Management Recruiters of Green Bay

Management Recruiters of Green Bay Management Recruiters of Green Bay Management Recruiters of Green Bay Management Recruiters of Green Bay
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News

Opportunity is knocking; help it find your door 

 

By Jaime Leick 

Published in The Business News June 25, 2007


 

Cliff Bowers spends part of his days cruising the Internet to find the ideal job candidate.  Vice president at Management Recruiters of Green Bay, Bowers and his team find employees for middle and senior management positions.  

  

They need high caliber, well qualified people, and that means they’re often tapping the passive job seeker—someone who is already in a job and probably happy and successful.  Those candidates are targeted and lured away with great new opportunities. 

  

Even if you aren’t actively looking for a job, take a good look at your online presence. A few updates will help increase your visibility to recruiters and potential business partners.  After all, you never know what sort of opportunity might present itself. 

  

First, update your profile on a few online sites.  The key is to make yourself visible to people who are searching for talent in your industry.  Start with LinkedIn, ZoomInfo, and Naymz.   

  

LinkedIn is a social networking tool.  It formalizes natural networking connections with an online contact group.  You can see who your contacts are linked to and ask for introductions. A new feature allows you to post questions to your group. 

  

“It’s just kind of a giant networking process.  One of our recruiters uses it with much success,” said Bowers.  “It is a growing tool.”   

  

Once you sign up on LinkedIn, spend some time creating a professional profile. Do that and potential employers will see you are serious about your industry and career.  Consider it a MySpace page for professionals. 

  

ZoomInfo is another tool Bower recommends. A web crawler, ZoomInfo searches the Internet looking for names, creating personal bio pages for the people it finds.  

  

“If I’m doing a search for a sales rep with special background in the textile industry, I can go to the one company I might know and find their competitors,” said Bowers.  “I can go in and often find names of executives from those companies.” 

  

For greater visibility on ZoomInfo, Bowers recommends getting your name on the company website and in press clippings.  You can also update your own ZoomInfo profile. 

  

Naymz is another profile tool that can help get you seen and put your best foot forward online.  More than a basic profile, users get a free Google ad for their name.  Every time a potential client or employer Googles your name, your Naymz profile pops up as a featured link.   

  

Because Naymz will appear at the top of search listings, it can help you steer readers to the information you want them to find.  With a free profile, you can post a short bio and provide links to other personal sites such as your LinkedIn page, website or blog. 

  

Naymz also sends you an email every time someone views your profile.  For a small monthly fee, you can create a more complete bio and see the domain addresses from people who visit your page.  

  

Bowers said professional associations were another one of his top resources.  

“When I’m on a search I always look at professional associations.  They are often people that are active and are often people that know a lot of people,” Bowers said.  “It’s someplace I go early to look for a candidate.” 

  

As for posting your resume to an online job site, Bowers said that didn’t have much value for recruiters. 

  

“There’s a bias against people posted on classic job boards.  They are already so public.  They’re not unique to a recruiter,” said Bowers.  “If I presented a candidate I found on Monster [clients would] say ‘I could have done that.’” 

  

That is not to say that your resume shouldn’t be out there if you are unemployed and looking for work.   

  

Kiar Olson used both Monster and LinkedIn when he was looking to hire people for his web development business.  

  

“LinkedIn is probably the best by a long way.  You can really search it pretty well.  It’s ease of use is much higher and you don’t have to pay to be listed on it.” 

  

Olson also recommends signing up for a Plaxo account to keep your address book and networks updated.  Plaxo keeps you connected to other Plaxo users in your address book.  When someone you know changes jobs and updates his/her email address, Plaxo sends you a notification and automatically updates their contact information.   

  

“You can’t take for granted your existing network,” said Olson. “A lot of times the person you are looking for is closer than you think.” 

  

If that’s the case, then logic says the perfect job opportunity or business deal may be brewing right among your existing contacts.  All the more reason to get visible online, keep your profile up-to-date, and help people find you.