If you're sitting at your computer all day, applying for jobs posted online, consider this:  only one job in five is ever advertised; and a large percentage aren't good jobs.

Many positions listed in ads or posted online represent the bottom of the job barrel: entry-level jobs, high-turnover positions, straight commission sales, scams, multilevel-marketing sales, recruiting or "fishing" expeditions, salary researchers, personnel and government agencies paying lip service to EEO hiring, and one percent—occasionally a good job or two—for which a hundred percent of the competition is applying.

Relying on Ads for Job Vacancies

Most job-hunters devour online job postings as if they will actually provide something.  That's so predictably rare!  Companies often receive hundreds of responses to posted positions, especially from postings on some of the more popular sites.  Like cotton candy, these published openings melt away to nothing with every bite, and all you have left is a sticky mess.  And worse: even when job-hunters do find an interesting position, they ruin their chances for an interview by sending an application and resume and hoping for the best.  Or, they'll disclose salary information that gets them screened out of interviews from the get go.   There are much more effective ways to get interviewed.

If you're an uneducated job-hunter, you spend hours of time slaving away, bragging about yourself in emails and cover letters, and inevitably discovering that the sole result of all this effort is that you end up looking like every other self-adulating, ill-informed job-hunter.

They all send "By golly, I'm great; hire me!" messages that sound the same. 

Job Search Tactics out of Date

Don't feel bad if you do this!  No one taught you how to do it right.  Remember, the world changes fast.  The job-search methods that worked for your parents may no longer be functional.

It wasn't so long ago that people dialed a telephone instead of pushing buttons, corrected mistakes with whiteout, put a needle on a record to hear music, and used a "church key" to open beer cans.

These made sense a few decades ago.  Now they Don't!  Answering all the ads wasn't a mistake.  Now it is!

Here's what to do with print ads and online postings.  Don't answer them all!  Answer a select few.

·         Spend no more than 15 percent of your valuable job-search time on want ads.

·         Give yourself a limit of one hour to pick out the top ten.

·         Really go after those ten.  (See below.)

·         As for the rest you're interested in, just spin off a quick résumé.  (See below.)

Going After the Top Ten

Use Google or another search engine to find information about the company.  Find out answers to these questions:

·         What business is the company in?

·         What unique competitive advantage do they have in the industry?

·         What are the two largest problems or challenges the company faces?

Now decide if you want an interview.  In your letter to the company, use the information you gathered.  Send an email and a letter to personnel and send another directly to the hiring decision maker.  Focus on what you know about the company and how you can help it out.  Cover enough ground in your email/letter so that you Don't need even a résumé.  Actively follow up to set an interview. 

Blind Ad?

Apply by NOT sending a resume.  Instead, prove that you have all the points in the posting or ad by using an email/cover letter only.  Target it specifically to that job.  Say you'll bring your resume to an interview.  Send this letter three times a week with handwritten notes at the top explaining that you're making a second submission (third submission, fourth submission, etc.).

For the rest of the ads you're interested in, hire someone at minimum wage to send a short cover letter (three to four lines) and a resume.  You see, in a 21st-century job hunt, time is your most valuable asset.  Time wasted answering the ads and postings cannot be regained and can cost you a job interview you could have made if you'd spent the time building connections.