By Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter
We are all influenced by brands and I can prove it to you.
When you buy detergent to do your laundry, I bet you don’t read the list of chemicals from one brand, compare it with three others and say, “Hmm. The combination of these in this brand will probably be far superior to the combination in these other three.” You never say that, do you?
Instead, you assume they’ll all do the same job and buy one as opposed to another because it’s on sale, you have a coupon, or has no scent or maybe your wife, husband, or mother
specified what they wanted. You do anything other than figure out what will actually make your laundry cleaner.
When companies hire and when recruiters screen resumes, we’re also influenced by brands. We see names we know like a large company or a “hot” company or recognized leaders in our market area and we believe this person is better than someone at a company we’ve never heard of. Right or wrong, that’s human nature.
What can you do if you work for a small company or a “no-name company?” What can you do to create a better impression?
The answer is to define it for the recipient.
For example, a person who works for Jillie Jack Jay Consultants (I made that up), what do you write? You might write something like a 32 person regional strategy and operations consulting firm focused on the hospitality industry.
If you work for Benoit Fashion (again made up. Any similarity between this name and a real one is accidental), you might say that they are a $50 million dollar swimwear firm. Get the idea?
Leaving a company that few have heard of to stand on its own does little to create a positive impression. Defining it gives people a better opportunity to understand it, understand your experience and be interested.
© 2006, 2011, 2021 All rights reserved Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter
ABOUT JEFF ALTMAN, THE BIG GAME HUNTER
Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter is a coach who worked as a recruiter for what seems like one hundred years. His work involves career coaching, all as well as executive job search coaching, job coaching, and interview coaching. He is the host of “No BS Job Search Advice Radio,” the #1 podcast in iTunes for job search with more than 1900 episodes, and is a member of The Forbes Coaches Council.
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