Once you have a resume and cover letter, you want to share these documents as widely as possible. Techniques include the following:

• Posting your resume on Internet job boards.
• Registering with Internet job boards to receive notifications when posted jobs match your criteria.
• Creating, updating, or improving a LinkedIn profile and networking as much as possible.
• Sending out targeted introductions to hiring managers at companies or organizations that are of interest to you.
• Contacting recruiters, search firms, or employment agencies (although if you do all of the above, they will most likely find you).

Locating Job Listings

Job listings on the Internet are extensive. Some can be found on the individual websites of companies and organizations. Therefore, on a regular basis, search the corporate sites of organizations that interest you. There are also job listings on the websites of professional and trade organizations. So, if you are interested in a job in the insurance industry, for example, look at the website of the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors (naifa.org). The third and largest category of Internet job listings belongs to the commercial sites. Although you won't have to pay to look at the listings, employers pay to post and that's why these sites are called commercial. Some of the most well-known and largest are monster.com, hotjobs.com, and career builder.com, but there are hundreds of these sites and you should seek out ones that may have a specialty in your field. Indeed.com and Simplyhired.com are aggregate sites that compile listings from many of the others and are therefore very useful to most job seekers.

Targeted Job Search

Did you know that many great jobs are never advertised? They are never on a recruiter's desk and never posted on the Internet. That is because those great jobs get filled before any of that needs to happen. They are snatched up quickly by people who made the right connections ahead of everyone else. Therefore, my advice to you is that you need to be one of those people who make the right connections ahead of the pack.

The strategies I am advocating are frequently referred to as networking and targeted introductions. Career experts agree that these are the most successful job search strategies with 60-70% of the job-seeking population finding employment using these methods.

The premise of networking is that you know someone who knows someone who can introduce you to many of the employers you would like to meet. As such, networking involves telling many people you are in the job market and looking for leads. Begin your networking strategy by perusing your electronic social media contacts on LinkedIn and/or Facebook. In addition, write down the names of all your other acquaintances. Include relatives, friends, neighbors, your hairstylist, people at your gym, professors, physicians, dentists, fellow commuters, and colleagues (only those that you can really trust). Make this list as large as possible. We will call these people your primary contacts. After you have created your list, call, visit, or send an electronic communication to each of your primary contacts. Tell them about your job search and ask for leads.

Example of what you can say to your primary contacts:

"John, I was wondering if you could help me out. I'm looking for a job in corporate training and I' m targeting companies in the financial services industry. Do you happen to know anyone who does corporate training?…What about anyone who works in the financial services industry?"

As your primary contacts provide names of others, contact these new folks who become additional (secondary) contacts.

At a certain point, depending on the situation and on your personal style, you will switch from calling people to sending your cover letter and resume, which makes it a more formal job search inquiry. Imperative to this whole process is keeping good records of who you have contacted and when. Doing so will enable you to evaluate if you are reaching out to enough people (volume is important) as well as tracking your activity for follow-up with employers.

The approach called targeted introductions is closely related to networking but gives you the opportunity to contact companies you are interested in working for, even if there are no advertised job openings and even if you can't identify a single insider. It starts with developing a "hit list" of employers to target. You then send your resume and very compelling cover letter directly to them and follow-up with a telephone call.

There are several resources you should explore to help you develop your "hit list" of potential employers. I like the not-for-profit site, dmoz.org. You can think of dmoz.org as a directory of the Internet. It organizes a tremendous volume of commercial websites into tiered categories, which you can use to hone in on the type of employers you seek. As an example, if you were looking for a job in pharmaceutical manufacturing, you would start on the first page of dmoz.org and select the category "health," since that is the closest matching category provided on that first page. Then you would select "medicine" as the best subcategory of the choices next presented. Then "pharmacology," then "pharmaceutical companies," and finally, "manufacturing." If you do that, you will land on a page that provides company names and website links to over 250 different pharmaceutical companies that do manufacturing! It can sometimes take a little trial and error to find what you are looking for, but you could certainly hit pay dirt here.

Also, reference librarians can be very helpful in finding employer information. They are most able to assist you if you can be specific about your needs. Do so by saying something like this, "I am looking to develop a list of employers in the advertising industry within the metro New York area." Reference librarians will direct you to business directories, which are useful for this type of research. Most use the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) system, which assigns a code based on the business' chief industry. Therefore, all companies within an industry will have the same NAICS code. This makes it easier to cross-reference other directories. Check out:

The Directory of Corporate Affiliations
The American Wholesalers and Distributors Directory
D&B Million Dollar Directory
Ward's Business Directory of U.S. Private and Public Companies.

Finally, other good resources for identifying companies or organizations to target include trade publications specific to your field, and for Long Island job seekers, The Book of Lists and a few other directory-type publications created by The Long Island Business News, www.libn.com. Your local library will have those publications.

The list you develop should include addresses and (ideally) the names of the best people to send your resume to within those organizations. It will also be helpful to collect some information about these businesses. Such information can be used to customize a cover letter or help prepare you for an interview.

The targeted introduction strategy has the great benefit of allowing your resume to arrive solo, not in a pile with dozens or hundreds of others, which is what always happens in response to an advertised job opening. Though your resume and cover letter will sometimes arrive when there is no opening, sometimes there will indeed be one. When that happens, you become the front-runner. Additionally, even if there are no current openings, your quality resume and cover letter will surely be saved for future reference. Sounds great? Well, there is one catch. The catch is that targeted mailings can be a lot of work and you will need to invest some serious time and energy.

Recruiters (headhunters, employment agencies, search firms)

Success rates for obtaining work through recruiters can vary tremendously depending on the position and industry you are pursuing. Individuals in fields enjoying high employer demand will have much more success utilizing recruiters than those in occupations where employees are more plentiful. Additionally, you are likely to experience greater success with recruiters if you are currently employed and/or at the managerial or executive level. One clear exception to this, however, relates to temporary agencies, which routinely work with junior level administrative people.

Most recruiters specialize in certain fields or industries. They may focus exclusively on technology, finance, public relations, not-for-profit, or administrative support, to name a few. Therefore, you must select agencies that work with candidates in your field. To find the best agencies for you, peruse classified ads, both in print and on the Internet, and relevant periodicals such as trade magazines. Look for agencies that regularly advertise the kinds of positions you seek.

Several large employment agencies are located in the Melville, Long Island business corridor. For your convenience, they are listed here.

Access Staffing
25 Melville Park Road, Suite 115, Melville, NY
631-777-2800
accessstaffing.com

Adecco Staffing
50 Republic Road, Melville, NY
631-844-7650
adeccousa.com

Lloyd Staffing
510 Broadhollow Road, Melville, NY
631-777-7600
lloydstaffing.com

Randstad Staffing
500 Walt Whitman Road, Melville, NY
631-547-4878
us.randstad.com

Sigma Staffing
535 Broadhollow Road, Melville, NY
631-694-7707
Sigmastaffing.com

LinkedIn Profiles have now become essential in the professional world. The core of LinkedIn is that it has created an enormous web of interconnected people who have shared information about their professional backgrounds. A little bit like an online resume, a little bit like a database of job information, LinkedIn is really something quite amazing! Use it to your advantage in learning about companies or organizations, finding out who the insiders at those companies are, and getting introduced to those who may help you advance your career or simply stay connected in your industry or field. In addition, if you have ever lost contact with a former colleague or supervisor and now wish you hadn’t (perhaps you need a recommendation?), you have a good shot at finding those old buddies using LinkedIn. You can also use the site to directly search for jobs by keyword, location, or name of company.

Careers by Choice can help you by writing or substantially editing your LinkedIn profile. Your profile needs to be extremely well-written and yet should not be a copy of your resume text. It is most effective and enticing if it does not read like a marketing piece to promote you for a new job, which is what is typical and expected in terms of a résume’s tone.

Know that job searching is inherently frustrating and time consuming and some of what happens, or doesn't happen, is beyond your power to control (such as competing with another applicant who has a better background for the job in question). However, work hard at what you can impact, such as your overall knowledge and proficiency levels, your proper targeting of employers that may need you, your persistence in following-up, and your interviewing skills.

Stay positive and focused and believe in yourself. Press on in the face of turndowns, which are experienced by virtually all job seekers.