This guest post is by Lior Levin.
Blogging is not just writing your personal notebook these days: it’s a truly open platform where people share their ideas, passion, goals, and thoughts on subjects they care about. Gone are the days when people would consider blogs “a personal affair.” The scene has long since changed.
Blogging as a job search tool
Image copyright Luna Vandoorne - Fotolia.com
Of course you’ll face challenges, and there is no guarantee that you will get hired as a result of your blog. But it never hurts to give this idea a decent try, and see the feedback and response you get from employers who stumble upon your blog.
If you’re seeking a dream job and want to use the Internet to drive potential employers to your online resume, here are a few tips you should keep in mind:
Set up your LinkedIn profile
The very first thing you should do is set up your LinkedIn profile and connect with like minded people, who share common interests and professional backgrounds. LinkedIn is the social hub of career professionals, and employers are always scanning this social site to find enthusiastic candidates who love their work, and are considered leaders in their fields.
By engaging with like-minded people, you’ll understand what they want from you.
Blog about your core interests
Keep your blog focused and up to date on specific topics. It would be better if you leave aside personal rants and ramblings. Instead, blog about your career goals, past projects, lessons, assignments, and so on. The more you blog about your career assignments and skill set, the more people will consider you an “authority” and a “focused person” who knows what they’re talking about.
Blog regularly
If your last blog post was published couple of years back, potential recruiters will think you’ve lost interest. Write often—at least twice a week. Blog about your latest project, blog about the work culture, and remember a golden rule: “Never criticize any of your past employers.”
Engage
This is really important. Write about your interests, but at the same time, engage with the most important asset in any organisation: “People.” Visit their blogs and comment on a post you loved reading. Reply to their tweets, start a conversation with them, and maintain healthy relationships with your peers. Sooner or later, people will notice your online behavior, and they might shoot off an email expecting to hear more from you.
Never lose patience. It takes time to grow a tree, but once it’s there, the shade lasts forever. Just because you don’t see anything on the surface doesn’t mean the plant isn’t growing beneath it. Give your blog some time and keep writing about things you love. That’s what matters most if you want potential recruiters to notice you.
This post is written by Lior Levin, a marketing enthusiast who works for a start-up company that offers a to-do list app for businesses and individuals. Lior also advises for a web hosting company that offers consumers a list of the top 10 website hosting companies available online.
I agree, but up to a point. The thing is, blogging and writing take so much of my time. While I do appreciate and believe social networking is vital in the game of blogging, I realise that it takes as much time (if not more) as producing the work itself.
Some time or the other, one has to suffer. I find that if I’m doing great at networking, my writing suffers. How does one get around this?
I actually have the same dilemma. Trying to balancing out marketing, networking and writing.
I think with time, I’ll learn how to efficiently balance them out
My blog is also my resume. Employers like to see people that can communicate well.
I agree with your point. Blogging successfully and constantly is not possible everyday. It is not a one-man show. Blogs that are run by a single person may be updated twice a month or once a week at the extreme. Writing unique articles is not an easy task and also if you wish to produce quality work. Blogging is a time consuming work and networking is even more. These two can rarely work side by side if you plan to do all that regularly.
I started blogging around a year ago to document how I solve programming problems, some books that I read and some thoughts that came to me.
I do feel the same way as you in the time aspect. But what I did was to create drafts of what I had encountered first and slowly fill in the details when I could find the time to focus.
I guess my main problem would be that I am often distracted from blogging to learn new things. There would be just times when I felt so bored writing about problems that I had already solved. But when I do get the posts out, I felt that I got to understand the documented programming features better. :)
Engaging is key Lior. Chat people up. Build your network. The more connections you make the more likely you will land a job more quickly. Make connecting with folks your specialty.
Thanks for sharing.
Lior,
I think this is key. Blogging can be great in helping someone achieve success but it is better as a “platform” rather than a goal in and of itself. Using it to promote your business, skills or as a job search tool are among those ways to use blogging as a platform.
That’s a better idea. i believe.
Most companies have blogs; look for those in your field of interest and be a regular commenter on their blogs. I guess this is another spin on the work ‘engage’. Get known in your field. Bear in mind though that engaging is not the same thing as spamming – not by a long shot. Don’t go to blogs and spam the comment section; it’s not in good taste.
Great article Lior.
So true! This is online networking.
i believe that i can make money with blogging the problem in here is the time which made me feeling hard in my work :)
Blogging can be a great way of building your personal brand. You have to be careful though that you don’t damage it as well. I agree that Linkedin is a great way to get exposure.
Hey Lior
I’ve been a recruiter for 20 years and LinkedIn has to be the best tool ever created for candidates, recruiters and clients alike. Anyone looking for opportunities without a highly customized and professional LinkedIn profile is really missing the boat and any company without a LinkedIn strategy is nuts too
Nice post!
Mark
As a web consultant, I use my blogs to showcase different things towards different potential customers, so basically it’s the same as someone using to find a job, except in my case it’s jobs.
I am hoping that my new blog can help me in my career, this is a good read. Many of my questions were answered. Thank you.
Gr8 idea to use blogging as a job search tool
thanks for sharing it
:)
great post. I think many people specially ones who own their own business over look the value of engaging.
Yes it takes time but is well worth the effort and writing about the things you love definitely make it worth wile. It becomes fun and attracts a lot more viewers.
Learning a lot from this site. Thanks for posting.
I’m retired. Now my job is full-time blogging. But I do like to stay informed.
You also need to have a good sense of networks, from social networking sites and personal referrences. That way, you’d be more noticeable to the eyes of your potential employer.
This certainly is a whole new idea. Of course there’s a lot more to explain on your resume but cannot be done without printing a magazine. Using your blog to give out added information and revealing your talents can do wonders. This certainly is a new idea but it can reveal better results.
Bloggers are often seen as the wise. The owner of the company will find this brilliant.
I agree. I would also like to add that one of the ways we can use a blog to find employment is by blogging about a specific field. For example, If i have a high traffic blog about updates in the marketing industry, I can be a valuable asset to a top marketing firm because I have already proven how much I know.
I never thought of using a blog in this particular manner. Thanks for the tip!
I use the blog an my personal CV. People can see what I write there, what I’m passionate about and got some jobs as a freelancer. Now I work at an e-commerce company and the fact that I have two blogs just pushed me in the front line. So blogging pays off: big time. It’s worth every minute that I use to be informed, to learn new things and then to share them with the readers. Nice feeling that is :D
I thought of this for my mother but she would not update it consistently. It is a great idea nonetheless.