We've long advocated the benefits of your network to job seeking and there's no easier way to expand and leverage this than using Linkedin - the world's number one professional networking service online.

Linkedin serves a multitude of purposes to benefit your career.  Your personal profile acts as a shop window in which to promote your credentials to the thousands of recruiters trawling the site for candidates.  Carefully requested recommendations serve as instant references.  Equally, you can search and research prospective employers to learn more about their organisation and make contact with the right individuals.  Linkedin now also lets you follow groups - a two-way street which gets your name seen in the right circles and provides you with relevant information.

If you need any more convincing about the value of Linkedin, a new article on Global Recruiting Roundtable must clinch it.  The article, entitled Everything you wanted to know about Linkedin - UK Statistics and Trends 2011, breaks down the current usage statistics for the site.

• Over the past year usage has more than doubled
• 4 January this year saw the highest ever number of visitors in one day from the UK alone: 498,000 individuals
• In total there are over 4.7 million UK members registered on Linkedin
• Nearly two thirds of these members make their use of the service at work.

The community is huge and growing.  Why miss out on such a fantastic networking opportunity?!  Visit our Linkedin introduction for more information about this fantastic professional tool.