How To Add Interests On LinkedIn (And Remove Interests From Your Profile!)
As you’re filling out your profile on LinkedIn, you might be tempted to skip over the Interest section or just not put much effort into it.
But that section is more valuable than you might think it is at first glance.
In fact, you should put in a lot of effort at adding interests to your account on LinkedIn.
The reason why is that this section gives recruiters and potential employers a chance to get to know you beyond your work history.
So, if you’re looking to beef up that profile on LinkedIn, we’re here to help you add more interests to your account.
Steps To Add Interests On LinkedIn
Though you used to be able to manually enter in your interests on the site, that is no longer possible.
Instead, you have to search and then can only add things that are selectable options as things that you’re interested in.
Here’s how to do that.
1. Use the search box to find people (influencers), group, school, or company that interest you.
Maybe you’re interested in getting a job with Comcast, so just search for Comcast in the search box.
Everything related to what you enter will start to populate below the search box.
2. Click on the organization that you were searching for in the results.
As you can see in the image below, the search results include not only the Comcast organization, but also people who work for the company, available jobs, and related groups.
You just need to click on the organization that you’re searching for, which will be the first one in this example.
3. Follow it
As you can see in the previous image, you can simply click the “Follow” button to the right of the organization’s name.
Or, you can click through to the organization’s profile page and then click on the “Follow” option from that page.
Once you do this, the page you followed is listed as an interest on your own profile.
You can strategically add interests like this in an attempt to land your dream job.
How To See All Of Your Interests On LinkedIn
Not sure what all you’ve got listed as interests on your profile in LinkedIn?
No problem!
You can easily view all the things that you’re listed as interested in on one screen.
Here’s how to do that.
- Log into your LinkedIn account, if you’re not already logged in.
- View your LinkedIn profile.
- Scroll down to the “Interests” section of your profile and click on “See All.”
This brings up all of the interests for your account.
You can view your interests by category using the tabs near the top that read: Influencers, Companies, Groups, and Schools.
How To Remove An Interest On LinkedIn
Do yo have some interests listed on your LinkedIn profile that you no longer want to be there?
No problem! You can easily remove them.
Here’s how to do that.
- Log into your LinkedIn account, if you’re not already logged in.
- View your LinkedIn profile.
- Scroll down to the “Interests” section of your profile and click on “See All.”
- Use the category tabs at the top to get to where the interest is that you want to remove. (Note, this only works for Influencers, Companies, and Schools)
- Click the checkbox (✓Following) to Unfollow. When you successfully do that, you’ll see a +Follow instead of a check.
If you want to remove a group from your LinkedIn interests, then the process is slightly different.
Here’s how to do that.
- Log into your LinkedIn account, if you’re not already logged in.
- View all of your groups here.
- Click on the group that you want to remove as an interest. This takes you to the group profile page.
- Click the settings menu at the top right (three dots) and select “Update your settings.”
- Where it says “Display group on profile” change it from from ‘Yes’ to ‘No’.
And that’s how you can remove any interest from your LinkedIn profile.
Final Thoughts
Though you can’t add more personal interests to your profile on LinkedIn, filling out the Interests section can still help you stand out from other applicants.
For starters, it shows that you took the initiative to add the company to your interests list so that you can keep up with them.
Plus, if a company that you’ve selected as an interest sends ads only to people who are following them, then you’ll be able to see those ads and possibly score your dream job in the process.
It doesn’t take much effort to add interests to your account on LinkedIn and it only benefits you to do it.
So, what are you waiting for? Go add some new interests to your profile now.
