What do you want to do when you grow up? Does your target audience
know your desires? Do you know your target audience?
If you don’t know the answers, it’s time to figure them out. If you don’t
know what you want for yourself or how to market yourself, how can
people help you get you what you want? Even for someone like me who
teaches résumé writing, I had enough critical feedback from readers of
my own résumé as being “too dense” or “too broad” to know that I had
to make some significant changes. For example, that flexibility was easily
identified as a marketable trait on my résumé since I averaged many positions
in a short period of time at the same company. This strength of being
flexible was a nice-to-have, but people making the hiring decision needed
to know what competencies I had, what skills I possessed, and what I
could do for them. The companies I was pursuing couldn’t be expected to
guess what path I wanted to take. I had to find a way for people to know
that I was both flexible and competent. As much as I thought I was giving
companies options, I found that they didn’t have time to be too interpretative.
The message is to still cast a broad net, but be more targeted with
the approach so people know exactly what you want.
An effective way to be precise about what you want is by putting together
a marketing plan. I used this tool in networking situations and
found the murkiness cleared up not only for me, but for the people who
could lead me where I wanted to be. You can still have multiple options
based on your various pursuits, but the key is to have a targeted approach
that aligns your skills with a field of work. The marketing plan can have
fluidity for different fields you are looking into, but should be stable
enough that you don’t need one for every person you meet or for every
different company you are looking into.
There are a variety of types and definitions of marketing plans. My
advice is to look at the purpose of a marketing plan first, and keep it
simple. The purpose is to make your goals as clear as possible to someone
reading the document. The design of your marketing plan should be
based on the harsh reality that someone may well glance at it for less than
thirty seconds, so make the layout count. For example, you might put a
clear statement expressing your interest at the top of the page, followed
by examples of the types of positions you want to pursue, skills and/or
competencies you possess, strengths, and accomplishments. It should be
in a table format to pack a punch with an economy of words. In sessions
that are truly networking only, you can also list all of the companies you
are looking into so the person you’re meeting with gets a sense of the
direction you’re taking. Your marketing plan can be adapted for different
fields you are pursuing, but don’t put yourself in a position where you’re
constantly revising it. My rule of thumb is that 85 percent of the story of
you should remain the same regardless of the positions or fields you are
looking into. Remember, the importance of a marketing plan is to market
yourself in order to give someone a very clear picture of what you want.
Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):
- Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
- Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
- Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
- The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
- From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
- The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood
See “Products” for details on www.transformationtom.com. Book and eBook purchase options are also available on Amazon- Please click the link to be re-directed: Amazon.com
MP3 Downloads of “From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide” are available at Apple iTunes, Amazon, Rhapsody, Emusic, Nokia, Xbox Music, Spotify, Omnifone, Google Music Store, Rdio, Muve Music, Bloom.fm, Slacker Radio, MediaNet, 7digital, 24-7, Rumblefish, and Shazam “From Fear to Success” MP3 on CD Baby