Thank you to the almost 2000 amazing people who signed up for this newsletter. This newsletter is for Talent Acquisition and HR professionals interested in growing their brand.

1. Each week, I’ll be interviewing a Talent/HR/People leader who is doing a great job with their content. (Internal recruiters, Agency recruiters, HR leaders…)

   From TikTok influencers to Podcasters, bloggers to video superstars. Each episode will include a short video where they share how building their brand has impacted their career and their life.

2. I’ll then break down how you can use their same strategies to build your brand, so each week you’ll learn and be inspired to create content.

I’ve already lined up some fan favorites and I’m super excited to continue to learn from the best in the industry.

This week I’m featuring a creator who has grown a following of over 240,000 people on Linkedin. She’s spent time recruiting for Amazon, and Mercedes and now uses her recruitment and content skills in her new job at Teal! (A former sponsor and candidate job search platform)

Her content is genuine and always high value!

Leah Dillon

Here is Her Story!

FROM LEAH’S LINKEDIN PROFILE:

I'm Leah Dillon, a California-based recruiter and social media manager. With a background encompassing tech corporations and startups, I delve into the nuances of recruitment processes, shedding light on topics like applicant tracking systems (ATS), interview preparation, and resume optimization.

I am dedicated to dispelling prevalent recruitment myths while offering practical insights from someone currently working in talent acquisition. My ultimate mission? Empowering job seekers with transparent advice for enhancing their self-presentation. On the corporate side, I collaborate with companies to refine their hiring strategies, ensuring they not only acquire top talent but also foster their teams' growth.

Joel: How long have you been creating content?

Leah: I’ve been active on social media for over 15 years. I’ve been more active on LinkedIn professionally in the last 4-5 years.

Joel: Why did you start creating content?

Leah: In 2016, I joined LinkedIn while transitioning from a career in theater to the corporate world and I quickly realized how challenging it was to find information about job seeking in general. To help others in the same situation, I started sharing my own experiences with job searching through my journey into recruiting and social media.

Joel: What channels/platforms do you focus on?

Leah: I solely focus on LinkedIn for my own content. I found that putting my eggs in one basket yields far better results than spreading thinly on all accounts. As a social media manager, I cover all main channels for the brand.

Joel: You’ve built a successful Linkedin following, how long did it take to do this?

Leah: I built my network organically over the last 4 years, but I think it really amplified in 2021 when I made a post about Recruiting Coordinators and their impact in talent acquisition that had over a million views in a span of 72 hours. Since then, it’s been a steady growth.

Joel: What are some mistakes you see people doing with their content?

Leah: I believe that everyone has their own unique approach to growth and content creation. While I have certainly made my own mistakes, I find it can be disingenuous when people ask for likes and follows. I want to follow someone because I enjoy their content and want to follow for more, not because someone asked me to. Grow your brand and following organically, people resonate more with that.

Joel: How has your brand led to career opportunities and business opportunities?

Leah: Through my LinkedIn platform, I've successfully secured numerous job opportunities and partnerships, and I feel very privileged for those. Whether it’s assisting both individuals and companies in pinpointing their unique brand identity and goals, it’s allowed me to strengthen my own skills in content strategy.

Joel: You are now involved in social media as part of your job, how has this changed your strategy?

Leah: I leverage SEO more in my own strategy. Everything published online is easily searchable by keywords, so making successful content means finding a way for it to stand out among the countless other posts out there through your brand identity.

Joel: You are now working with a job seeker platform, what advice do you have for job seekers when creating their own content?

Leah: You are your best marketer. How you represent yourself online will help shape your brand. For example, if you’re a software engineer, I encourage you to share your work and talk about topics related to your tech stack. Your profile is your chance to showcase yourself - who are you and what do you bring to the table? Have you shared your life experiences or gained knowledge in your previous work? Recruiters and hiring managers are searching for people to fill a void in a company using keywords and titles, so ensure that reflects on your profile with the content you showcase. Set aside 1 hour a week to write about something you’re passionate about or something you want to showcase or teach. Becoming your own subject matter expert will help draw people to your profile and want to hear more – that includes those hiring.

Joel: What advice would you give to people thinking about starting on Linkedin?

Leah: Before you start job searching, fill out your profile first: add a photo, about section, and work experience beyond job titles. This adds value to marketing and branding yourself and you show up in search results more.

Joel: What was the most challenging part about creating content on Linkedin?

Leah: Dealing with negative messages or comments can be tough, I still struggle with it, but I try not to let it set me back. Most of the time the hateful content is someone wanting attention or just voicing their own frustrations, so I try not to take it personally and often ignore those. The positive feedback is a good reminder of why I do post what I post and the message I’m trying to send.

Joel: How have your employers viewed your LinkedIn content?

Leah: It’s how I landed my current role, but I’ve had employers bring it up before. It hasn’t been an issue in the past and set boundaries between my account and my past employers. If someone doesn’t want to hire me because of the content and presence I have online, then it’s not a company I want to work for.

Joel: How do you maintain your authenticity?

Leah: I try not to get wrapped up in the likes or follows. People are more likely to engage if you have something to say that adds value rather than just seeking likes. I strive to get transparency from others, so I ensure I’m giving that same transparency back.

Joel: How have you built relationships offline with your LinkedIn presence?

Leah: I’ve attended a few networking events and in-person coffee chats with individuals as well as Zoom hangouts and phone calls with people. I have a core group of people I’ve networked with in my industry and we share advice, hot takes, and market trends. It’s good to get different perspectives and learn from each other.

Joel: Who are some creators who inspire you?

Amy Miller has always been a creator and recruiting professional I admire. She’s stuck to her brand identity and the message and content she puts out is consistent and honest – even if it can be a hard truth, it’s still the truth.

Ryan Musselman has a wealth of information and advice on content strategy and ensuring you’re utilizing your brand effectively for a product or service. I’m always learning from his content.

I could list over 30 creators who inspire me, but my best advice for others looking for their inspiration is to start searching for content that aligns with your brand or message and see the posts they create, you’ll find your inspiration with those who have consistent messaging.

Joel: How have you remained so consistent?

Leah: I ensure I follow my own content pillars. When creating content you have to ask yourself if it's Promotional, Entertainment, Educational, or Conversational. I won’t post something that’s not my own words or something that I don’t truly believe in. If I’m promoting a brand, it’s something that I’ve actually personally vetted and don’t promote competing brands which creates more confusion. Something I always keep in mind before pressing send is, “How does this help or impact someone?” If I can’t think of a reason why, I won’t post it.

Joel: What is next for you in your content creation journey?

Leah: Long term, looking at how I can help creators or brands on their organic social media strategies, but as far as my own content, just ensuring I’m providing help, information, and advice when and where I can. I’d love to expand into a newsletter and podcast in the future as well.

Joel: What’s the biggest piece of advice you’d give to someone starting out from day 1?

Leah: Open a document or notebook and start listing things that interest you, issues or pain points you come across that align with those interests, and how you can help or relate to this. That can help with building a content portfolio. Utilize tools like AI to work with you, never for you. You’re the one pressing post on your content so ensure that it’s truly something you want aligned with your brand.

Joel: Where can people find you/connect with you?

Follow me on Linkedin

Check out the content at Teal: @tealhq Across Socials!

Each week I am going to give you a few tips if you want to get started on creating content based on the conversation I’ve had:

_{My tip for this week…}

You Don’t Always have to ask for people to follow you.

“I find it can be disingenuous when people ask for likes and follows. I want to follow someone because I enjoy their content and want to follow for more, not because someone asked me to.” - Leah Dillon

“If you like this post Share, like, Follow…”

“Don’t forget to subscribe”

“Please Repost”

Ugh this is a hard one.

Mr Beast the world's biggest Youtuber always asks for people to subscribe to his channel… But would that impact his subscriber count?

I’m with Leah on this one. I’ve never been a fan of people asking for a follow. However, I’ve been testing the strategy with my business page and it seems to be working. I’ve grown the page to 4000 followers in less than 2 months.

My general advice is, do what’s comfortable to you.

If you feel cringy and awkward asking for the follow, don’t do it.

If you want to ask for the follow, do it.

In general, what matters most is putting out quality content people care about, that’s what earns the follow and engagement.

What do you think?

Let me know!

Thank you for reading this episode:

About the Author: Joel Lalgee has built a social media following of almost 400,000. In 2019 he started creating content on Linkedin and since then he has expanded to Tiktok, Twitter, Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram… yeah everywhere. He’s also hosted 2 successful podcasts. His content has been viewed over 500,000,000 times and he now coaches recruitment teams on how to create content successfully to win on social media.

If you are looking for additional help with your content I’m providing 1 on 1 coaching, corporate team workshops/training, and ghostwriting and advising services. Want to work with me?

You can book a quick call here: https://calendly.com/humanheadhunter/quick-meeting?back=1&month=2023-06

Until next time!

Joel

✌🏽