Tag Archives: social media

Aug1

Job Search From All Angles

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To those of you who have peeked at my subject plan in the page about submitting guest posts, know – August is the month designated to discuss Job Search From All Angles.   The search for work (or career) is a job in and of itself, requiring flexibility and creativity to be ultimately successful.

I have spoken of resumes in previous posts, this month I will share tidbits on finding the jobs.

Let’s start with how people traditionally search.  When asked how to find a job, most people of a certain age will answer – “look in the newspaper”; the next generation after that one will answer – “Look on the internet”; and perhaps many of our current job seeking generation will answer with a combination of tweets and social media.   The concept is the same, even if the media is different – the first thing someone thinks of is a posted job opening.

There are many ways to find the posted opening.  Printed page, internet listing, websites that aggregate the listings, social media…to name a few.  And these are good ways to start your search.  But there are other ways to find out about job openings, ways that increase your odds of being seen, and perhaps selected for interview for those jobs.

The first and best way to find out about jobs is to network.  I can already hear the introverts in the reading audience groaning.  Yes, you have to talk to people.  No, you don’t have to do it in person – some networking can be done in emails and social media.

You should follow some standard rules of etiquette, if someone tells you of a position.  And I will outline those below.

Start with the people you know and are comfortable with… ask them if they know of any job openings (yes, you can email or text or tweet or update your status on Facebook or Google+).

If they say they do not know of anything – thank them and ask if they would please let you know if they hear of anything in your field or job type.

If they do, even if it is something you may not be interested in – thank them and take down the information.  Ask if it is okay to reference them when you are following up on the position.

You might wonder why I said to take down all the information, even if you are not interested in the position.  First, it is courtesy.  And second, you have just been given information about a company or person who is hiring.  If you do want to submit for a position at that company – you will have a name that referred you to the company, and that gives you an edge.  Plus, you know (or should know) that if a company is hiring, there may be a position you ARE interested in, that your benefactor did not know about.  You increase the odds of getting in the door if you know someone who has actively referred you.

If you do apply, and do get an interview – remember to send a thank you note not only to the folks you met at the interview, but to the person who referred you.

You may not know anyone to network with, because you are in a new city looking for work.  What do you do then?

You will need to network with strangers.  If you are shy, this may sound daunting, but it is a good skill to develop even if you are not looking for work.  I suggest starting at the library.

What? You are thinking, she just implied that printed postings are not the best way to find a job… and that would be correct.  But asking the librarian to direct you to reference areas that have job posting relevant to your experience opens up a discussion with a stranger…just as once you are in the periodical or computer area, asking the people there if they can direct you, may open up an opportunity to get a referral.  Not to mention meeting new people and possibly making new friends.

Church or Temple are other good places to network for work, if you are new to a community.

And – SURPRISE – potential employers are also a good place to network.  You stop in and ask if they are hiring, they may say “no”, before you leave, ask if they know of anyone else who might be hiring.  Again, say thank you and ask if it is okay to say you were told about the position by that company.  You never know when your courtesy and determination might make them take a second look at you and your resume.

More “Job Search from all angles”in the next post.  Good luck out there. Let us know how it is going for you.

Mar26

We are in the land of “New is Better”

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Sometimes it feels as though we are in the land of “New is Better” – we are a consumer society… looking for the next new thing.

A good example is Pinterest.com - this social site caught people’s imagination like wildfire, and why?  Not only was it “new” it was visual.  And a picture is worth a thousand words, right? WHat is Pinterest?  Basically it is a web-based application that allows you to create “boards” like bulletin boards in real life, with themes, and share images/pictures/videos that you find from around the internet with people who choose to “follow” you.  It allows you to tweet or connect to Facebook in order to publicize your “Boards”.  You can see my Pinterest boards by clicking here (it is a link inviting you to join to see my boards).

And as soon as it caught on, we (the collective we) started looking for ways to make best use of this new social media tool.  There is a whole panoply of resources that seemingly sprung up, spontaneously, out of nowhere addressing the many ways to market your business or wares using Pinterest.com.

But like any new tool, you should take a look at how much you can benefit versus how much effort you will be putting in.

One of the grand challenges that we all face is carving out regular time to manage and attend to the variety of tools we have at our fingertips.  Facebook pages, Google+, Twitter, Posterous, Friend Feed, and Pinterest – to name a few, are only as successful as the effort that is applied to them.  The investment of time, and sometimes money, requires planning and discipline.

I have seen many folks throw up their hands and declare that -fill in the blank- social media doesn’t work for them, after only a minimal effort.

There are few free lunches.  You have to carve the time out or assign someone to do it, or invest in one of the many applications out there to do it for you.  Time or money or both.

But take heart, if you do expend the effort, you will get your name out there, and your service or product.  Marketing is not necessarily about the dollars brought in, but in the awareness of your business that is heightened by the effort.

Good luck, and please comment with your experiences!

 

Feb22

Resistance is Futile

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The title of this post is the oft-quoted phrase from Star Trek, and it is also an appropriate mantra for dealing with change. Whether we like it or not, we live in turbulent times with a great deal of change facing us daily.  I see in those around me and even in myself, a weariness with this aspect of modern life.  For example, I’m a big LinkedIn fan, and often tout its virtues to others,but a friend recently responded to my encouragement to set up a profile, “I just don’t want to have to learn something new.”  I understand his feelings.  I’m having to face that issue with my own attitude toward Facebook, which I use with trepidation because it feels so very automated.  I feel like I’m not “in control” of a tool that is supposed to serve me, and I know I’ll need to spend some of my precious time learning more in order to feel comfortable with it. 

But the purpose of life is not always to be in control.  That would be an impossible goal, wouldn’t it?  As human beings we definitely need to impose a degree of structure upon our lives, but rigid control actually works against us.  We need some balance between the logical, analytical, scheduled times and the creative, freedom-loving, playful times.  As a person with a natural resistance to change, I’ve had to come up with some new attitudes to encourage myself to “roll with it” and adapt to new things.  I hope sharing these ideas will be helpful to you when change is staring you in the face and you’re wondering whether to dig in your heels and resist, run screaming in the opposite direction, or smile while accepting it gracefully.

1.  Change is not inherently bad.  It’s hard to know when something new comes along if it will be bad or good.  The truth is, it will be both.  To those who did radio dramatization, TV was a bad thing.  To Apple, the PC was a bad thing.  But radio has evolved and so has Apple.  The changes from competitors moved them in new directions, and those new directions made them better and stronger.  So when I’m faced with change, I make a concerted effort to remain neutral rather than negative, and to think of the change as something that will make me stronger in the long run.  (Okay, I’ll acknowledge that the short run might be hell…..but keep your eye on the long term good.)

2.  Change is inevitable.  We have limited amounts of energy, and fighting a change that we have no control over is a waste of energy.  If management is upgrading your computer, adding a new CRM, or altering work processes, you may have no choice but to accept the changes gracefully.  Here’s the plus side:  new pathways will develop in your brain as you learn and make those changes.  You are exercising your brain and that is good for you!  You don’t want to have a hidebound, crusty, creaky old brain, do you?  And speaking of exercising the brain, check out Lumosity.  It’s an amazing and scientifically-researched way to play games and improve your brainpower at the same time.

3. Change is filled with opportunity.  What we see now in the marketing world shows us this.  There are opportunities due to the internet, social media, economic changes, and demographics that can lead us in exciting new directions.  I feel like an explorer, and that is exciting.  Every day brings something new to consider.  If you view yourself as a life-long learner, this makes every day an educational opportunity.  And yes, even though change brings problems – problems are opportunities to provide solutions, services, and training on how to overcome them.

My last observation on change is that it prevents stagnation.  I truly believe that we’re either moving forward or losing ground.  Stagnant water is stale and foul-smelling and full of bacteria.  Change, and the forward movement it brings, keeps us as individuals and as a society, fresh.  As Benjamin Franklin said:  “When you’re finished changing, you’re finished.”

Feb1

Up at the Crack of Dawn Today

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I rose early this morning – 4:30-ish – to trek across the city of Dallas and meet with a fellow writer who wanted some advice on kick-starting her writing business. We’re also involved in a mystery-writing critique group, so the foggy mist that obscured the White Rock Lake area along Northwest Highway seemed the perfect setting for our get-together. It was literally so foggy that I held the wheel with both hands and peered over it into a pea-soup cloud. The good news – all the traffic was headed west, and I was going east, so I didn’t have to worry about cars right around me as I strained my eyes to see the lane markings.  Meeting at 6:30 a.m. is a rare event for me.  But J. is a rare friend, and I didn’t mind giving up a little sleep to meet with her.

Today my friend wanted to talk more about business-oriented writing services rather than our usual creative novel-writing pursuits. Like many experienced writers she is learning to transition from traditional marketing to the new age of social media, with all its complexities.  We had a great brain-storming session and she left with some good ideas about how to promote her work.  She wants a website, so my suggestion was to use WordPress as her starting point, because it is intuitive, easy to use, and free or low-cost, depending upon the options chosen.  I encouraged her to set up a LinkedIn profile, but I’m not sure she is ready to do so.  I also showed her a blog post by Carol Tice, whose blog and website I’ve found both practical and thought-provoking.  Carol is a successful free-lance writer and award-winning blogger who recently wrote about where her writing business came from in 2011.

There are other options, of course.  Using the telephone to contact her targeted customers is one possibility, with a follow-up letter and/or email.  She might consider doing a newsletters using an online tool like ConstantContact, iContact, or AWeber, but a traditional printed newsletter might be an option for her, also.  She can do it on her computer and have it printed at an office supply store like Office Depot.  We also discussed magazines that use free-lance writers and would be interested in her travel-writing skills.   Please note that the advice I gave her was geared to someone who is not yet comfortable with social media.  It’s about dangling one’s legs in the water and adjusting at a slower pace rather than diving in headfirst.

I’m eager to see where my friend goes from here.  J. has many years of experience in writing, ghost-writing, travel writing, resume writing and editing books and marketing materials for all kinds of businesses, so I know she’ll do well with her writing endeavors.  I’m also hoping to see her pursue her dream of self-publishing the mystery novels she has written, since she’s one of the best writers I’ve ever read – honestly – and her work should be out there for readers to find.  She’s a published writer already, but she doesn’t currently have an agent or publisher.  That shouldn’t hold her back.  Lots of writers are finding success by self-publishing.  It’s a brave new world, and everyone – writers, publishers, agents, and even readers – is learning to swim in unfamiliar waters without any floaties.

I’ll keep you posted once she gets her online presence in place.  And I guarantee you, her books will not begin with “It was a dark and stormy night….” and they will keep you perched on the edge of your easy chair, reading long past your bedtime.

Dec21

Social Media and Networking

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Well it has been a year to reckon with – all sorts of changes and challenges.  I hope you all made it through with enough energy to take on 2011 with your head high and your goals in place and a terrific smile on your face as you seek out the new year as a new opportunity!

That being said there are a couple of suggestions I have that might be helpful to you.  First – check out Larry Brooks’ new book Larry Brooks’ Guide to Marketing Your Business Online: How to Make Sure Your Next Customer Finds YOU First .  This is a comprehensive synopsis of what you might get attending a variety of seminars and webinars that might cost hundreds of dollars and take up hours of your time – neatly and logically summarized and explained in plain english so you can actually capitalize on the information.  You can also find Larry at www.WestCoastMKTG.com .

And for more detailed advice on social media, I also recommend Dan Zarrella’s blog.  Specific advice on what to do (and what not to do) when networking and using social media.  For more about Dan, who is an author, speaker and expert in social media, check out his bio at DanZarrella.com/bio#.

Don’t forget old-fashioned networking and marketing, using greeting cards to connect with your clients and potential clients touches their lives in a special way, and allows you to perform a random act of kindness here and there.  Check out http://www.sendmorehugs.com - if you send your clients just 4 cards a year – birthday, winter holiday, spring forward reminder and fall back reminder – with no “pitch”, just a genuine reach out, you will be surprised at how much that effort will reap.  It is a great way to differentiate yourself and to simply let people know you care.

Mar4

Why Social Media is Like Building a Mayan Pyramid

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Many years ago, my friend Dar and I went on a vacation to Mexico.  Part of the fun included a tour of Tumul and Xumal guided by an octagenarian named Senior Pinkie (really!). Senior Pinkie had been doing the tour for nearly 60 years at that point and had heard everything from “Chariot of the Gods” to the “X-Files” and set about to explain that the great “mystery” of how the ancients were able to create such amazing and long-lasting structures.
His delivery was good-humored and emphatic.  “How did they do these things? How did they build these temples, ports, pyramids?” He asked us all on the bus, with a twinkle in his eye… “They thought, they planned, they set their goals and then the people worked to those goals. How did they do it?? They worked HARD.  20% did the planning, 80% did the labor. All that you see here, the port, the buildings, these were built without television, without alien invasions, without supernatural powers, these were built by people doing work! HARD work, yes, but they knew they would be accomplishing SOMETHING, they were motivated, yes! Not by whips, but by the community. They built these things for themselves and their families. THAT is the great secret. WORK. ”

In terms of using social media, people who are not familiar with Twitter, or MySpace, or Facebook, let alone blogs or any of the myriad of social tools out there -  believe there is some magic in how others are able to make good use of these tools.  Perhaps some secret society of indoctrination has the special key to using these things effectively, or maybe it is some mutant or alien race who created these tools to torment the average person with tantalizing promises of media exposure and clients flocking to websites in droves.

The actual answer is that like the Mayans of old, the way to build a social media structure that will last and be successful requires a strategy, a plan, and then the discipline to work that plan, on a daily, weekly, monthly basis.  And like the amazing structures or old, a strong social media plan takes time to build up.  Unless you stumble on the “It subject” of the moment, you will need to grow slowly, and work at it.  This doesn’t mean you cannot capitalize on the momentum of whatever is popular at the moment, just remember that it will be fleeting, while what you are slowly building, will last longer.  And when you look back at the distance you have covered, the clients you have won, you may chuckle as others ask you what your secret is…

Posted via email from Natalia’s Other Blog

Jan25

The old dog that teaches itself new tricks

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Being at the tail-end of the Boomer generation, I become ever more surprised at the number of my peers (the technical as well as ”non-technical” ones) who are quickly becoming, well, downright stodgy. These are the people who have computers but do not have a Facebook or Myspace page…answer their emails about once a week or less, and complain that their kids and grandkids know more about the computer than they do. They also complain that they are no longer getting promoted, or able to figure out what their younger co-workers are talking about.

These are not unintelligent folks… they are in professions that are not dynamically involved in networking, or at least in positions that they perceive to be “not networking oriented”…and when they lose their job, through attrition or economics or because they don’t “fit” anymore…they are at a loss.   Why is this happening?

Aside from the social divisions, there are self-imposed divisions within any culture.  The self-imposed divisions are the hardest to overcome.  People who make an effort to stay on top of what is going on in the world at large, not just the news, but what people are doing, how they are doing it, how new jobs are coming into being – those are the people who are teaching themselves “new tricks” and are able to be adaptive and “embrace changes”.

Learning doesn’t stop when you leave school.  Technology, whether you like it or not, is continuing to evolve and if you can’t keep up you will not stay marketable.  If you aren’t sure where to begin, start with Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies ; then go open your Facebook or Myspace account and findout who you know that is there… you’ll be surprised.   I stay in touch with many of my Godkids more frequently through my Myspace and Facebook pages than I do on the phone, email, or snailmail.  Although I was surpised to have to explain just what “snailmail”* was to my 16 year old godson – *snailmail is paper mail sent by regular post.

If you work for a living and you don’t have a Linkedin.com account – why not.  It is the main US career-oriented site out there.  The one place where your “resume” being out there doesn’t instigate retaliation by a boss who thinks you are actively looking… this “open networking” is important for you should you ever need to find a job.  Remember the old adage “It isn’t what you know, it is who you know“. It isn’t strictly correct, of course, you do have to have skills and experience, but you also need an introduction to the people you want to work with.

Recently a friend of mine was interviewing for a position she really was excited about…she was represented through a recruiter who went AWOL for a few days. During that few days, the company was trying to reach the recruiter to set up the second/decision making interview.  She lost out on the job, and she was very understanding of the recruiter that had a family emergency and was AWOL.  She is still on unemployment and hoping that she can find a job before she winds up having to move in with friends.  She still doesn’t have a Linkedin profile.  She does have Myspace and Facebook, but doesn’t ever use them to network.

My unspoken thoughts (she is my friend and I was comiserating with her) were:

  • Why didn’t the company have your direct contact info and why didn’t you have theirs?
  • Didn’t you send a thank-you for the first interview, another opportunity to get your contact info to them?
  • Why didn’t anyone else in the Recruiter’s office handle this for him?

When I asked her, gently, why she didn’t follow-up directly with the company, she was horrified at me… in her mind, the recruiter was representing her, and she would have been rude and inapproprate to contact the employer directly.

In my mind, once the introduction is made, it is as much my responsibility (since I am the one who wants the job) to communicate as it is the recruiter’s.  The recruiter works for the employer, not for me.  And I know that the recruiter will be compensated based on my placement – and has “skin in the game”, but I would not let that prevent me from trying to get the job if I really wanted it.  And unless the recruiter specifically asks me not to contact the person I interviewed with at the company, then I see nothing wrong with it.

This is an example of “old dog” behaviors that have not evolved with the technology.  In the coming year, and in the current economy, unless you are able to teach yourself new ways of doing even the most basic things, like saying “thank you” after an interview, you will be behind the curve.

I am going to go check my email now…and tweet some folks.  And after I make another pot of coffee, I may clip and share some news on Social Median.  Check it all out…
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