Posts tagged with “JobSearch”

Here's a creative solution to the economic downturn -- let people pay you to wear their swag.

Jason Sadler, 26, sells companies the opportunity for him to wear their company's shirt for a day. He charges what he calls "face value", meaning January 1st costs $1 and December 31st costs $365. It might not sound like a ton of cash, but it adds up to $66,795 on a sold out calendar. He then sells monthly sponsorships adding upwards of $18,000 to his take home.

It may seem like one of those ridiculous ideas that would never actually work, but last year Jason made $83,000. According to BLS.gov, the average US take home was $32,000.

Here's the best part. In true entreprenuerial style, Jason's hiring on the west coast of the United States to expand his fledgling company's reach. Time to start bombarding his website with that Emurse resume. Make sure to mention how awesome your farmer's tan is in the cover letter!

Brand association isn't just for advertising and public relations nowadays, even the common worker is effected by this. As such, please don't say that a blog disclaimer is going to disassociate your brand with your company's because it's not and when you get fired your boss won't accept that excuse either!

Brand association is powerful and cannot be undone, which means you have to be smart about what kind of attention you want to draw to yourself. A reporter, journalist, producer or blogger can easily scrape your content and quote it in a story, without your permission. Not only should you be careful about your presence on your blogs but be careful about any attention you draw to your social media outlets including answering linkedin questions, status comments on facebook or myspace, etc. They can link you to your company, even if the blog topic isn't related to your current work position. If news breaks out because of this visibility, your company can fire you for carelessness and for harming the corporate brand. Its called conduct detrimental to the company outside of work. Again, our lives are different now, so you better be safe than sorry (and that sounds like something my parents would say).

Next: Social Media Mistakes Part 5: Tweeting Too Early >>

Previous: Social Media Mistakes Part 3: Corporate Policy >>

Chances are you know someone who is in sales. If they are currently in sales and not looking for a new job the odds are that this person must be pretty good at their job since they have not been fired, laid off, or quit because the work has become overwhelming. After all, someone has to pick up the slack for others as their fates are handed out in the job market. Nevertheless, I am sure if you asked that person what their approach to success is you would most definitely hear that following up, keeping in touch, and sealing the deal have been key. As much as it has annoyed me I still remember the salesmen who have called to check on my search and see if they could still help me out.

You've read the blogs, you've commented, you check back weekly, but there still seems to be a burning question that you haven't seen addressed yet. I am sure our readers all have unique situations that have effected their job search, career, and/or unemployment and now is your chance to get your questions answered.

What is happening in your job search that has prevented you from attaining suitable employment? What kind of crazy stories do you have? Feel free to submit your questions to the comments section of this blog post or to email Emurse directly for help. We will take the best questions that are universally accepted across most job searches and answer them for you here.

Examples of some good questions would be the following:

• Should I include references on my resume?
• When promotion times rolls around what is the best way to ask for a promotion? How much should I expect for a raise?
• When is is appropriate to bring up the salary negotiation in the interview process?
• How can I mange a long distance job search if I plan on re-locating?
• I have background "A" and want to do job "B", how do I transition?

Feel free to post your responses here and we will answer the best ones on a future blog.

• Prepare in advance (before you even go to a first interview) to answer uncomfortable questions about your background -- know what you're going to say and how you're going to explain important points.
• Avoid becoming anxious or defensive if/when the subject comes up in the interview (especially if it comes up unexpectedly).
• Be upfront and honest (but don't necessarily bring it up until the interview gets to the background check stage) and don't try to cover it up, pretend it didn't happen, or hope the employer doesn't notice it. You'll only end up looking worse.
• Tailor your list of personal and professional references to show character and to counterbalance any concerns created by your less than perfect history.

Working with a recruiter and staffing agency can be a quite daunting task. You never really know the amount of contact they have with the manager, sometimes they are vague in the requirements they have, occasionally you will hear from the recruiter in the beginning and then never again.

How do you distinguish who you should work with and who would be wasting your time?