The Alternative Remedies Guide

The Internet offers huge opportunities for a job hunter, but also presents several possible challenges. It also adds several complexities, and a lot more things to consider…and be wary of.

Job hunting needs to be thought of as a highly personal, extremely directed marketing operation where you are the product. Your resume is an advertisement. Your extended network of associates is your source for information and opportunities.

So where does the net fit in? At AA-Careers, we just posted a job on Craigslist and got 600 plus responses in a week. For one job. That’s increased job hunting competition.

Had a strong person called us before we placed the ad, they could have secured the position before having all that competition. How? By finding someone who knows someone at our office who became aware of the job prior to posting. Everyone was aware 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 how you submit your application as well. When we did an analysis of the 650 resumes, we found a large number of errors. 63% of the applicants were easily taken out with a fast-paced triage process. How? The same way any hiring manager would. By eliminating resumes where the objective didn’t match our position description. By passing over prospects whose cover letters gave us grounds not to engage them, like "I know I’m overqualified but I really need a job". By eliminating candidates whose documents that didn’t open properly. And by eliminating job hunters who didn’t bother to spell check their cover letter and/or resume.

So the good news is that job sites give you a sense of who is hiring, and for what kinds of jobs. But once those jobs are posted, the competition is intense. You can still compete, if you have a well honed 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 potential problem to be aware of is how easily you can be looked up on the net. As we Googled several job hunters, we ran into some pictures and comments that were in questionable taste. Nothing insane, but enough to swing our thinking about who to hire.

AA-Careers provides a comprehensive 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!