Looking for a Job Using the Internet to Your Advantage
The Internet offers huge opportunities for a job seeker, but also presents several possible challenges. It also adds great complexities, and a lot more matters to think about…and be wary of.
Job hunting needs to be thought of as a personal, extremely targeted marketing operation where you are the product. Your resume is an ad. Your extended network of colleagues is your source for information and opportunities.
So where does the internet fit in? At AA-Careers, we recently posted a job on Craigslist and got 600 plus responses in a week. For a single position. That’s increased job hunting competition.
Had a great candidiate contacted us before we placed the ad, they could have gotten the position before running in to all that competition. How? By finding someone who knows someone at our company who became aware of the job prior to posting. Everyone knew about of the job for at least 11 days before it was posted. Who in your network might know of a job that’s coming available soon?
Be careful to check your application materials thoroughly before submitting them. When we did an analysis of the 650 resumes, we found a large number of errors. 63% of the applicants were easily removed with a quick triage process. How? The same way any HR professional would. By passing over resumes where the objective didn’t match our job posting. By rejecting candidates whose cover letters gave us grounds not to engage them, like "I know I’m overqualified but I really need a job". By eliminating prospects whose documents that didn’t open properly. And by eliminating prospects who didn’t trouble to spell check their cover letter and/or resume.
So the great news is that job sites give you a sense of what companies are hiring, and for what kinds of positions. But once those jobs are posted, the competition is intense. You can still compete, if you have a well thought out resume, designed to appeal directly and clearly to the recruiter. And if you have practiced interviewing – so you don’t stumble at a critical point.
Another thing to be aware of is how quickly and easily you can be checked on on the net. As we Googled several job hunters, we ran into some Facebook comments that were in questionable taste. Nothing illegal, but enough to sway our thinking about who to hire.
AA-Careers provides a broad set of services for Bay Area job seekers, providing our clients a personal career consultant, a managed job hunting campaign, modern tools like a personal website, video, highly targeted resume, and much more. Let us know if we can help you.
Be careful out there, and good hunting!
