definitions. A first level connection is a direct contact, such as a friend or colleague. They are your main supporters. You may not know a second level connection, but your first level connection does—ask for introductions to expand your network. A hiring manager has an open position they need to fill and makes the final decision. An internal recruiter works with the hiring manager and decides who gets interviewed. These are the gatekeepers. An external recruiter … that is a subject for a whole other post!

Best Practice 1.1) At the risk of redundancy, don’t waste time submitting applications if you don’t have a first level connection. I’m not kidding! Assume that no one is going to look at your application (see my last couple posts for an explanation). Submitting applications blindly makes internal recruiters’ jobs harder, wastes your time, and – most importantly – will whittle away at your morale. I want to make sure you never think that someone looked at your application and decided you weren’t good enough. That’s not what happened. No one looked at your application. You are still awesome.

Best Practice 2) Convert your first level connections from allies into champions. Engage them with InMails (do these still exist?), messages, emails and – best of all – phone calls and face to face meetings. Discuss the company and open position. Polish and practice your case. Convince them you are a fit. Once they are 100% team YOU, ask them to forward your resume to the internal recruiter. Only then should you hit the APPLY button. Remember, if you get hired, your champion may get a referral bonus! People like bonuses.

Protip: When applying through LinkedIn, you may need to upload a resume. This process can sometimes distort the resume format, requiring manual correction of each field, particularly in the work history section. To simplify this, use a plain text version of your resume for easy copy and paste.

Best Practice 3) Post on LinkedIn. You can write about whatever you want but I recommend writing about your job search. My favorite Einstein quote (and I am not looking it up to make sure I get it right) is “If you can’t explain something simply, you don’t know it well enough.” You will get better at job searching when you can write about it in a logical and meaningful way. But again, you can write about whatever you want if the reminder that you are searching for a job is clear.

Note: You can post on LinkedIn as either a post or an article. Posts are short, have word limits, and eventually disappear. Articles are lengthy, include a title and header image, and remain on your profile. Use posts for quick thoughts, and articles for detailed content.

Best Practice 4) Post regularly. LinkedIn is quick to tell you that people are more likely to read your posts when they show up weekly. I’m not that good. I try to post every other week … ish. But I have found that having a common theme that I can return to makes it easy to write and engaging to read (hopefully?). This is my fourth post on the things I have learned about job searching during a career pivot. I’d be thrilled if you already knew that!

Best Practice 5) Post with the #OpenToWork hashtag. For whatever reason, #OpenToWork posts generate more impressions, and will elicit better responses from your network than ones without this tag. Add other tags too. Lots.

Best Practice 6) Ignore most of the responses you get from people you don’t know. There are a lot of resume-rewrite trolls out there, and they will send a nice note to everyone who uses the #OpenToWork tag. They don’t add value. There is always a downside. It’s small. Let’s move on.

Best Practice 7) When you post, be humble and demonstrate vulnerability. These things resonate with people who care about you. It may be hard to do this at first, but you will find that vulnerability is power. Let me say that again – VULNERABILITY IS POWER. Everyone has been there and when people see you turning lemons into lemonade, they get a sense of how you would handle difficult work situations.

Best Practice 8) Stay frickin’ positive! If you have read my last few posts, the inclusion of this best practice here will not be a surprise. Looking for work is a hard job, but it is your job. Do it to a level to which you can be proud and never take it personally.

Wrapping up, remember that the goal is audience, not applications. Audience leads to opportunities, ideas, and introductions. Your job is not to apply for a million jobs. Your job is to tell your story to everyone who is receptive to hearing it. This distinction will make you more successful and your path clearer. Do it for 3-5 hours every day. Don’t get upset when you don’t hear back. Make your bed. Love your kids. Smell good. Be your best you.

Next post – best practices OUTSIDE of LinkedIn! Stay tuned.