Here it is! The completion of our blog series on how to find a new (sourcing) job! In our first post of this blog series, we talked about how you could create a stellar LinkedIn profile and a resume that will land you an interview. The second article in the series demonstrated how to find: relevant jobs at scale, the right stakeholders and their contact details. In this final article, we’ll talk about how you cab stand out with your application and how you can prepare for your remote job interview.
These articles have been created with the help of Marcel van der Meer, Mike “Batman” Cohen, Dean Da Costa, Anna Brandt, Jonathan Kidder, Jules Maregiano, Tom Gerencer, Tris Revill, Alexander Gerritse, Maarten van der Kwaak and Guillaume Moubeche. Each individual is an expert in his or her field and have shared their advice and experience with the sole purpose to help ❤️.
5. Stand out with your application
In this section you will learn how to use personal video messages 🎥 and emails 📧 to make you stand out and land interviews on a consistent basis.
Loom
One of the ways to truly stand out is to use personalized video messages via Loom. Guillaume Moubeche is a clear advocate of using personalized video messages and he recommends you to keep the following guidelines in mind:
– Personalize your video to the person you are reaching out to.
– Introduce who you are
– Explain why you are reaching out
– Explain why you are interested in them
– Explain why they should spend time on YOU
– End with a clear call to action
– Keep the 🎥 short!
The first few videos will be ‘scary’ to make and you will spend a lot of time on takes and retakes but once you get over the hurdle of talking to your computer and looking at your own work, you will realize that it doesn’t have to be perfect and you will be able to create videos in a matter of minutes.
Here is an example video that Guillaume Moubeche made for a sales position by using Loom.
The disadvantage of using Loom videos is that the links in Loom videos can trigger spam filters and your beautifully crafted video might never be seen… Secondly Loom requires the receiver to click on the link in your video and have their sound on. “Luckily” the majority of your recipients will be working from home these days and this might be less of an issue but it is something to consider.
On the positive side of things, Loom allows you to track whether someone has actually viewed your video. When someone has and didn’t respond it is good to send a small 👋 as a reminder to grab some 🍿. The opposite is also true, when your video hasn’t been viewed after a few days it is good to send a reminder.
Reaching out via email
If you don’t feel comfortable reaching out by video you can still send an email 😊. On average people receive over 100 emails per day so it is your job to stand out and truly make a lasting impression!
This starts with a subject line that triggers your email to be opened in the first place. Mike Cohen will outline the basics to write a great email that will lands you an interview (or at least a response!).
Create an appealing subject line that gets opened
One of the top opened subject lines is the name of their company — just the name of the company (that’s it) — clean it up though — don’t reach out to “Salesforce.com” or “Lockheed Martin Missile Defense Group” — it’s just “Lockheed” or “Lockheed Martin”. This might sound boring or ‘this can’t be true’ but data from hundreds of email campaigns show that this tactic results in the highest opening rate… #learnfromthebest
Or — even better — write something personal that links you two as humans! Check the person you are reaching out to on Facebook or Meetup or another social site — do you have something in common? Throw that in the subject! Be creative, but not too over the top — the goal of the subject is one thing, and one thing only, get them to open the email!
Don’t include this in your subject line:
Avoid using !#$%$@*? characters
Don’t use more than 38 characters
Avoid using emoji’s 😎
No Punctuation marks outside of dash ” — “
Don’t go CAPSLOCK CRAZY! Just normal sentence capitalization will do
Body of the email
Do NOT use a template to write an email — say hello, express who you are and why you’re reaching out, specifically why YOU are reaching out to specifically THEM. Be personal — especially with what’s going on in the world now.
Then express why you’re interested in their company — if you don’t have a reason, Google them, look for news articles, read their mission statement or company values — something that specifically speaks to just that company.
Then mention why that role, specifically, pull details from the J.D. — don’t just say “I did the thing you’re looking for”… no duh. You’re applying to the job. I don’t expect an Accountant to be applying to a commercial pilot’s job….
Then close with a call to action — “I look forward to hearing back from you one way or another — if I don’t hear something in the next couple of days I’ll follow up — I know how busy and chaotic things can get in these times, especially while hiring.”
Example of a good, personal email
Below is a good example of what a personal email could look like. This candidate clearly read my, sorry it’s Adriaan again, LinkedIn profile and did his research for the job he was interested in. He referred to my Ironman (brushing my ego a bit), did his research on our company MatcHR and he wrote why I should be interested to speak to him (the candidate mentions “you” three times). Would you invite this person for a first call? 👍
Follow up
Another great tip from Mike is to schedule a reminder in your agenda after 2 and 4 days to send a follow up. When you follow up — reply to the first email you sent, and reference it! Don’t change the subject, it’ll add the “Re: ” to the front of your subject, showing them you’re following up. “Hey again NAME — Just following up as promised from my previous email a couple of days ago…” and then add some new piece of information — don’t just nudge to follow up. Any recent news about them? Anything else you can share?
On day +4 without an answer you can be more creative and send a funny meme or photo to trigger a response. Humor does work if it is appropriate and relevant to the job and/or yourself.
How can you not respond to the message below 🦄?
“Hi XXX,
Yep… that’s me with a Unicorn… I hoped to be the Unicorn you were looking for but since I didn’t receive any reaction from you, this might not be the case…
Either is fine with me but I would love to hear from you if we are in touch for the right reasons.
Looking forward hearing from you.”
6. How to prepare for your remote job interview
In this section you will learn to get the basics right for any remote job interview you might have 💻
You have made it! You are invited for a remote job interview 🍾. Tris Revill has conducted hundreds of interviews remotely and shared these tips for a successful remote job interview.
– Make sure you have the right log in details for your call and download any necessary apps ahead of time.
– Research your interviewers on LinkedIn and potentially other relevant platforms. Find something you have in common or something interesting to comment on. It’s good to show you have done your research and break the 🧊.
– Turn off anything that can be a distraction. Notifications, email, Facebook whatever and ensure that you have nothing that is going to distract your awesomeness on the call.
– Make sure you have a great sound and no (or very limited) background noise. Don’t use the microphone of your computer but use headphones. Test this upfront with someone to make sure you sound great.
– 90% of video quality is down to lighting. Sit facing a window if you have one, put a lamp in front of your laptop and make sure people can see your face and your expressions!
– Look into the camera on not to your screen (this is hard 🙄).
– Try to set your camera at the same level as your eyes so your interviewers will look you straight in the face. If you use a laptop put it on a pile of books to level it out.
– Log in early to the call.
– Be yourself, be confident, smile and just nail it 💪.
In Conclusion / So what’s next?
These are tough times and at the time of writing it is unclear what the next few months will bring us. COVID-19 unfortunately is a given but there are many aspects in your direct environment that you can influence and the first one is your own state of mind and the actions you take.
“I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become” — Carl Gustav Jung
We hope these articles will help give you the tools and advice you need to quickly find a new job.
You could help us by sharing these articles on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or email. We want to help more people find a job quicker and help companies that are looking for new talent.
Please stay safe and good luck ❤️❤️❤️.
A small not about me. I am the co-founder of MatcHR, a sourcing and recruitment outsourcing company based in Kyiv, Ukraine. Due to COVID-19 we were unfortunately forced to lay off the majority of our employees (read more about it here) 😔.
To help our employees find a new job quickly I gave a presentation that has been the basis for this article. I am grateful to share that everyone found a new job within 4 weeks 🙏🏻.
If you have any questions or comments feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn or in the comments below.