The 5 Best Job Hunt Strategies of The Year

The best advice for finding a job.


If your goal for the new year is to find a great job, good for you. The job market is tough out there, but companies are still hiring people just like you everyday. They key to find the job you want is marketing. The old strategies of job searching no longer work and today, it's all about the way you present yourself.


To help you get started on your journey, I scoured the archives to find the 5 best job hunting strategies of the year:


No news is not good news - Many people think that by not having any personal information they are doing better than if they had tons of thing come up in a web search. The truth is that if you are invisible online, it can cause confusion and make you appear to be unimportant. If a prospective employer does a web search for your name, it's easy for them to mistake you for someone else, especially if you don't have anything relevant online. Instead of being invisible, create an online presence that shows who you really are.


Watch out for your online reputation - Almost any employer will at least Google search an applicant before they even invite them in for an interview. Do a web search on your name and see what comes up. Make sure there aren't any pictures of you or comments you made that could be viewed as inappropriate. You can give your online reputation a boost by putting some time and thought into your Linkedin and Google + profiles.


Do your homework - With the ease of web searching, there is no reason to show up at a job interview without knowing anything about the company. Before you apply for a job, and especially before you go to an interview, you should do some research to find out a little bit about the company, their goals and even some personal information about the interviewer. In any interview, you will be asked if you know anything about the company. Showing that you know how to use the internet to find out information is impressive and it shows that you really want the job.


Customize your resume for the job - Instead of using the old style "work history" resumes, you should target your resume to the job you are applying for. There is no need for an objective statement, and you only need to include relevant work history.


Get Networking - Use the power of social networking sites to get in touch with friends, family and past co-workers. In a tight job market, who you know is just as important as what you know. Tell your friends that you are looking for a job and ask them if they've heard of anyone who is hiring. You'd be surprised at how often these sorts of warm leads and referrals end up in a job offer.




What other job hunting tips do you think are really helpful? Please share your thoughts in the comments.


By Melissa Kennedy- Melissa is a 9 year blog veteran and a freelance writer for LogisticsJobsiteBlog and Nexxt, along with helping others find the job of their dreams, she enjoys computer geekery, raising a teenager, supporting her local library, writing about herself in the third person and working on her next novel.