Find the right job market
Decide on your key job markets. Identify the location, career field, company type, special needs such as day care or telecommuting, and the ideal job description. Decide up front if you are willing to relocate and where you would be willing to relocate to. Figure out what you want. You can’t get what you want if you don’t know what you want.
Search online
Make use of online job and search and career planning sites such as:
- Indeed.com
- Monster.com
- Careerbuilder.com
- Linkedin.com
- Local newspapers and job services
Track everything
Tack all of your key information such as resume submissions, job contacts, recruiters, interviews and results. You should start each day (or end each night) by reviewing and filling your schedule with tasks to accomplish in your job search.
Find outside assistance
You might want to talk to a professional career planner or career counselor. You may also want to hire a professional to design your resume.
Join groups and expand your contacts
Sit in with other job seekers and discuss employment possibilities. It can be good to get involved with other job seekers just to realize you are not alone and build a support network. You may also want to volunteer in your community and look for ways to keep your skills sharp by working with others.
Make phone calls
One of the keys to expanding a job search is direct contact. Call the people who might be able to get you a job. Contact people in your industry and let them know you are looking. Emailed resumes are a good tool, but a direct call is the fastest way to determine a company’s interest. It is a lot harder to ignore someone on the phone than a random email.

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These are great tips to search for a job online,
This post very nicely sums up several ways to improve the job hunting process.
I think too many job seekers skip over the first point. If you haven’t figured out what kind of a job you want, where you want to do it, and what else you need to go with it, it is very hard to tailor your search for leads and to customize your resume to market your skills for that specific type of job.
I will be participating in a session on helping job technical communications job seekers improve their resumes, and would like to use this post as a handout.
Feel free to use the article as a handout Margaret. Thank you for commenting.
Great article! I especially like that you mentioned tracking. That’s very important to know when to follow up and make sure you’re not duplicating your efforts along the way.
I also wanted to recommend a website I started with two friends of mine called Resify.com (www.resify.com). We offer up-to-date job search advice, free resume templates, and tips on what NOT to do. I think it would be really helpful to anyone looking to start a new job search.
Hi Casey,
I’ll be discussing tracking in more depth soon.