WHAT TO KNOW

Searching for jobs online is becoming increasingly significant in the job search process. There are some occupations that lend themselves to this process more than others. You first must first determine what job search sites would be best for you to find the particular occupations that interest you. Some sites specialize in certain types of jobs. Use the resources provided by your transition office and the transition website to research these. With thousands of job sites online, advertising millions of jobs, where do you begin? It can get confusing and frustrating if you don’t know where to look. To practice, begin with a large, popular site, such as Americas Job Bank (AJB).

WHAT TO DO

Once you get into the site, it will ask you several questions. First, in which state and locations you are willing to work. Identify these, then look under job families, which are broken down into many different job fields, depending on the site, and then individual job titles under each one. When typing in keywords, it is important to try and keep your search as broad as possible in the beginning. Once you have identified a variety of job titles, try and narrow it down. For example, if you wanted to be a “camera operator for television,” but do not have the experience to obtain that job right now, type in the word “television.” This will give you a deeper variety of job titles relating to jobs that may help you work up to the position you ultimately want. For example, a “camera utility” worker is a job title that is more entry level than television camera person. Type in a variety of keywords separated by commas to get an even broader perspective. Understand that how you type in keywords will dictate your results, because “construction, project manager” will give you an entirely different list of jobs than “construction project manager.”

As you look at specific titles that interest you, it will narrow your search. Employers often list jobs in a wide variety of titles for the same occupation. Finding these jobs is part of the challenge. If you stay with just one job title, you may miss out on a variety of jobs in related areas. In AJB, if you are looking for a construction project manager position, you might look in occupation fields such as management and engineer rather than construction. You need to understand how each site is organized, as each is different. Experimentation is important in locating all of the jobs that interest you. Look at both the big sites and also the specialty sites catering to the specific occupations that interest you. There are job search engines that provide extensive lists of job sites.

When you identify a job opening, try and research the company to find out all you can about the company and the job. You can also go directly to specific company web sites to locate job openings they may have and apply for them online.

Applying for Jobs Online
There are several ways to submit your resume online. One of them is posting your resume on a job search career site.

Posting Your Resume on a Job Search Career Site

There are countless job search career sites on the web. Each is unique in its own way, but for the most part, similar in many respects of creating a resume on their site. Sites such as America’s Job Bank have a way for you to register on their site and post your resume, hoping employers will utilize these career sites to recruit you as a potential employee.

• Most of these online resume builders are simple and straightforward. They give you a step-by-step, fill-in-the-blank process that is easy to follow. More than likely they require you to register on their site, which is usually free. Some of these sites are good and some are not so great in terms of resume format, so be selective.
• With each fill-in-the-blank space, you must carefully edit and proofread your documents. Spell check is usually not provided by the site. To spell check the document yourself, save the resume to your computer, spell check the document in your word processing program, then go back to the online document and make corrections.
• The objective is what the employer will usually use to screen applications. If interested, they will open the entire resume to review. Therefore, be sure that your objective is simple and clearly stated. A mistake many job seekers make is trying to sell your skills here by making their objective statement too long.
• Posting your resume on a website may not be the most effective way to get a job. The main reasons why this technique does not work are that individuals do not target their search or that the resume is poorly written. The best resumes are targeted resumes, and posting a resume on a web site does not allow for the most effective targeting.

Wealth comes to those who make things happen, not to those who let things happen.

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