Having a personal brand that differentiates you from the 100’s of resumes is critical to your search. Especially during this economy.
So how do you make yourself different? By establishing your unique competencies, why you are relevant to the person reading your resume and how you have consistently demonstrated these competencies. These must be aligned with and relevant to the company or person.
For example, if you brand yourself as a “Sales person with exceptional negotiating skills dealing with multi-million dollar and multi-year contracts.” then you become relevant to those types of companies and industries. However, you become irrelevant to high volume low dollar companies.
Too many candidates see this as a negative because this eliminates these companies. In fact, you would be eliminated anyway because your expertise isn’t aligned. On the other hand, you become more valuable to those companies that do align with your brand. The more valuable you become the more the company is willing to pay.
A strong brand is always beneficial to a candidate. Every candidate has a brand. Most don’t take the time, reflection, and in-depth research to identify what their brand is. We aren’t suggesting that your brand will eliminate every other person conducting a similar search, but it can move you to the “A” stack of resumes. We have a free complete audio presentation on personal branding. Click here to download it is free.
Try these practical steps as you develop your unique brand:
- Conduct a brainstorming exercise with yourself. List out all the things that make your experiences, values, passions, etc unique to you. Unique doesn’t mean exclusive. It is just what you bring to the party that some others won’t.
- How other perceive you is the most critical. So start asking co-workers, past employees, ex-bosses, friends, networking connections to describe how they see your unique experiences, values, passions, etc.
- Consolidate these and develop a branding statement.
- You may have more than one statement depending on circumstances.
For more on personal branding CLICK HERE
Leave a comment with your personal brand. We may even be conducting an active search for your brand.
Brad
In our
LinkedIn Group this has been a major topic of discussion. So we thought it important to give some tips that will help out.
In our new executive job search book
“This Is NOT the Position I Accepted. Executive recruiters reveal the inside secrets how to reduce your time in search” we have a whole section on this topic, so I will summarize as best I can to help out. If you want more on how you can read the complete Ebook for $1 and read the whole book.
Click HereAs a retained recruiter for almost 30 years here are three ways to get recruiters to call you back:
1) Have your resume so compelling that it stands out from all the rest. This is your marketing brochure. It must be succinct, highlight your accomplishments, be well organized, no errors ( I know most of you just thought “DUH.” Well rethink it, over half the resumes/cover letters we receive have errors) and the reader must be able to get all this in about 20 seconds. If this doesn’t happen, your resume is just one of 500+ resumes that enter the system. A common misconception is recruiters are seeking qualified candidates. WRONG. We are seeking exceptionally qualified candidates, especially in today’s market. Only the top 10-15%. Companies don’t need recruiters to find qualified candidates, they can do that themselves. Remember, the recruiter is just as interested in filling the search as you are in getting it.
2) Have a referral from someone who has built a relationship with the recruiter. Not just an acquaintance with the recruiter. This could be a former client or candidate. I always return the calls when someone I trust and know refers a person to me. Use tools such as Linkedin or networking groups to find someone who has a relationship with the recruiter.
3) Instead of calling, send an email. Most recruiters are overwhelmed with calls and no matter how hard we try we can’t return them all. I currently have a list of over 40 calls to return. I try and get to a few each day, but regardless of how hard I try the list gets longer. Sending an email makes it easy for recruiters to respond. I can do it late at night, early morning or between calls. I can’t do that with a phone call, especially with folks back east that are three hours ahead of my time zone. It will be 9 or 10 PM for them. I also can’t return a call when I have a couple minutes before my next interview, but I can quickly shoot off an email.
Good recruiters will respond to these techniques. I have recommended these to many of my candidates and networking connections. Most are amazed at the increase in the response rate.
Try these or any one of them and I think you will see your response rate increase with recruiters.
Using social media sites such as Linkedin, Twitter or Facebook to find customers, new employees or a job is new to most people. Today’s show is all about how you can leverage these sites to get what you are looking for. My partner Barry Deutsch and I discuss all the reasons to begin using these sites but most importantly how to use these sites to accomplish your objectives.
Social media sites are all the rage but few know how to use them to drive business, sales or sourcing for people or a job. Most become overwhelmed and just give up. We will show you how to start, which sites are best suited for your needs, how to engage people and the real purpose of these sites. Social media may be right for some and a waste of time for others. Find out which category you fall into to most effectively leverage your job search.
You can listen to or download our Career and Job Search Radio Show in our FREE Audio Library.
STOP NETWORKING TO FIND A JOB. Instead learn how to develop relationships so you have people marketing and selling you. Interview with Dave Elliott. Learn how to convert networking contacts that forget about you, into a relationships that become advocates for you. The key to successful networking is getting a 100 or 200 people that know you to become your sales team. Dave Elliot will show you how he does it and how you too can take networking contacts and turn them into relationships.
Every Monday from 11 – noon Pacific time, on www.latalkradio.com you can listen live as we discuss every aspect of your job search.
To download and listen to this show and all our radio shows just go to our audio library. CLICK HERE
Networking is one of the most important first steps in a job search. However, the manner in which most candidates approach job search networking is horrific. It’s useful, ineffective, and frustrating to watch. STOP conducting traditional job search networking — it is a complete waste of time.
In our LIVE Interent Radio Talk Show, we’ll show you how to build a powerful job search network that quickly begins to yield an abundance of job search leads, referrals, and opportunities. If you missed our LIVE Internet Radio Talk Show which we conduct every Monday 11-Noon PST on LATALKRADIO.com, you can still listen to the audio recording. We post all our Job Search and Career Management Radio Broadcasts within 24-48 hours after the LIVE show in our FREE Job Search Audio Library.
Marketing, Networking | bradremillard May 5, 2009 | 
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