I saw another one… an article listing 99 sites that everyone should (1) know about and (2) use.
So here’s my list of 100 Best Sites to Use in Your Job Search:
1. Linke………….
Wait!
NO!
I don’t like lists like this.
Thinking practically, who in the world has time to (1) know about all of these sites, especially since they seem to come and go with whimsical weather (I’ve had more than a couple JibberJobber competitors fold up and drift away into oblivion).
Yes, of course job seekers have time, right? They have nothing else to do but to check out new sites that might be gone in three months.
NO. Job seekers don’t have time. They are not technical analysts for VC firms, trying to decide what is going to be the next LinkedIn or Facebook. Or figuring out what “popular” sites will be the next MySpace. They need to know the handful of high-impact, must-use sites to get them from Point A (no paycheck) to Point B (paycheck).
Don’t waste time on the lists, that take entirely too much time to read, feeling bad about not being up to speed on the “you must know about and use” sites. Instead, figure out what your gaps are, and address those gaps.
Here are three, count’em, THREE sites I’ll recommend to every job seeker. Beyond that, YOU have to figure out what your gaps are and where else you should be.
One: JibberJobber
Yes, I put JibberJobber as number 1. Partially because this is my website, my blog post, and I can order these however I want. But more than that, the ability to keep you organized in a job search, help you with your follow-up, and be a hub for the information you are collecting from online and offline sources.
In my recent phone calls with users I’m amazed and humbled to hear how people use and depend on JibberJobber, not just in a job search but to manage their personal and professional relationships. Indispensable. “Logged in all the time.” People are using it the way I envisioned they would use it, and have come to depend on it to help keep them organized… it’s very cool to hear from people around the world that for them, JibberJobber is more important than LinkedIn, or other sites.
Two: LinkedIn
LinkedIn has changed a lot since I wrote the first edition of the LinkedIn book. They have decreased the value by removing features, or moving them to the paid side. Recruiters tell me they aren’t using LinkedIn much, or as much (they are going to where their target audience is engaged, which isn’t necessarily LinkedIn). They seem to be saturated in the U.S. and, while expanding globally is fine for them, the change in the userbase means that the value to a U.S. user has lessened.
Having said all that, they are the 8,000 pound guerrilla in the professional networking space. You should turn to LinkedIn (or, if you are in a country that has a more powerful professional network, like Xing in Germany, then use that one) for research. Learn about your target companies, your prospects, come up with a prospect list, figure out the structure of, and players in, a company, etc.
I regularly go to LinkedIn to figure who the heck people are, and why we should get on a call or have a conversation. I can’t think of any system or site that is as helpful as LinkedIn is to help me understand that, and make a decision on how much time to pursue on a person or company.
Don’t use LinkedIn to read all of the influencer stuff, blog posts, or immerse yourself in Groups in the name of learning and education.
Do use LinkedIn to help you focus on networking and targeting prospects, and being more prepared for conversations.
And then, of course, go to JibberJobber and enter relevant information about your companies and contacts 🙂
Three: _____________
I’m really kind of stuck on this one. Do I tell you to use Indeed? When I’m on the road, at job clubs, they all talk about Indeed and LinkedIn. My hesitation is that too many people use Indeed the wrong way. They use it to find and apply to jobs. WRONG! WASTE OF TIME! DON’T FALL INTO THIS TRAP!
Okay, applying to jobs isn’t totally wrong or bad, but if you do it a lot, because it’s easier to do that then to call someone, email someone, go to a network meeting, etc., then you are chickening out of your job search and probably wasting time.
Use Indeed as a research tool. Find out what’s going on in an industry or company by the postings on Indeed. Or, if you are preparing for an interview for a Product Manager, go to Indeed and open up ten Product Manager openings. Then, study those job descriptions and make sure you understand the lingo, keywords, phrases, expectations, qualifications, tasks and duties, etc. What a great way to prepare for your interview! Marry what you learn with your interview preparation (which you can wordsmith and store in JibberJobber), so you have stories that exemplify the phrases from those job descriptions, etc.
Or instead of indeed, should I tell you to use Google? The starting point for the internet… Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc…. to find information and do research. You can find too much information, which becomes a pain to sift through, but if you can get over your fear of picking up the phone, a search engine + your tenacity can be invaluable.
I’m not sure what #3 really is.
There comes a point in your job search where you have to accept that your problems aren’t going to be solved by widgets or websites, and that you simply have to send *that* email, or make *that* phone call.
Don’t hunt for silver bullets. Work on relationships, and your messages, and how you request help. You need to add a bit of old fashioned elbow grease to this job, and not hope you stumble into your next dream job just because you are on the 99 right tools.
What am I missing?