Friday, January 23, 2009

How to use Employment Classifieds

By Alex Wu

The unemployment rate is as high as it has ever been in close to 30 years. With all of these people out of work, finding a job is getting tougher and tougher. You need to take advantage of every possible outlet in finding a job. Employment classifieds are a great way to get started.

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.

Let's start with the basic employment classifieds. Your local paper will have them in a couple of editions every week. The Sunday paper is automatic, but most publications are going with at least two times a week now to take advantage of the market. You may also want to either subscribe or go to the library and look at industry specific publications, just about every one of them has added a classified section to help out job seekers during this horrible economic climate.

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.

While many may not consider job boards like Monster and HCareers employment classified ads, what else would you call them? They are merely one large help wanted ad. This is where you can really spend some time. These sites have everything organized and there are also a ton of industry specific job boards that can help you pinpoint opportunities across the country.

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 been doing reconnaissance to this point, now it is time to go on the offensive. Start doing you own posting! All of but the print ads will allow you to make your own posting for free. You would be surprised how many employers sift through these sites looking for people that are looking for work. A great idea is to start up a blog and create another link where you can have your resume posted and put this link up on a classified or on a social page.

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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