Copywriting for job hunters

Copywriting for job hunters

January 12, 2009 by nancylamb | Edit

It is with a groan that I read some of the latest direct marketing pitches towards job seekers. I sent a resume out for a copywriting gig last week. Since then, I receive thrice daily email from some source called DayJobFinder.com. What a joke. The author, a Mark Jenson, has a GREAT subject line for his email. That is why I opened it. To my dismay, he enticed me with a good title and nice lead: “The 2 most important things to our users”. It’s a nice lead in to his promise to send out job resource information. He even says that what he intends to do is send out information daily. What throws me is the rest of the email. He has made a promise, but then he didn’t provide anything unique or urgent. What he did is list 4 government sources, links to government websites, that post jobs.
He says they are legitimate. They might be. But they are all government jobs, both federal and state.
So what is good about his email promotion? He reaches out to all in his contact list. That is a nice touch and many recruiters could do the same. He must be counting on the notion that providing these emails will be a win win situation. He may really be able to help others find jobs this way, but his service will bring back some customers or clients. Not bad. What he is doing is causing people to remember the name of his website for later searches. And he has an easy name to remember.
He is showing some creativity here, but the content is what bothers me. He is an agency staffing specialist. I want a recruiter to do more than sendi out links to job boards. Where is the value in that? He got my attention, but he lost it quickly. Why?
I sent a resume on Friday. In 3 days, I’ve already received emails 2 or 3 times a day, none of which say a thing I want to know about. I can opt out, fortunately. And I might. But I might save these in my “What Not To Do” file.
What this tells me is I best make sure that my newsletters or information bulletins contain unique, useful, urgent information that my readers can actually use. And I better make sure my timing is appropriate. I don’t want to do to my clients what I don’t want done to me.
There is no USEFUL in these emails. There is nothing here that I can really do anything with to help me find a job. If I was writing the email, I would offer tactical advice, specific strategy, or even motivational strategy. I would provide some links, but I would offer more than that. What good is a job board if I don’t know how to maneuver through it to get to the hiring manager?
In fact, the internet has totally changed how people look for jobs. For years, it’s always been — oh you are looking for a job: go to company C’s website and look through the job postings…
It’s not enough. People need education on how to create a marketing program for their job search. Maybe the first step is a job board, but what do you do after 300 people apply for the same job via a website link? There has to be more.
And this guy offers nothing beyond the first hello.

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