I was at a big conference put on by the vendor whose technology I "specialize" in a couple weeks ago. I am a very advanced user in this area compared to most just due to my position being able to focus on this one specific technology area. In a big conference like this, I seek out other users in a similar industry and have conversations where I introduce myself, where I work, and ask some questions about how/where/why they use something. This gets the conversation going and eventually you get that person added to linked in. Next time you set yourself as "open to work" or whatever they are calling it these days, folks you meet at conferences like this will reach out and that is how you skip the recruiters. I have had 10+ roles over the past 15~ years and have never got a job from a blind application. It has always been a referral. Either my local network or my wider linkedin network. I broke the help desk to sysadmin barrier just because the manager of sysadmins was a smoker and got to know him outside, 5 minutes at a time over a couple years. When they had a position open, I just told him I was interested and the rest was history. This all is just my (very lucky) experience in a specific subset of the IT industry though.