In honor of the launch, this month I’m writing series of “back to basics” blog posts on the essentials of getting from college to career. Today I’m sharing my absolute favorite, most impactful resume tips:

1. Don’t reinvent the wheel. Particularly at the beginning of your career, it’s really hard to start your resume with a blank sheet of paper. So don’t. Check out examples of strong entry-level resumes online or at your university career center and borrow the best ideas for formatting, headings, wording and more.

2. Include key words. Employers’ eyes are naturally drawn to the words they’re looking for — the brand names, skills, and experience they need — so make sure you include these terms on your resume. And, be as specific as possible. For instance, “Experience with Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign through the production of 12 issues of on-campus magazine” is much stronger than “Design Experience.

The best way to find the right words to use is to look at online job listings for the kinds of positions you’re interested in and the LinkedIn profiles of people who have the positions you want. Then use some of the prominent words and phrases in those job listings and profiles throughout your resume.

3. Tailor your resume to each opportunity. Employers can tell when they’re seeing a generic resume that is being blasted out to anyone and everyone. It’s fine to have such a resume as a template, but then you need to customize it with different accomplishments and keywords that fit with the individual companies where you’d like to work. (One warning: if you’re sending your resume to a large corporation or posting on the recruiting website of such an organization, you will have to choose just one version.)

4. Quantify everything that’s quantifiable. “Managed a team of camp counselors” is less impressive than “Managed a staff of 12 camp counselors and 5 counselors-in-training.” Quantifying can also give life to administrative tasks: “Receptionist at a 4-doctor medical practice handling over 100 clients per day.” If your work helped to raise money or profits, then numbers are even more important: “Improved sporting equipment sales in my department by 50% in six months” or “Raised $2,000 through solicitation of alumni donations.” Quantifying shows your unique contribution to an organization and also demonstrates that you’re a person who understands the importance of measuring results.

5. Prioritize. When you list bullet points under each job on your resume (and you should always list bullet points under each job), be sure to list the most important task, accomplishment or responsibility first. It’s highly unlikely that a potential employer is going to read every bullet point under every item on your resume, but most people will read the first or second bullet point on each list. You don’t have to list accomplishments chronologically; list the most impressive first. Also note that more challenging jobs (which ideally should be your more recent jobs) should have more bullet points than less challenging work experiences.

6. Don’t forget to list internships, volunteer work and unpaid summer jobs. Just because you didn’t get paid for something doesn’t mean it doesn’t count as real experience. When including unpaid experience on your resume, emphasize the professional skills you’ve developed. Use terms such as “leadership,” “fundraising,” “public relations,” “people management,” and “budgeting” to describe your activities.

7. Note any notables. Be sure to mention anything about you that is unique and uncommon. Some examples include, “Founding president of first-ever entrepreneurial club at XYZ University,” “Winner of the Anita Lawrence Scholarship for Excellence in Social Studies, awarded to the top junior history student” (remember to explain an award if it’s not nationally known) or “Youngest person ever promoted to assistant manager at local high-end jewelry store.”

8. Don’t highlight something that you despised doing. As you can see, there are many ways to draw a reader’s eye to what you want that person to see on your resume, so avoid these strategies when you don’t want to promote something. In fact, if you’ve had a task or responsibility that you hated and never want to do again (like selling vacuums door-to-door or cleaning animal cages), then don’t include it on your resume. You can even leave off an entire job if it’s not relevant to your current job search.

9. Don’t ever lie or stretch the truth. This happens way too often, and it’s never a good idea. There are so many reasons not to lie on a resume. First of all, if your lie or truth stretching gets discovered, you’ll lose a job opportunity with that company forever. Second, if you exaggerate your skills, such as being fluent in Spanish when you really just studied it in high school, your lie will become extremely obvious the day you start your job and you lack the skills you said you had.

10. Keep it to one page. I’ve seen senior executives with one-page resumes, so I don’t see any reason why a college student or recent grad’s resume needs more than that. Remember that your resume is a marketing tool and not a transcript or a laundry list of everything you’ve ever done. By keeping your resume short and sweet, you’re demonstrating that you can edit yourself and sell yourself clearly and concisely, which are both important skills in the professional world.

11. Curb your creativity. In the vast majority of circumstances, it’s inappropriate to present your resume in any other format than a simple black font (Times New Roman, Arial, etc.) on a white background. On hard copy resumes, it is not okay to use colored paper, scented paper, colorful or creative fonts or any other bells and whistles. Recruiters, especially those in the corporate world, laugh at these attempts to stand out and immediately throw such resumes away. It’s also smart to PDF your resume to make sure your formatting looks the same on all computers (and to ensure you haven’t left any Track Changes markings — seriously, I’ve seen that happen).

12. Don’t title your resume document “resume.” This tip comes from employer Don Fornes writing on the Job Bound blog. “About a third of applicants name their resume document, ‘resume.doc.’” Don writes. “’Resume’ may make sense on your computer, where you know it’s your resume. However, on my computer, it’s one of many, many resumes with the same name…. By using such a generic file name, the applicant misses a great opportunity to brand themselves.”

13. Get professional input. As I recommended in last week’s post on the 7 essentials of a successful job search, if you can afford a professional resume writer, hire one. If you’re still in college, get a free resume critique from your college career center. If you can’t do either of these things, then ask your smartest, most successful friend or family member (ideally someone who works or has worked in your industry) for help.

14. Leave out unnecessary information. Here is what you should not include on your resume: references (an employer will request these if desired), the phrase “References upon request” (they know this), a GPA under 3.0 (click here to read my tips on how to get a job if you have a low GPA) or obvious skills (there is no longer a need to say that you know how to use Microsoft Word or Internet Explorer). You should also remove high school activities once you’re out of college.

15. Quadruple-check for any typos. Typos happen to the best of us, so be meticulous about spelling, grammar, formatting and consistency on your resume. Be especially careful with details like whether or not you end each bullet point with a punctuation mark or whether you’ve capitalized all of your job titles. Even a small typo can blow an opportunity, especially if you’ve included “excellent attention to detail” as one of your skills!

And one more bonus tip…

Make sure your resume gets read. A recruiter once told me he always has two stacks of resumes on his desk: one super tall stack of resumes that are submitted online and one very small stack of resumes sent or handed to him by a trusted friend or colleague. Of course you want to be in that smaller, more elite stack. So, always look for an “in” at a company — a friend-of-a-friend, an alum of your university, a LinkedIn connection — who believes in you and will recommend you to his or her employer. You can have the best resume in the world, but if a recruiter never sees it you’ll never get the job you want.

So, what do you think? Are there any other resume tips I should have included here? Please add your additional tips and suggestions in the Comments!

In honor of the launch, this month I’ll be writing series of “back to basics” blog posts on the essentials of getting from college to career. Today I’m starting with the basics of getting yourself set up with what I consider to be the 7 absolute basics you’ll need for a successful job search:

1.     Time. You’ve probably heard it said that job hunting is a fulltime job. I don’t believe that’s necessarily the case, but it is an activity that needs serious commitment. You’ll likely fail if you’re job hunting in your spare time, only on weekends or “when you get to it.” To get serious, schedule specific blocks of time in your calendar that are dedicated to your job hunt. I’d recommend starting with 30 uninterrupted minutes a day and adding time from there.

2.     A Really Big List. A lot of people tell me this is their favorite tip from Getting from College to Career. A Really Big List is a collection of every idea you have that’s related to your job search — companies you’d love to work for, internships to apply for, people you’ve been meaning to talk to, blogs to subscribe to and anything and everything else. Start a list in a notebook, an Excel doc or in a file on your phone and keep it with you at all times. Your list will provide the assignments for the job search sessions you’ve now made the time for: employers to research, people to invite for informational interviews, events to attend, etc. It’s like a journal and assignment book all in one.

3.     Friends. Notice I said “friends” instead of “a network.” This is so you don’t get scared. The reality is that your friends are your network, and a network is absolutely critical to landing a job. Your friends are the first people you should tell about your job search. Your friends are the people who can offer advice, ideas and connections to their friends who might also be helpful. Your friends are the people you should connect with on LinkedIn before anyone else (see #6 below). A job search doesn’t require reaching out to dozens of strangers. You’ll be more successful if you reach out to your friends first and grow your network organically from those relationships.

4.     Business cards. A lot of people feel weird having business cards without a title or company name on them. Don’t. Business cards are the currency of the professional world, so you absolutely must have them to engage in a successful job hunt. I’m especially impressed when I meet a student or recent grad with cards. It shows maturity, foresight, and an eagerness to have the appropriate tools for the working world. Design a simple card with a simple font and the highest quality card stock you can afford at DesignYourOwnCard.com, VistaPrint, FedEx Kinko’s or your local print shop. Include your name, phone number and email. If you’d like, you can also include your university, major and year of graduation; a professional website if you have one; and your LinkedIn profile URL.

5.     The Best Resume You Can Possibly Have. Chris Russell’s recent post reminded me of the importance of having a professionally written resume. Although the economy is getting better, it’s still an incredibly competitive job market, so your resume has to be the very best it can be. Don’t wing it! If you can afford a professional resume writer, hire one. If you’re in college or are a recent grad, get a resume rewrite from your college career center. If you can’t do either of these things, then ask your smartest, most successful friend (ideally someone who works or has worked in your industry) for help. No matter how you improve your resume, I promise that the time, effort and/or money spent will be well worth it.

6.     100% Complete LinkedIn Profile. Now take that professionally edited resume and turn it into a LinkedIn profile. With more than 135 million members and counting, LinkedIn has become the professional Yellow Pages: no matter what your field, professional level or geographic location, you simply must have a presence if you want to be found by employers and taken seriously by networking contacts. For comprehensive tips on setting up a great profile, watch my short LinkedIn how-to videos for students or register for one of my upcoming 60-minute LinkedIn for Job Seekers webinars. Both of these resources are totally free and open to all.

7.     Two Professional Outfits. While it’s great to have a closet full of clothes, you can make it through a job search with two main outfits (sorry – my husband always tells me that men don’t call their clothes “outfits”) sets of clothes. First, you need a professional suit. When in doubt, go with a basic black suit (skirt suits or pant suits are both okay for women) and black shoes. Make sure the suit is always dry-cleaned and the shoes are polished and not too worn. You can make a black suit look totally different for different events by changing the shirt you wear underneath.

Second, you need a go-to business casual outfit. This is harder than it sounds — depending on your industry, business casual could mean ripped jeans or it could mean neatly pressed khakis and a cardigan sweater. Research what’s appropriate in your industry and, when in doubt, err on the side of a bit more conservative just to be safe. Whatever you determine, always have your business casual option at the ready for networking meetings and other casual encounters with employers.

What are other absolute essentials to begin a job search? Please add your additional tips and suggestions in the Comments!

In a nutshell, Resunate enables job seekers to create customized, job specific resumes. As I learned in a demo, your work experience gets screened against any job description and then indicates if you’re a strong match. Resunate then helps you improve your resume accordingly.

Here is my full conversation with Mona:

Q: Who is the team behind Resunate and why did you choose to build a business in the area of job hunting?

A: My co-founders and I met in my last semester of graduate school at Carnegie Mellon University. I became acquainted with a graduate research project, looking at different ways of applying cutting-edge technology to solve labor issues.

Our team interviewed unemployed individuals, asking them what pain points they faced. By and large, [they said] it was the time-consuming process of applying to jobs and tailoring their resumes that frustrated job seekers the most. From there, we spoke with hiring managers and HR directors to learn how they processed job applications. We discovered that employers utilize numerous kinds of technologies to screen candidates.  We keep updating the product based on user feedback and testing new features against employer screening systems.

Q: Are job seekers having success with Resunate?

A: Our most recent study showed that resumes pre-screened with Resunate were two times more likely to be called back for an interview than a candidate’s original resume.

Q: Congratulations! One of the things I learned from our conversation is about the importance of resume parsers. Can you explain what a “parser” is and why job candidates need to know about this?

A: A parser is a tool within every applicant tracking system (ATS) that scans your resume and breaks up the words into a searchable database, removing all styling. The parser also assigns meaning to the content within your resume. This is important for candidates to know because the way you format your resume can affect how easy it is to scan and how much an employer sees.

Additionally, parsers provide employers a synopsis of your key skills when they scan your resume. That’s why it’s so important to have your resume format optimized for these scanning systems.

The greatest way to ensure you have a parser-friendly resume is to build well-organized resumes with as much relevant content to each job you apply to. This ensures the skills employers are looking for are the ones the parser will highlight.

Q: What are the biggest mistakes entry-level job seekers make on their resumes and what can they do to fix them?

A: The biggest mistake is sending out cookie-cutter resumes to every position. This undersells the job seeker and places that resume in the shredder pile. The easiest way entry-level job seekers can improve this is to pay attention to the job description and how they can contribute. Employers want to know how you’ll impact their organization.

Q: How do you see Resunate benefiting employers?

A: We launched a free widget for employers to utilize Resunate as a no-cost professional recruiting solution that enables employers to request applicants to screen themselves against their job opening before applying. Resunate helps employers save time by focusing on the most relevant experiences.

Q: This is all very cool and different. What’s on the horizon for Resunate?

A: We have many new features coming out, all with the goal of providing job seekers more insight into how employers evaluate their job application. One feature will be a “Parser Report” providing job seekers the exact information employers see, in partnership with the parser used by most job boards and Fortune 500 companies.

Another feature is in collaboration with the makers of the Myers Briggs® assessment. This feature, JobFit, will enable job seekers to verify their personality type and their natural work style preferences with Myers Briggs® to gauge job satisfaction, adding a whole new dimension to Resunate.

Thank you to Mona for answering my questions and sharing Resunate with us. Learn more at http://www.resunate.com.

As a global spokesperson for LinkedIn, I had the honor this week of writing a blog post to support LinkedIn’s Veterans Initiative, a new microsite tailored with tips, tools and information to help veterans find new opportunities (including a free one-year LinkedIn Job Seeker subscription for all current and former service men and women).

Please share this article and LinkedIn’s offer. And thank you to all those who serve our country.

Veterans Helping Veterans: LinkedIn Tips for Job Seekers Who Have Served

I often advise job seekers to reach out to people in their desired industries for advice and guidance. So, when I sat down to write a blog post to help job seekers with military backgrounds, I decided to follow my own advice.

I posted a query on LinkedIn asking veterans if they’d be willing to share some tips for other former servicemen and servicewomen. Not surprisingly, several veterans stepped up immediately to help, as did a few non-veterans who wanted to lend a hand.

Here are the top recommendations they shared:

Emphasize transferable skills.

Everyone’s first tip was to make sure your LinkedIn profile emphasizes your transferable skills.

“Being a marksman with an M-16 has little applicability to supply-chain management,” said Erick S. Van Savage, a former corporal in the USMC, “but attributes such as self-discipline, dedication, leadership, courage, esprit de corps and a strong work ethic have great application to virtually all facets of business.” Veterans looking for work need to emphasize such attributes in their LinkedIn Summary statements and profile Skills sections.

“You need to remove all the typical military language from your write-up,” added Robert Martin, MBA, LSSGB, who served in the US Navy and is now an E-6 US Navy and Supply Chain Professional. “Remember, very few of the people you come in contact with on LinkedIn will understand your background. Remember to write [your profile] from the perspective of a civilian because this what you now are.”

Read the rest of this post on the LinkedIn Blog…

To stand out in this economy, everyone needs an angle (or three…or four…). But there is an angle that I think many Millennials overlook, perhaps because it feels so natural to them. In my opinion, the #1 advantage Millennials offer employers is that they are digital natives.

As defined on Wikipedia, a digital native is “a person who was born during or after the general introduction of digital technology, and through interacting with digital technology from an early age, has a greater understanding of its concepts.” (Check out PBS Frontline’s excellent special on this topic.) In other words, if you clicked a mouse before you read a book, you’re a digital native.

I’m not talking here about coding ability, HTML5 design or any other specific technical skill. I’m talking about the overall instinct to use technology to solve challenges and create opportunities. This is a highly valuable career advantage and one that Millennials don’t exploit enough when applying for jobs.

If you’re a young professional, here are some ideas for using your status as a digital native to your advantage:

• Promote your social media knowledge. Many Gen Ys are shocked when I recommend including social media skills on their resumes or LinkedIn profiles. The reality is that everyone doesn’t know how to use Twitter and many employers (especially small business owners) will pay someone to do this. If you consider yourself an expert designer of Facebook fan pages, a super-Tweeter (including using all of the myriad Twitter-related sites like HootSuite and TweetDeck) or you’ve been posting videos to YouTube for years, then this expertise should appear as a skill on your resume and LinkedIn profile.

• Demonstrate the ability to tap your online networks. Many companies today are obsessed with crowdsourcing, a skill that most Millennials possess innately. For instance, if you want to be a journalist, editor or TV producer, you should market your ability to quickly tap your online networks for referrals to sources, information and ideas. This is also a valuable skill for aspiring marketers, recruiters and fundraisers.

• Emphasize your self-sufficiency. While Millennials do require a lot of feedback from employers, what you don’t require is a lot of tech support. According to new research from Bomgar and GigaOm Pro, “Millennials initially seek outside sources to solve their own technology problems versus immediately turning to the IT department when something goes awry. Sixty-one percent said they don’t go to company support first, and the majority (71 percent) had searched for an answer on Google at least once.”

• Market your mobility. Everyone is talking about mobile marketing these days, so if you’re especially good at finding apps for your phone, or — better yet — designing apps, be sure to make this known. Since mobile marketing is still a relatively new field, your natural abilities can stand out when companies are looking to build their mobile strategies. But they won’t know you can do this unless you tell them.

If the above tips resonate with you, be sure to add these digital native skills to your resume and to the “Skills” section of your LinkedIn profile (check out this article from Mashable on how to do that).

What other digital native traits are valuable to employers and overlooked by Gen Ys who possess them? Please share your comments!

Yes, there are some professions (e.g., accounting), where you may need a particular major to land a job with a particular corporation. And job interviewers may ask why you chose your major in order to learn about your decision making process. But in the vast majority of career and job search situations, your major is pretty much meaningless.

The reason is that your college years are about much more than the subject matter of your classes. Here are some of the things that employers tell me are more important than a college major:

• Experience. Virtually every employer mentions experience as the most desirable resume item a job candidate can offer. It doesn’t matter whether that experience comes from internships, extracurricular activities, volunteer work, part-time jobs or working in your family business over the summer. What matters is that you have built professional skills, ideally related to the industry you want to join.

• Skills. Hand-in-hand with experience come tangible skills. For a programming job, for instance, your performance on a sample coding project will matter much more than the words on your diploma. The same goes for artistic talent, sales ability, foreign language fluency or any other measurable skill that is required for success in a job. Such skills can be inborn or learned outside the classroom as much as in it.

• Passion. If I were, say, a designer hiring an employee to work at my clothing label, I’d take someone deeply passionate about fashion over an unenthusiastic fashion major any day. Any entry-level employee will require a lot of training in the actual “work” of a particular job, but genuine enthusiasm can’t be taught. And it’s that enthusiasm that makes people want to teach you, mentor you and eventually promote you.

• Grades. No matter what your major, grades do matter early in your career — for about the first two years or so. The reason is that your grades are a reflection of your diligence, your intelligence and your work ethic. If your grades aren’t that great, it can be helpful if you’ve at least shown some improvement in your GPA over the years. I’ve heard of job offers being rescinded because of a potential employee’s low grades second semester senior year. Employers don’t want to hire slackers.

• Connections. Yep, you’ve heard it a million times: getting a job is often about who you know. The more you build your network in college — by forming relationships with classmates, professors, advisors, career services professionals, internship colleagues and others — the more job opportunities you’ll have no matter what your major.

* Since I write about careers, I’ve addressed the irrelevance of your college major when it comes to your professional future. Where I think college major does matter is when it comes to your happiness and fulfillment in college. My best advice is to major in a subject simply for your enjoyment or your fascination with the content. If you’re dead-set on having a pre-professional major, then you can always double major or minor in something “practical.” Of course, if you are totally passionate about accounting, business, PR or any other pre-professional major, then by all means choose it and enjoy!

How do you feel about the importance of a college major? Please share!

I’ve come to use these tools on a daily basis and wanted to share them with you. (Note: I’m writing about these tools because I love them and use them. I have no official relationship with them.)

1. Instapaper. As a career expert, one of the most frequent pieces of advice I give is to read the news every day. This means, at the very least, reading a major national news source and subscribing to industry publications and blogs. Most people follow this advice by skimming each day’s headlines, reading some digest emails and checking their social networks for shared articles.

Doing all of that is fine, but it means that most people only have a surface understanding of news and current events. For many topics this will suffice, but the most successful people have a much deeper level of knowledge about their particular field, and current events as well.

How do they do this? By reading longer articles, opinion pieces and in-depth analyses. For instance, book editors read full-length reviews in The New York Times Book Review. Financial professionals read feature articles in Harvard Business Review. Doctors read studies in The New England Journal of Medicine. If you really want to make it big, you need to get smarter by going deeper.

The problem, of course, is that deep reading is incredibly time-consuming. Enter Instapaper. This no-frills app allows you to save any online article to your iPhone or computer (some other mobile devices work with the app as well) and read it when you have time. When I’m not able to read an article I know is important, I’ll Instapaper it and then read when I can.  This ensures I don’t miss important content and it helps maximize my “downtime”.  Riding the subway, sitting in traffic and waiting at a doctor’s appointment are great opportunities to catch up on my reading.

If you’re not sure what is important or interesting to read, check out Instapaper’s weekly selection of the best articles on the web. Not only will you feel smarter, but you’ll also have a great diversity of knowledge to talk about at networking events, job interviews and other situations where you want to make a good impression.

2. Klout. Knowing more information makes you smarter. And so does knowing more about yourself. Klout is a relatively new tool that provides information about the influence you have online. Your Klout “score” uses data from LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other social networks to determine the people you influence through your online activities. Then, the site gives you an overall designation such as “observer,” “dabbler,” “activist” or “thought leader” in the categories you like to engage in. In other words, Klout analyzes how much you’re viewed as a knowledgeable person online.

Why should you care? Because your Internet image matters to your career. As recruiters and hiring managers pay more and more attention to candidates’ social media presence, a high Klout score could help you land a job (or a client or an investor).

Remember that in today’s competitive market, success is not just about what you know, but how you show it. Instapaper and Klout are here to help.

What other tools help make you smarter? Please share!

8 Steps to Effective Informational Interviews

One of the most frequent pieces of advice I give to young professionals is to seek out successful people and ask to conduct an informational interview with them. Essentially, an informational interview is a networking meeting where the interviewee (the successful professional) agrees to share some career advice with the interviewer (you).

I conducted tons of informational interviews when I was a student and young alum, and now I’m often the one being interviewed. And here’s the thing: If someone impresses me, I’ll go out of my way to help that person find a job or connect them with other people I know. If that person doesn’t seem to take the informational interview seriously, I usually end the call early and rarely keep in touch.

If you want to be in the former group with the people you ask for informational interviews, here are some secrets to success:

1. Confirm. At least 24 hours in advance of your scheduled phone call or meeting, confirm with your interviewee. This shows that you respect the person’s time and that you are taking this opportunity seriously.
2. Be on time. This is just as important for a phone call as it is for an in-person meeting. If you have agreed to 2pm, call at 2:00pm on the nose. Again, it’s a matter of respecting the other person’s time.
3. Do your research. It’s really irritating when someone asks to speak with me and then his or her first question is, “Can you tell me about what you do?” A simple Google search will lead you to my (or anyone’s) LinkedIn profile, Twitter feed, website and all of the articles and blog posts I’ve written. This opening question isn’t a smart use of the time you have to gain valuable career advice.
4. Clearly and concisely explain your situation. In most cases, the person you are interviewing won’t know much about you (don’t assume that he or she has read your resume or any other information, even if you’ve sent it in advance). So it’s a great idea to start the call with a brief (one- to two-minute) introduction to who you are and what you’re looking for. For instance, “I’ve just graduated with a BA in computer science and I’ve completed a few internships at big companies. My goal is to find a job at a start-up in the Boston area where I can work in product development.”

If you’re not totally sure what you want to do, it’s fine to say that you’re not sure yet, but do give the person some indication of the fields you’re interested in. For example, “I’ve just graduated with a degree in communications and, although I’m not completely sure yet what career to pursue, I’m currently looking at positions in public relations and marketing and would be open to other opportunities as well.”

1. Prepare questions in advance. I recently spoke to a student who had prepared about 5 questions to ask me in a 30-minute phone call, which struck me as the perfect number. She clearly had specific issues she wanted to discuss and I really respected the fact that she had prepared so thoroughly. Her questions were also a good mix of specific (regarding a particular interview she had coming up) and general (she asked me what books I was currently reading and would recommend to a recent grad).
2. Show that you’re listening. Remember that you are the interviewer in this situation, so it’s important to be a great listener. You want your interviewee to do most of the talking so you can gain as much wisdom as possible. This means repeating back some of the highlights of your interviewee’s advice and jotting down some action steps that you can share with the interviewee at the end of your call. For instance, perhaps the interviewee recommended a book to read or a particular company to research.

Sharing action steps is also a fantastic way to set up the expectation of a follow-up conversation. Tell the interviewee that you will be in touch as you accomplish the tasks he or she has suggested.

1. Send a thank you email within 12 to 24 hours. Just like a formal job interview, an informational interview— even a very quick or casual one—requires a thank you email. The sooner you send one, the better to stay on that person’s radar screen and show that you appreciated his or her time. A handwritten note is a nice gesture, too, but given the speed of the world today, I generally prefer email thank yous following an informational interview.
2. Keep in touch. If someone has agreed to an informational interview, that person now has an investment in your success and wants to hear how you’re doing as your job search continues. While you don’t want to overdo it, it’s absolutely appropriate to follow up with this person in a few ways:
   1. As mentioned, let the person know that you have taken action on his or her suggestions.
   2. Connect on LinkedIn with a personalized connection request that can serve as another thank you note (for example, “Thank you again for taking the time to speak with me last week. I look forward to keeping you posted on my job search!”).
   3. Be sure to inform this person when you eventually land a job. Everyone wants to feel that they contributed in some way to your success.

Do you have any other informational interviewing tips or best practices?  Please share!

When done in a professional way, writing a blog can lead to many benefits in your post-college job search, including real internship and job opportunities. Here are a few of the benefits of blogging:

• Enhancing your online personal brand and Google-ability
• Demonstrating skills such as writing, design, photography, and analytical thinking
• Showing your ability to take initiative and commit to a project
• Connecting you to a whole new network of other bloggers and commenters

Because the barrier to entry is so low — blogging platforms like WordPress.com, Blogger.com and Tumblr.com are all free — blogging is also something you can try for a while to see if you like it. If you do decide to join the blogosphere, here are some tips for getting started:

1. Write for the career you want. While it’s nice to blog about any topic that interests you, the only way your blog will help your job search is if you write about the industry you want to join. If a recruiter checks out your blog, he or she must know immediately what you’re interested in. One of my favorite blog posts by tech evangelist Robert Scoble puts it this way, “Post something that teaches me something about what you want to do every day. If you want to drive a cab, you better go out and take pictures of cabs. Think about cabs. Put suggestions for cabbies up. Interview cabbies. You better have a blog that is nothing but cabs. Cabs. Cabs. Cabs all the time.”

2. Be very careful what you post. The major reason most job seekers don’t blog is because they’re afraid that blogging might hurt their chances more than help them. This is a very real concern. If your blog is filled with photos of cats playing the piano, rants about parking tickets or sad tales of relationships gone bad, you’re not going to impress any employers. Think of your blog as a purely professional forum and you should be just fine.

3. Be consistent. Although I said that you can give blogging a try before you commit entirely, once you do commit to being a blogger, you have to post consistently. (And if you decide you don’t like blogging, delete the entire blog from the web so it doesn’t look as if you abandoned the project. You can share your favorite past posts on Facebook or elsewhere.) It’s up to you whether you want to post once a day, once a week, every two weeks, etc., as long as you post consistently. If your posts are sporadic, it will appear that you’re not fully committed, which does not impress employers.

4. Drive people to your blog. The downside of being one blogger among 161 million is that people may have a hard time finding you. This means you have to be proactive about guiding people — especially potential employers — to your blog. As long as your blog is 100 percent professional, you should list it on your resume, your business cards, your LinkedIn profile, your email signature line, your Facebook contact information, your Twitter profile and anywhere else you can think of.

5. Drive blog readers to your credentials. On the flip side, you want to make sure anyone who comes across your blog is aware that you are a great job candidate. On the “About” page, be sure to include links to your LinkedIn profile and a PDF download of your resume.

Has blogging enhanced your career or helped you land a job? Please share!

By Lindsey Pollak

In recent years, social media has transformed from a convenient way for college friends to stay in touch to an essential tool for professional networking and personal branding. In her new book, Social Networking for Career Success: Using Online Tools to Create a Personal Brand, career expert Miriam Salpeter shares the ins and outs of social networking.

Miriam was kind enough to answer some of my questions about how young professionals can maximize their professional use of social media.

LP: What does social networking have to do with career success?

MS: In a competitive market, success seekers need to do what they can to differentiate themselves and highlight their value propositions. Social networking is an amazing tool to do just that. Here are two major reasons why: 1) social media offers users a chance to share their expertise and 2) using these tools can connect them to people they would probably never otherwise know; those people may be exactly the ones to introduce careerists to a targeted contact.

LP: How can people use social media to illustrate their expertise?

MS: All of the networks I highlight in the book, especially LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and blogging, make it easy to let your network know what you do and how you solve problems. Sharing expertise can be as easy as sharing a link to a relevant article along with a smart comment on Facebook or Twitter. It’s as simple as answering a question via LinkedIn with insight and expert information. Don’t underestimate the potential these connections may offer.

LP: What’s the best social network for job seekers?

MS: The first place job seekers should spend time is on LinkedIn. It is the go-to hub of professional networking and continues to expand the ways it allows job seekers to connect and extend their networks, especially via the Answers section and by using Groups.

That said, my favorite network is Twitter, because it is so open, and allows users to find, follow and interact with people they otherwise would never know. Once users find a community of people in their field to follow and communicate with, Twitter can provide a constant stream of information, professional development opportunities (right on your desktop), information about specific jobs and the chance to connect directly with colleagues, mentors and prospective bosses.

LP: Most young professionals are primarily active on Facebook. Can that site be used in a professional way? If so, how?

I admit, I hesitated at first to suggest using Facebook for professional reasons. However, when you think of the sheer number of people using Facebook (so many more than any other network), and the fact that 27% of firms locate hires via personal referrals from employees, it makes sense to “be where they are” and consider how to harness Facebook’s power for job hunting.

I advise readers to do a careful audit of their Facebook profiles and to remove anything a potential employer may consider objectionable. This includes photos inappropriate for professional environments, “trash-talking” comments, excessive negative comments (no one wants to hire Debbie Downer) and memberships in groups such as “I hate Mondays” or “Working is for suckers.”

I advise setting privacy settings for “just friends” for everything except for “About Me” (write a professional bio), “Education and Work” and “Contact Info.” Opening these sections to “everyone” helps recruiters using Facebook find you and also allows various Facebook applications, such as BranchOut, Jibe.com and SimplyHired.com’s Facebook tool to connect you with potential opportunities.

LP: You say social media can connect people to others they’d otherwise never meet. How can that help a young job seeker?

MS: Any job seeker or business owner’s goal is to be found. Malcolm Gladwell’s book, The Tipping Point, outlines how important it is to broaden your network – to meet and connect with “weak ties,” people who previously had no direct relationship with you – in order to find contacts who can help. Touching base with people beyond your immediate network may be just the thing you need to connect with someone who can really help you propel your plans forward.

Another thing many not already involved in social media don’t realize: online connections have a tendency to be extremely generous and willing to help. The book is full of stories of people who received crucial help from strangers online.