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Your Two Options: The Hidden vs. the Published Market
To begin, there are two types of job markets. One is called the
hidden job
market
and the other is called the
published job market
.
Let us begin with a review of the
published job market.
This source is comprised
of Internet job boards, want ads, newspaper ads, and radio advertisements;
these are media sources where employers will proactively seek employees. The
published job market accounts for approximately 20% of all the jobs or one out
of every five jobs.
Regardless of method, follow-up is the same: Obtain the name of a contact
person and call or email a few days later to express your sincere interest and
offer a concise statement indicating your qualifications. Find this contact name
by visiting the company website and then play detective with the receptionist to
determine whom to contact.
The goal is to put your credentials in one screen’s worth of content. This means
including the essential data you need to attract attention at the beginning of
your message. Your subject line has to motivate the recruiter to open your email;
he or she may get hundreds of such messages daily, so yours needs to stand out!
Be clever but still highly professional; present something that is intriguing and
creative. Make sure that your email screen name is a variation of your name and
not the handle you use for Internet dating or to correspond with cyber pals.
The main thing for you to remember when hunting online is that you follow
recruiter directions, create a properly formatted resume, do your own follow-up
and are relentless in pursuing your dream. The likelihood of you actually getting a
job offer as a result of an Internet job board posting is still less than 5%, whereas
we know for sure that about 80% of all new hires result from personal networking.
So where do you think you should devote most of your time and efforts given
these statistics?
Not
to the Internet job sites, but
to building personal relationships.
You can use the Internet for this purpose as well.
Section 13 – Best Job Search Strategies
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