Get Hired Faster: Building a Web Presence

Making yourself standout in a pool of thousands of applicants is especially difficult in today’s economy. Handing out your resume is most likely not enough to even get you in the door. With the intensification of  web and social media more employers are looking for digital samples of work, thoughts, and other accomplishments. I wanted to outline some steps you can take to build your personal brand and build a web presence.

1. Building Your Brand: Building your brand is essential for gaining a good reputation. Start by connecting through social media site such as LinkedIN, Twitter, Facebook, and Google Plus. This will help increase your visibility on the web and help you easily be more found.

• Post content related to your career goals and things you find interesting, not content related to how messed up you were this weekend.
• Connect with people in your industry to ask questions and networking opportunities. Most connections and opportunities are based off referrals today, and it’s import to expand your network.
• Interact on company websites you want to work for. Like them, share their posts, and comment on topics you find interesting. This helps establish credibility and might get you noticed.
  

2. Build Credibility:  Recruiters like nothing more than if you show your knowledgable in your field and interested in certain topics. Start by using sites such as WordPress, Blogger, Tumblr to write posts on topics your interested in or thoughts related to subjects.

• Use blogging as an easy way to communicate to an audience your views, philosophy, and thoughts. Share your posts on social networks to get more views.
• Most Importantly- Blogging helps improve your search engine optimization (SEO) so you come up first on search results on Google or other search engines. This is critical when recruiter search for your name. They can see quality information about you and see your expertise on subjects.

3.  Build an ePortfolio: Recruiters can receive hundreds of resumes a day. Having a quality resume is still an important asset in the job search and should be utilized accordingly. If you really want to stand out, create a website that’s all about YOU.

• If your moderately skilled in web design or familiar with WordPress, buy a domain name such as www.yourname.com
• Include a pdf and HTML page of your resume. Also include your online samples of papers, projects, and other work.
• Include an about me page with career objectives and other hobbies and interests.
• ePortfolio’s are the best way to show your qualified. They should bring together your accomplishments and link you to all your social networks.
• Here are example ePortfolio’s to reference: ChadLieberman.com or ElizabethTimmons.com

Blogging, posting, commenting, on your personal websites and social networks is time consuming. It requires dedication and hard work but, building a web presence is crucial these days to stand out.  By following some of these steps it will help bring you closer to building your personal brand. With hard work and marketing, you can utilize these tools to help get hired faster. Keep in mind that there are other tools to utilize such as working with recruiters or putting your resume online which when used collectively, can work very well.  If you have questions or other ideas, comment them below.