Chapter 15
Triangulating Opportunities, Companies, and People to Target
In This Chapter
Uncovering the hidden job market with niche boards
Finding and tracking your next boss
Getting help from your social network
Organizing your research to optimize your job-search campaign
Companies don’t hire people. People hire people. Consequently, developing direct relationships with the people who have a hand in hiring is a better use of your time than trolling job boards and applying to the positions you find through them.
But how exactly should you go about developing those direct relationships? Consider this chapter your guide. In it, I explain how to identify the companies you want to work for and the people you need to connect with online and offline to get your name added to the employee roster.
First, I help you discover some new, social media–powered ways of finding hidden job openings — the kind you wouldn’t know about otherwise. Then I help you peel back those opportunities to reveal the very people making the decisions about them. I guarantee you’ll walk away from this chapter with a top-ten list of companies and hiring managers that can help you begin focusing your social media job-search strategy.
Taking Advantage of Niche Job Boards to Find Opportunities
I’m sure you didn’t buy this book to discover how to use job boards. In fact, I’m willing to bet you’re already quite comfortable visiting one of the major job boards (like Monster, Indeed, or Simply Hired), finding possible fits, and then applying online. But because you still haven’t found a suitable job, you’ve probably discovered that applying on these huge websites isn’t always the best use of your time. Only a very small percentage — about 2 or 3 percent — of available jobs appear on job boards.
Don’t get me wrong. Checking out the major boards can be helpful, but one of the better ways to find out who’s hiring is to search the postings on niche job boards, which have smaller, regional, or industry-specific listings. Niche boards generally have less traffic than the big ones, which means you have less competition for some jobs that appear only there. Employers who don’t want to spend big money for a major board and who want to advertise the opening to only a narrow segment of the population generally post jobs on niche boards. The following sections introduce you to such boards. Happy browsing!
Using niche job boards to build a list of companies you want to target with your social media strategy is a terrific tactic. Just make sure you don’t jump the gun and start applying to those companies immediately after identifying them. Before you apply anywhere, you want to be sure to research your target companies and their hiring managers in order to identify their real needs; I help you do just that in Chapter 16.
Using Google search strings to ID hidden job boards
Because more than 4,000 niche job boards are available on the Internet, many job seekers don’t even bother trying to find them. The task just seems too daunting. Yet, very often, these niche boards hold the key to the best job postings.
Why do these boards offer the cream of the crop? Think of it this way: If a fresh, young company must choose between paying $600 to a major job board only to get tons of spammy résumés or paying a cheaper $60 to niche boards to get targeted résumés, it will likely choose the second option. The problem with these industry-specific boards is that they’re smaller and often harder to find.
Here’s the quick-and-easy way to find these smaller, hyper-focused, industry-specific job listings: Enter either of the following search strings, just as you see them here, in a fresh Google search, replacing [Your field] with the name of the industry or field in which you hope to find a job. Be sure to keep the quotation marks intact as shown.
Discovering the hidden uses of traditional job boards
Traditional job boards can actually be useful in ways that aren’t so obvious. For instance, you can use them to
Find out which companies are growing.
Study what language is being used to describe what you want to do.
Prepare your job interview skills by determining what’s expected of you in similar positions.
Analyze which industries and fields seem to be hiring more than others.
Build a list of target companies to focus your strategy on.
Tip: If a company is hiring, take a look at its competitor. You can identify competition by using Hoover's (www.hoovers.com). The free version gives you the top three competitors for almost any organization. Looking at the competition is a great way to expand your list of target organizations. Even if the competition isn't posting jobs on any job boards, the company may still be hiring.
“[Your field]” Careers intitle: “job board”
“[Your field]” Careers intitle: “job listing”
Here’s an example search string that I entered:
“Nonprofit” Careers intitle: “job board”
Then I entered this string:
“Nonprofit” Careers intitle: “job listing”
Try entering these search strings with marketing, accounting, teaching, design, or whatever your industry happens to be.
The International Association of Employment Web Sites (IAEWS) is an international association just for niche job boards. It has thousands of members from every field imaginable around the world. Its site is an amazing resource for finding a local or focused job board in your area. Go to www.employmentwebsites.org, click on Members, and then click on Browse by Industry/Area to see a listing of boards by industry and location.
Considering other niche job boards
Following are some alternative job boards focused on various niches. See if any of them offer you something new. Remember that your main goal is to identify companies that are growing or that may be offering positions not found elsewhere. Even if you don’t find a specific job for you, use the company information to grow your network, something I talk about in the next chapter.
CareerCast
CareerCast (www.careercast.com), owned by an online classifieds company, provides you with jobs posted from newspapers and magazines from around the country from the following 12 industries: construction, disability, diversity, energy, green, healthcare, nursing, trucking, veterans, IT and engineering, marketing and advertising, and retail.
VentureLoop
Looking for work in a startup environment? VentureLoop (www.ventureloop.com) tells you what venture-backed organizations are hiring. By developing a relationship directly with venture capital firms, you get access to a collection of jobs that are often not found anywhere else.
Automating Craigslist for fast job-posting alerts
Despite the craziness of Craigslist (www.Craigslist.org), it's still a marvelous place to find up-to-the-minute job postings. (If you've ever tried to sell something on Craigslist, you know that some people are just nuts!) In fact, if you were to walk into a business and ask the hiring manager about the first place he would post an ad for a new job, without much thought he'd likely say, "Oh, I'll just drop it on Craigslist to get some résumés in the door." Craigslist is a great resource for part-time jobs, temp jobs, and entry-level jobs. Typically, jobs posted on Craigslist are filled at a fast pace and can be a real solution for someone not interested in spending (or not in a position to spend) a lot of time on strategy or networking.
Although I typically recommend you spend time researching a company before applying for a job, listings on Craigslist don’t always allow for that. You want to apply when you can and as soon as you can, before someone else snatches the job right from under you.
Follow these steps to guarantee you’re the first person to know about any new job postings in your area of interest without camping out on Craigslist all day:
1. Visit www.Craigslist.org and go to the Jobs section you're interested in.
2. Type in all the necessary filters in the search field so you see specific jobs that interest you.
For example, if you’re an educator, click on the Education link in the Jobs section and filter with the keyword “ESL.” The results should be a list of jobs you could do pretty well at.
3. Copy the URL from the search result that you want instant updates from. Find the URL in the address bar of your browser.
It will look something like this: http://nh.Craigslist.org/search/sss?query=training+wheels+%28newfields|newmarket|Epping|stratham|greenland|hampton|seacoast|exeter%29&srchType=A&minAsk=&maxAsk=
4. Open a new browser tab or window, head to the IFTTT website (www.ifttt.com), and set up a free account.
IFTTT is a free website that lets you build logical statements that connect several different actions online. For instance, you can build a recipe that sends you an e-mail every time you are tagged in a Facebook photo. You’ll soon receive an e-mail asking you to confirm your e-mail address.
5. Find the recipe called Craigslist Search and paste in the URL you copied from Craigslist.
You can open it directly from here: https://ifttt.com/recipes/79.
The faster you respond to a Craigslist posting, the more likely it is that someone will read your résumé. So if you think you'll respond better by getting an alert via text message, Gmail, or chat, feel free to use any of the 900+ recipes for Craigslist on IFTTT found here: https://ifttt.com/recipes/search?q=Craigslist.
As you find job opportunities on Craigslist, remember to jot down the names of the companies. You need these names later when you search out people on LinkedIn to talk to. (I explain how to use LinkedIn as part of your job search in Chapter 9.)
Following Twitter for job postings
Almost every city has an entire hidden job market that’s accessible only through Twitter. Even if you never send a single tweet, you can still take advantage of this underground market. Here are the four ways people post jobs on Twitter:
Local recruiters often post their job openings on Twitter first in order to test the level of interest and determine whether to post them to a job board later. You can take advantage of this trend by finding recruiters on Twitter and following their tweets. Type in the keywords "recruiter," "recruitment," "sourcing," or "executive placement" at Twellow (www.twellow.com).
Volunteer Twitter accounts aggregate and stream jobs posted in specific locations. As a result of these volunteer accounts, local job-search channels are emerging in almost every city. You can find and follow them by searching for "[your city] jobs" at www.twellow.com. Check out Local Buzz Network for job postings on Twitter (http://localbuzznetwork.com).
Companies sometimes use their Twitter accounts to post jobs. Some companies also have Twitter accounts specifically designed for recruiting. You can find these corporate Twitter accounts either by locating a link on the company's home page or by searching it out on www.twellow.com.
Many leading brands use TweetMyJobs to find talent. TweetMyJobs (www.tweetmyjobs.com) is a job board that's unique because it posts jobs only through a specific Twitter account for your industry and location.
Flip to Chapter 12 for more details on how to use Twitter to access the hidden job market in your area.
Hello, Hiring Manager! Finding Decision Makers through Key Social Sites
Chances are that the people you need to talk to about future employment — the many hiring managers in the job market — are online. And lucky for you, a considerable amount of information is available about them. Just like in sales prospecting, knowing your key decision makers helps create your strategy and puts you in a competitive position during interviews.
In the following sections, I walk you through the steps for using two key social media sites (LinkedIn and Twitter) to track down hiring managers for the companies you’re interested in.
Looking to LinkedIn for information
Ten years ago, you would have had to pay hundreds of dollars for the information that’s freely available about companies on LinkedIn today. Every year, LinkedIn augments its features in the direction of turning company profiles into rich sources of information.
Using LinkedIn, you can follow changes in a company and be alerted to promotions, layoffs, and new hires. Companies also use this social media to display products, make status updates, and address the public. What’s even more useful about LinkedIn is your ability to uncover great places to work and then find the exact people you need to talk to about employment.
To access LinkedIn's hidden list of recognized industries, go to www.linkedin.com/companyDir?industries=. (Note that you need to be signed in to follow the link to the page.) From there, follow these steps to start building your list of companies and their hiring managers:
1. Click on the industry that’s most closely related to the field you want to work in and then filter down your choices by location and company size.
Play with your filters until you get a list of about ten possible places to work.
2. Follow each of the companies that appeal to you.
3. Click on the How You’re Connected tab at the top of the company’s page and then again on the See All link.
This link brings you to a people-search results page that allows you to filter that company’s employees.
4. Filter your search by location and add a keyword that’s related to the role your hiring manager may have.
For example, if you’re hoping for a marketing job, type “marketing.” If you’re going for operations, type “operations.” The keyword opens the search to contacts beyond your current network.
If you have a paid version of LinkedIn, you can also filter by seniority level to make sure you’re viewing directors and managers.
After you pick out some hiring managers, you’re ready to start gathering some information about them. Check out the later section “Picking up relevant information from LinkedIn profiles” for details.
Seeking out key folks on Twitter
Many hiring managers maintain Twitter accounts. Following these managers on Twitter, reading what they have to say, and then ultimately interacting with them can put you ahead of the other candidates for a job.
When people have Twitter accounts, they often link those accounts to their LinkedIn accounts. So you’re smart to check the profile of any hiring managers you find on LinkedIn (I explain how to find them in the preceding section). Also pay careful attention to the blue-shaded area at the top of their LinkedIn profile. If a hiring manager has linked a Twitter account to his or her LinkedIn profile, you can see it there in the gray Contact Info area. Just look for the Twitter line to access a link to that person’s Twitter account.
You also have the option of seeking out hiring managers directly from one of the many Twitter user directories. (Of course, if the person doesn't mention that she works at a particular company, you won't be able to find her unless you search for her name.) I recommend using a Twitter directory service like Twellow (www.twellow.com). Check out Chapter 12 for tips on using it.
With these Twitter directory services, you enter the name of the company, and then the directory tells you about any profile in which that company name was used. You can also check to see whether your target hiring manager is on Twitter by searching for her name directly. I suggest following this person and reading her tweets for a week before trying to engage with her. Listen first, talk second. Her bio or picture should clue you in on whether she’s the right person. See Chapter 12 for tips on engaging with hiring managers through Twitter.
As you find and follow hiring managers, drop their Twitter username into a Twitter List called “Hiring Managers” and make that list private. This list allows you to track their tweets easily. (For details on how to create a Twitter List, see Chapter 12.)
Zooming in with ZoomInfo
ZoomInfo (http://zoominfo.com) is a database of professionals from around the world that includes their work history, role, and contact information. The site combines web-search technology with social profiles, automatically using mentions of people's names online to create profiles in their database.
Using similar advanced search criteria to LinkedIn, you can enter variables like the company, position, and location to build a list of possible decision makers at your target companies.
If you create a free account and verify your information, ZoomInfo gives you five views a month. This means you’ll get the e-mail address and phone number for anyone in the directory, which is especially powerful when taking a networking approach to your job search.
After you know what company you want to work for, use ZoomInfo to try to identify who the key decision maker is. Uncover his name and e-mail address for future use. You may be able to use that information to connect with him on LinkedIn.
Spying on Hiring Managers before They Spy on You
When you apply for a job, especially if you qualify and make it into the final group of ten applicants, chances are very high that the hiring manager will research you online. He’ll look you up on Google, study your LinkedIn profile, and analyze your Twitter feed for any red flags. In essence, he’s going to spy on you (cue the James Bond theme song).
Now that you know this, why not spy on the hiring manager first? You have the advantage because he’ll be on your radar long before you’re on his. After you complete the research I describe in the earlier section “Hello, Hiring Manager! Finding Decision Makers through Key Social Sites” and have uncovered the names of the very people who will be making a decision about your future, start your spy mission by using the methods I describe in the following sections.
Setting up Google Alerts with managers’ names
Google Alerts is a service from Google that sends you e-mail notifications whenever a topic you’ve specified gets mentioned online. Here’s how this feature works: Google’s robots scour the web at an incredibly quick pace, finding new content, analyzing it, and indexing it. Google then sends the newly indexed web pages to your e-mail however frequently you choose to be notified. When Google alerts you, you get fresh content in near real time. Essentially, you get an e-mail when something new appears online related to the keyword you’ve set up.
Now that you know what a cool tool Google Alerts is, you can set up alerts for information on potential hiring managers. I walk you through the steps of setting up a Google Alert for yourself in Chapter 7. To modify those instructions for the purpose of getting the scoop on a potential hiring manager, just type the name of your targeted hiring manager in quotation marks rather than your own name.
When analyzing the results of your alerts, look for the following information:
News items you can mention during an interview or in an e-mail
Similarities that you can lead with when you reach out to the person
Articles the person has written or was mentioned in so you can congratulate her
Red flags so you can determine whether the company is truly a match for you
Picking up relevant information from LinkedIn profiles
Earlier in this chapter, I show you how to use LinkedIn to find the hiring managers that you want to follow and, well, spy on. After finding these key folks, you can begin gathering information about them that you can use to connect on a more personal level. When looking at a hiring manager’s profile on LinkedIn, pay careful attention to the following elements:
The school he went to: School spirit can be a great topic to break the ice. USC grads are nuts about the Trojans. Boston school grads worship the Red Sox. Find out whether a manager’s school has a strong school team or is noteworthy in some way. Then use this information to connect with him.
Similarities you share: As you glance through a manager’s profile, pay close attention to anything you have in common. Look at his interests, schools, and past jobs. When you reach out to him later, lead with a similarity.
The LinkedIn Groups he belongs to: At the very bottom of a manager’s profile, you often can find a list of groups he’s joined. Look for industry-specific groups and then join them.
When you join the same LinkedIn Groups as a potential hiring manager, you gain access to the same stream of information he’s getting. As you participate in that group, the hiring manager may see your name for the first time. Later, when he sees your job application, he may recognize you. (For advice on participating in groups, see Chapter 9.)
Some LinkedIn profiles are full of rich information about a person; other profiles are barely filled out. What does this imbalance mean for you? Simply that you’re at the mercy of how much information a particular hiring manager decides to disclose. If one hiring manager doesn’t give you much to go on in his profile, find his equivalent at a competing company. After all, you want to gain access to the most content-rich profile possible in order to further your job search.
Listening to what managers say
In addition to hiring managers’ professional profiles, which are relatively static, you want to listen to what they are saying across their other social media channels. Listening to, or reading, what someone says on social media can give you a sense of his or her style, interests, and personality. Use these four approaches:
Follow them on Facebook: Facebook gives you a chance to follow someone rather than add them as a friend. After all, it would be kind of weird if you added your future boss to your network before you’ve even had a job interview! You can get his public posts to show up on your home page without making a big deal about it by following his profile.
Follow them on Twitter: It goes without saying that you need to follow your future boss on Twitter. Just make sure you actually read his tweets! See Chapter 12 for ideas on engaging with them.
Read their blog: Some bosses have time to blog. If the one you’re interested in does and you find the blog, read it! Blog writing is often personal.
Add them to Newsle: Newsle (http://newsle.com) is a site that tells you who in your network was mentioned in the news or on a blog. If your future boss is a thought leader, he'll probably be writing or be written about. Newsle will let you know if that happens. Sign up for the site and add your future boss. If he shows up online, you can pay him a compliment on Twitter.
Asking Your Social Media Network for Help
As you begin interacting with people on social media, becoming a valuable source of information to them, you grow what’s called social equity. Social equity is like having money in the relationship bank. You keep depositing to that bank every time you do a good deed in the eyes of your network, such as retweeting, commenting on blogs, or helping someone make a valuable connection on Facebook. After you have enough relationship money, and only once in a while, you can make a withdrawal (in other words, you can ask your network to return the favor). Who knows when you may need to ask for an introduction or request a referral so your résumé gets to the top of the pile.
A common mistake people make is asking for help without building up any social equity. I had a client who rarely used LinkedIn when he was working. In fact, his profile wasn’t even complete. Then he got laid off and e-mailed everyone in his network asking for help with a generic résumé attached. Not surprisingly, no one jumped to his aid.
In contrast, I’ve interviewed many successful job seekers for my blog who were enabled to succeed through the generous help of their networks. The difference? The successful job seekers built up strong relationships over many months before making a social-equity withdrawal in the form of asking for assistance.
The trick to asking your network for help is to never appear desperate or needy. If you’re looking for general information about a company or an industry, sending out an unfocused, untargeted message is appropriate. However, if you’re specifically asking people to step up and pass on your résumé or any other thing that would put their neck on the line, then ask on a one-on-one basis. Never send a mass e-mail to your contacts, asking whether “anyone” can pass on your résumé because you have nothing else to go on. Doing so may be perceived as offensive.
I’ve spoken with many people who were introduced to the person who hired them because they asked their network for help. One blog reader simply changed his LinkedIn headline to say, “Recently Unemployed.” In a day, someone in his network made an introduction that got him hired two weeks later. This client was a very outgoing fellow who never hesitated to help people in his network and who spent years adding value. And frankly, he also got pretty lucky. Don’t expect this to happen to you — but if it does, don’t be surprised either!
Here are some effective ways you can ask your network for help.
Send mass e-mail updates to your connections every once in a while. First, make sure you BCC people on the e-mail addresses so people aren’t receiving the e-mail addresses of everyone else in your network. Also, if you haven’t e-mailed these people in a while, you better build some equity first by giving them an update about your life and asking about theirs.
For example, I receive a newsletter from a job-seeking friend of mine once a month. In the newsletter, she tells me some cool things she’s doing in her life, shares some fun links, and then asks for a connection to a specific company. I enjoy reading about her journey, and because she uses a specific company by name, I can easily think about my own network and see whether I can help.
Always be very specific about what you need people to do for you. Never say, “I just got laid off; does anyone know of any jobs out there?” Instead, say, “I’m looking for my next career opportunity, and I’m very passionate about optimizing supply-chain processes. Do you have connections at an import/export firm in town that I can call on for advice?”
Make your mass messages (think e-mail blasts, discussions on a LinkedIn Group, Facebook Timeline posts, or tweets to your whole audience) positive and undemanding. These messages aren’t the place to ask people to stick their neck out for you. Instead, use large groups of people for what they’re good at: general info and social support. Ask about industry trends, cool companies to look out for, what skills you may need to master, advice, and so forth.
Ask for more specific help in one-on-one interactions. For example, you may ask for someone to pass on your résumé, give you the name of the hiring manager associated with a specific job opening, or even just have informal conversations about an industry. This is where LinkedIn InMails, Twitter DMs, Facebook messages, and personal e-mails — all of which are forms of direct, one-on-one contact — come in. You’re calling in a favor, so find a way to make it easy and rewarding for someone to help you.
For the most part, people really do want to help you. Being helpful makes people feel good, especially if they can make a difference and their efforts are properly appreciated. If someone lends you a hand, always tell him exactly what his help has done for you by sending a short thank-you note.
Organizing All the Data You Gather
After about a week of researching target companies and the hiring managers within those companies, you may find that you have way too much information to keep in your head. Ultimately, you need some kind of system for organizing all the data you accumulate about people.
I recommend creating dossiers of important people in your network. (A dossier is a file or collection of information about someone.) I talk about some of these network-organizing tools (called contact relationship management, or CRM, systems) in Chapter 3. Use your CRM system to apply tags such as “Hiring Manager” so you can easily segment your list. Add notes to each hiring manager in the system so you can refer to them later.
You may feel like you’re overdoing things by keeping so many notes, but believe me, your work will pay off. To avoid kicking yourself for not remembering a crucial fact about a hiring manager that you discovered weeks earlier, make sure you’re organized from the very beginning. Use the techniques I present earlier in this chapter to find opportunities, companies, and people to target, and then keep track of them in one of these organizing tools.