Personal Branding Interview: Jacob Share

by Patrick Ambron • July 23, 2009 • View Comments

I recently spoke with Jacob Share, personal branding & job search expert at JobMob. In the interview we discuss the changing job market, specific personal branding tactics to use, and how to find a job on twitter.

Many recent grads are having trouble finding jobs, despite sending their resumes everywhere. What is different about today’s job search?

1) Personal branding – personal branding has always existed even if we didn’t call it that. The people who’ve met you all have an impression of you. The question is whether they have the same image, and if that image is a positive one. Using both online & offline tools, it’s easier than ever to continuously project and reinforce the desired impression of yourself so that people remember you the way you want them to.

2) Networking – In the past, leveraging a network usually meant your family & friends, an alumni association or other student-related group such as a fraternity/sorority. You should still reach out to these people for help but the reality is that relatively, they are just aren’t too many people and more importantly, many of them aren’t familiar with your profession.

In today’s world, it’s very easy to complement (not replace!) that real-world network with online friends and acquaintances from social networks, forums and anywhere else that you’ve congregated online with people who share interests with you.

Do you have/know of any astounding personal branding success stories where joining the right networks and building an online presence helped someone find a perfect job?

Recently, people have begun to understand how they can use twitter to attract jobs, and often much more quickly than they expected. In one of the success stories mentioned in The Ultimate twitter Job Search Guide, a woman working near Boise, Idaho was at work when she found out that she was going to be laid off. By the time she returned to her desk from the meeting where the layoff was announced, the IT department had already blocked some of her access to the Internet, including twitter. Still, she sent off a quick tweet using her Blackberry and then gradually made her way out of the office. By the time she got to her car in the parking lot, someone had already replied to her with a job opportunity.

Many people join twitter, and find themselves stuck. Are there any specific actions EVERYONE needs to take to put them on the right path?

1) Search. Use twitter Search, Google, or any other search engine that indexes tweets to see which jobs have been posted recently and are still likely to be available. Search on keywords related to your field (like your desired job title) or on phrases that companies in your industry might use when mentioning a hire. Subscribe via RSS to any searches that are yielding good results so that you can follow them for future job openings.

2) Follow the right users. There are many twitter accounts used for posting job listings – I recently blogged a list of over 400 of them – so follow the ones that are relevant to you. There are also industry headhunters who post leads and so do the companies themselves, so look for the twitter presence of any companies you might want to work for and then follow them.

3) Personal branding. By building your brand on twitter and helping people as much as possible with expertise, the priniciple of reciprocity comes into play. In other words, the people you helped will be inclined to give you something back. If they know you are available for hire and are aware of a lead, they will bring it to you. And if you’ve been following and helping i.e branding yourself to the right people, you’re more likely to have those leads come quickly. Another way that personal branding attracts jobs on twitter is by bringing up your profile consistently in search results when people go looking for answers related to your expertise

If you enjoyed this interview please check out our other interviews with personal branding experts:

Jacob Share is the founder and SVP of Share Select Media, a company focused on empowering quality bloggers and blogs such as Group Writing Projects, The Original Home of Group Writing Projects.