Saturday, January 24, 2009

Making the most of Employment Classifieds

By Alex Wu

Every time you turn around, someone else is out of work. Even people with high end jobs that you would have never imagined being without a job are getting let go and finding themselves on unemployment for the first time in their lives. With everyone fighting for the same jobs, how can you get an edge? Employment classified ads are a great way to start!

There are many ways to make use of this opportunity, but most people simply browse the opening pages and then give up. After all, everyone and their mother will see the same jobs so what is the point? Not so fast doomsayer, you can also post your own ad and have employers looking for you! Let's take a quick look at how you can make the most of employment classified ads.

First, we have the print media. Newspapers, magazines and other publications all have classifieds featuring employment ads. The key to being successful with these is checking them every time they come out. Everyone does know about the huge help wanted section in the Sunday paper, but how many people are checking the mid week edition and also checking the smaller employment classifieds that appear each and every day. How about the local businesses that advertises in the community paper? They can't afford to put an ad in the Sunday paper so they put it in the weekly that is only distributed in your neighborhood. The more you check, the more likely you are to find something.

The next area you are going to look is going to be on the net. Do a search for classifieds and you are going to get millions of sites that are posting classified ads for jobs. You will want to start with industry specific searches at first to limit how much research you have to do but once you get the hang of it, you are going to want to start playing around under different business headings because once you get down how to find them by keywords, you are going to find some hidden gems.

The next type of employment classified we are going to look at are job boards. Sites such as Monster.com and Jobs.com are nothing more than one big employment listing. They are the biggest help wanted section you will ever see. The best feature of these sites is that since they are only dedicated to employment classifieds, they are organized and easy to get through. You can easily find just about any job title that you want much quicker than dealing with the normal free classified listings.

Something you may not have thought about, but need to consider is rummaging through the social networks. While a search here won't be as fruitful as a job board, you will find little treasures here and there by spending some time surfing on their site. Most of these sites also now offer classified sections and there are limited opportunities on there.

Okay, we have checked all the postings, now what do you do? Now is when you really go to work and start posting. Everyone looks, few people even know that they can put themselves up on these sites as looking for work. Each and every employment classified has an area where you can say that you are looking for work. You are going to be surprised at how many employers will go through these listings on a daily basis looking for talent. If you can't get enough information on there, make your social page work for you as an employment classified and post your resume right there and then direct the traffic there from you classified ad.

When you get to the job employment classifieds (the job search boards like Monster), you can post your resume right there for perspective employers to see. You can also set your profile to send you daily, weekly or monthly alerts with new postings. Now this is putting employment classifieds to work for you!

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