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The marketing gurus say LinkedIn recommendations matter. I’ve never had a client tell me they contacted me because of one. I never look at other people’s recommendations either, and I doubt many people do. They’re buried deep in a LinkedIn profile, well below the fold where most visitors stop scrolling.
That said, I still ask for them and I still write them. A complete LinkedIn profile with recommendations looks more credible than one without, even if nobody reads them individually. They function less as persuasive content and more as a signal that real people have worked with you and were willing to say so publicly. That signal has value, even if it’s hard to measure.
The Real Problem with Getting Recommendations
Getting people to give recommendations is a pain. I’ve been asking clients for them across 53 ghostwriting projects, and the pattern is consistent. Sometimes they write one quickly, but it’s generic. “Richard is great to work with. Highly recommend.” That tells a visitor nothing useful. Sometimes it’s like pulling teeth. They agree to write one, then don’t follow through. They keep saying they will. Weeks pass. Months. Eventually you stop asking because it feels like nagging.
The main reason people don’t write recommendations isn’t laziness or ingratitude. They don’t know what to write. Standing in front of a blank text box and trying to summarize a professional relationship in a few paragraphs is genuinely difficult for most people. They know they appreciated the work, but translating that appreciation into specific, useful language isn’t a skill most professionals have practiced.
For ghostwriting clients specifically, there’s an additional complication: anonymity. Most ghostwriting clients don’t want to publicly state that someone else wrote their book. Some solve this by crediting me as their “writing coach” or “editor” in the recommendation, which makes it possible for them to acknowledge the relationship without revealing the full scope of the work. That compromise works. It’s better than no recommendation at all.
How to Actually Get Useful Recommendations
Don’t just ask “Would you write me a LinkedIn recommendation?” That question produces either silence or generic praise. Instead, make it easy for them. Tell them specifically what you’d like them to mention. The project you worked on together, the result it produced, the specific skill that made the collaboration work. Give them a framework so they’re not staring at a blank box.
Timing matters. Ask when the project is fresh, when the client is happiest with the result, when the value of your work is most obvious. Asking six months after a project ends means they’ve moved on mentally and the recommendation becomes a chore rather than a natural expression of satisfaction.
If you’re a ghostwriter or anyone else whose work involves confidentiality, suggest the language they can use. “You can mention me as your writing coach” or “You can reference the project without naming the book” removes the obstacle that stops many clients from writing anything at all. I’ve also written draft recommendations for clients to submit under their own name. This has worked a couple of times, but usually the same pattern plays out: they say they’ll post it and never do.
Write recommendations for others first. This isn’t manipulation. It’s reciprocity. When someone receives a thoughtful recommendation from you, many will feel motivated to return the favor. And if they don’t, you’ve still done something useful for someone in your network.
Writing Recommendations That Are Actually Worth Reading
If you’re going to write a recommendation for someone, make it specific enough to be useful. “Great to work with” is meaningless. Anyone can say that about anyone. A useful recommendation describes what the person actually did, what the result was, and what made their approach different from what you’d get from someone else.
Instead of “John is a talented writer,” try something like “John took a disorganized collection of interview notes and turned them into a manuscript that sounded exactly like me. He met every deadline and handled three major direction changes without complaint.” That tells a reader something real about what working with John is actually like.
Keep it short. Three to five sentences is enough. Nobody reads long recommendations. The people who do glance at them are scanning for specifics, not reading essays. Give them something concrete to scan and move on.
Only write recommendations for people whose work you can genuinely endorse. A half-hearted recommendation is obvious, and it reflects poorly on both the person receiving it and the person writing it. If you can’t say something specific and honest, it’s better to decline gracefully than to produce something generic that helps no one.
Do They Actually Matter?
You must have them. You should give them. The more the better, because a profile with no recommendations or just two or three looks incomplete. A profile with twenty looks like someone who has worked with a lot of people who were willing to say so publicly. That’s the entire value proposition.
The direct impact on business? Minor or zero. I can’t point to a single client relationship that started because someone read my recommendations. Nobody has ever mentioned them in an initial conversation. The career coaches and LinkedIn experts who call them “essential” are overstating the case. But having none is worse than having some, the same way having no profile photo is worse than having one. It’s not that the photo closes the deal. It’s that not having one raises a question you don’t want raised.
Get recommendations. Give recommendations. Make it as easy as possible for people to write them. Accept that most people won’t follow through no matter what you do. And don’t expect them to generate business on their own. They’re one piece of a credibility picture that only works when everything else is in place too.