Be the purple Skittle in a bag of M&Ms
WHY IT’S IMPORTANT TO DEMONSTRATE YOUR UNIQUE PERSONAL BRAND DURING A JOB SEARCH
When Vanshika Mehta was job searching, she branded herself as the #purpleskittle. She clearly articulated to employers that she is different than other job seekers— that she thinks outside of the box and has a unique skill set.
When Nina Mufleh relocated from the Middle East to Silicon Valley, she launched a high impact career campaign that generated over a half million views to her website and over 14,000 views to her resume in just two weeks. Just like a “real” business marketing campaign, she had a clear target, simplified goals and measured her results. One of her key takeaways in the white paper that she wrote about her job search was: be unique.
OUR MINDS ARE TRAINED TO RECOGNIZE NOVELTY. HOW CAN YOU BE UNIQUE?
It can be a simple as writing a compelling cover letter or leveraging your network to get an introduction to the hiring manager. OR it can be truly out of the box. Remember the guy who turned his resume into a donut box and hand delivered them to his dream offices? Yeah, Lukas Yla landed 10 interviews.
I just learned about a cool new website called lemlist by founder Nathan Latka which has the ability to personalize e-mails in a way I haven’t seen before. I can see a job seeker sending out unique targeted e-mails using the platform.
One of my favorite sales quotes is from Jerry McGuire (not the movie): “Different is better than better”.
Let me be clear: I’m not saying that you can get a job if you are unqualified, I’m just saying that the candidate who can clearly articulate their strengths, differentiators and can address how they will meet the pain points of an organization will stand out during the recruitment process.
