Every jobseeker should be on LinkedIn. It's an essential element of your networking and job searching strategy.

Why?

LinkedIn provides several strong advantages for you:

• LinkedIn is a way to get your name out there. (Personal branding, anyone?) Your LinkedIn profile is an online resume for you, and it's a way for you to get your resume in front of people without actually sending it. That means, then, that the quality of your LinkedIn profile is critical. Make sure it's professional and easy to skim to get what's important about you--a bullet-point presentation is great.

• LinkedIn is a way to reconnect with people you've lost track of, and also to meet new people. Making connections is what LinkedIn is all about. Joining groups is a great way to do that. (Check out Sales Cafe, a group for sales reps--we've had some great discussions and advice for jobseekers lately.) Find groups that are focused on your particular area, and you'll not only make connections, you'll be up on what's going on in your industry--trends and people. No professional networking effort is complete without it.

• LinkedIn is a fantastic source for learning about companies you're interested in. Companies often maintain LinkedIn pages that are more informative than their official corporate pages for someone who wants to know about working there. Executives at these companies have pages, too.

• LinkedIn is one avenue you can take to contact hiring managers directly about jobs you're interested in. Career Confidential's LinkedIn Ninja Tricks to bypass HR and get the job has specific strategies you can use to do just that.

• Recruiters search LinkedIn all the time for candidates when they have a job to fill. Make sure they can find you.

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