This is a guest blog post by Phillip Hayes, Co-founder of Kloodle. Find out more at http://kloodle.com.
You are but 1 Google search away from hundreds of potential graduate employers. What will they discover if they type your name into the worlds all pervading search engine? A dodgy Facebook profile? A potentially offensive tweet?
Or, potentially even worse??nothing!
The internet provides unbridled access to all of the facilities that you could possibly need to market yourself effectively to graduate employers. The trick is to utilise this power efficiently and effectively to your own advantage. Putting yourself on the radar of potential graduate employers has never been easier, yet many of todays students allow this opportunity for self marketing to pass them by. You are living in an age in which competition for emerging talent and graduate career opportunities has never been more fierce, therefore, the opportunity to take some control over your career profile should not be lost. The internet provides you with a chance to tell your story, to show how you are different, and to kick start your career by putting you in the shop window for graduate employment.
How do you do this? The following are 5 tips on how to get started on the internet marketing offensive, and how you will get ahead.
1 Buy your domain name and start a blog
The first step in the process is to head over to godaddy.com and buy your name as a domain name??for example johnsmith.com. There are plenty of video tutorials on how to do this on the GoDaddy website, so if you are struggling, have a watch and they will point you in the right direction. Also, if you are experiencing problems, look at the forum, where it is highly likely someone will have experienced the same problem you are.
After this, head over to tumblr.com and sign up for a blog. You can then use GoDaddy to point your domain name at your blog. This is again explained through tutorials on GoDaddy and is straight forward.
The benefits for doing this are thus: –
Imagine the wheel of an old style horse and cart. Your own website / blog is the centre hub of the wheel. The part which holds everything else together and the part to which all other aspects are connected. Your own site should be the place you are trying to draw people back to using your other online tools such as Social Media. Social Media profiles are the spokes??the offshoots of the hub of the wheel. When a person engages with you on social media, or stumbles across you in a google search, your aim should be to direct them to your main website. This will be the place where you record all of your experiences, learning, activities, and skills.
2 Sign Up for social media accounts
You should then create an account on all of the major social networks such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Kloodle, Pinterest, and Google +. You will probably already have a lot of these accounts, but if not, get signing up today. Your next step is to provide a link from your social media accounts back to the blog you set up in step 1. On your website, you also want to list your social media profile links which will give people the opportunity to follow and eventually engage with you.
3 Create great content
You will then use your blog to create great content about what you are interested in. If you are interested in a career in teaching, write about an article you have read on a particular teaching technique and how you would try to apply it in the future. Look at the skills you will be required to possess in your future career??teamwork, communication etc. Then find examples in your daily life and write about how you have demonstrated these particular qualities. Look at companies you would like to work for and research their firm and their graduate recruitment scheme. Write about their company. Write about their scheme. Show how much you have looked into their company and that you value what they are about. Spending the time to conduct this research is never time wasted, and it will stand you in great stead come interview time.
Once you have written these articles, post the links to your various social media outlets. If you are using Twitter, tag anybody who you may have mentioned in your article in your Tweet, get them interested and hopefully entice them to click back to your blog.
Great content is not only in written format. The internet gives you the opportunity to post videos, pictures, make podcasts etc etc. Utilise the media forms with which you feel the most comfortable. Create relentlessly. Learnt something new? Post something. Done something interesting? Post something. Read an interesting article? Post something. You get the idea. You can never post enough content. If you are interested, read more about content marketing at blog.hubspot.com. The principles applied to marketing for businesses here can be extrapolated to yourself.
4 Engage in conversations
Twitter is a fantastic tool. Use it to search for relevant conversations about your chosen career area and engage in them. Use the search bar at the top of Twitter and search for relevant terms. Once you get some Tweet results, engage in the conversations that are occurring. Be complimentary and conversational. If you are interested in becoming an engineer and you find someone who is talking about a tough project they are working on, ask a question, show interest. Questions are always the best way to engage. The best companies will respond to questions so you should search these companies out and start to ask away. Try to get on their radar by being friendly, inquisitive and complimentary.
5 Do it all in one place
Evidencing your skills and engaging with employers can all be done in one place??on Kloodle. The site is a Social Network for Graduate Recruitment. Your profile gives you the ability to create your professional presence and engage with potential employers.
The initial part of the profile is like a CV where you list your education, employment and achievements. The second part of the profile is dynamic and gives you the chance to showcase your ability to potential employers. Like above, you can create engaging content and showcase your skills.
This can be done via blog posts, videos, photos and document uploads. In these you can tag the skills you demonstrate in that particular piece of media. An employer can then view each of your skills through the evidence you create.
Kloodle then enables you to interact with potential employers, engaging in conversations and putting yourself on their radar long before you graduate. You will get jobs for which you are relevant for posted directly to your newsfeed. No longer will you have to search Google for irrelevant jobs??you will see them right in front of your nose. Your Kloodle profile will be searched for by employers interested in people like you. You will be on the map before you even apply.
Creating a great profile is easy??download the ebook guide here https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/418688.
Create your profile today??http://kloodle.com.
We would love to hear from you??send us a tweet @kloodleuk.
