The Rise of the New LinkedIn (by The Numbers) [Infographic]

What is LinkedIn to you? Chances are it’s a place where you keep your resume updated in case anyone in your network has any job openings for you, or a place where you post news about your industry so you can show that you care about your job. But do you ever post anything personal there? Things that are relevant to your personal interests? You should. Here’s why.

LinkedIn has become a key platform to help build your personal brand. If you’re doing more than logging on twice a year to update your resume, that’s great, but you have to do even more than that to maximize the platform’s benefits.

If you’re posting news about your industry to show that you care about what’s happening in your sector, that’s also great, but you’re going to have to do better than that still. You need to be posting every day about your wins and your losses. You need to post about your personal interests, and build your online community. After all, more and more hiring is being done inside of LinkedIn, and if you aren’t there when your network is looking for you, you’ll miss out.

LinkedIn’s also growing much faster than you probably think. Between 2011 and 2017 LinkedIn’s user base grew from 140 million to 500 million. There are more features now than ever before, and if you aren’t leveraging them to showcase your talents, you’re missing out on potential career advancement.

Learn more about the current state of LinkedIn, by the numbers, in this infographic.

A version of this post was first published on the Digital Information World blog.