Onward Search Career Cast #6

Hiring Trends in 2010 for Internet Marketing and Interactive Jobs

In this episode of CareerCast, we focus on how companies are approaching their hiring strategies during 2010 and what that means for professionals in our idustries. Internet and interactive marketers will find a changing market place as hiring companies begin to recover.

Ken and Josh from Onward Search discuss how the job market is turning around and what kind of opportunities SEO, IT and Creative types can expect to see during the rest of the year.(download mp3)

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This is Peter Clayton and I’d like to welcome back everyone to the Onward Search CareerCast. I’m joined today by Ken Clark, one of the cofounders of Onward Search, and Josh Gampel, vice president.

So guys, 2009 is over, thankfully, and since we just wrapped up the first quarter of 2010, I thought it would be an opportune time to check in with both Josh and Ken on what they’re seeing in the job market for internet marketing and interactive professionals. So let’s get started.

Ken, I think the first question on everyone’s mind is how the job market is today and how was the first quarter. Are we in recovery or not?

Ken: It’s safe to say that things are getting better, particularly in our market, Peter, as you know just from talking with us over last several months where we specialize is everything in the internet and web marketing world, and what has been very encouraging for us is really, even starting back in Q4 of last year, absolutely driving through into this first quarter job orders which is really how we can see demand in the economy within our business have been increasing dramatically. Particularly this quarter, I believe every month of Q1, January to February, February to March, our job orders have been increasing, and what we’re really seeing is a lot of demand in the marketplace.

Why is that happening? Well, in a recession, usually the first jobs to come back are temporary jobs. And there was actually a report that came out about two weeks ago that couldn’t have been more encouraging. What it showed was that in the last five months, the number of temporary jobs created in the economy basically was unparalleled over the last 20 years. And if I remember the stats exactly, in the last five months, the total number of temp jobs that were created equaled the number of temp jobs created in the last recession over, I think it was, a 24-month period. So what’s happening is, luckily, these jobs are being created, the economy is moving, companies are starting to hire again. Why temp jobs are the first to recover typically are because companies are still being cautious with their money, and so they hire people on a temp basis.

Long answer, but things are looking very good for us; internet, interactive, anything in that space is hot. That’s where folks are spending their money. We’re pretty encouraged right now.

Peter: How about geography; are there any geographies that are particularly hot right now?

Ken: I would actually say if you look at, just mentally kind of take calculus of the ten big metro regions in the United States, that’s where the jobs are. Not coincidentally, you know where our footprint is, we target our offices in the major metro regions of the country. That’s where you’re seeing a lot of job growth – New York, Boston, LA, Dallas, locations like that.

Peter: You just opened an office in Los Angeles, right?

Ken: We did. Actually, we’re two weeks in, and we’ve got a terrific team there. We are super excited to have our first West Coast office. So yeah, things are going great so far.

Peter: Let’s talk for a moment about the trends that you’re seeing in the marketplace. I know we talked about this a couple of podcasts ago but it seems like everyone is going crazy now that the iPad is out and of course, just recently there was another Apple event where they talked about the new iPhone software 4.0 which is going to be doing multitasking, and also about the new iAd format which, I would guess, would create some real opportunities for some of your folks.

Ken: Yeah, absolutely. The whole iPad mania, frankly, over the last week or so I think is very good for the job market. I was one of the faithful, I bought my iPad on Saturday and it is just so cool to use. The interface is amazing. And when you use it, the applications style and application design of an iPad app is very unique compared to what you see in an iPhone. So it really is going to drive a lot of job growth.

The iAd feature of the 4.0 software is pretty interesting. There’s a whole development, STK, I believe around that. And again, I think what we’re going to see are companies insisting that they have iPhone/iPad platforms to access their aps, their sources, everything like that. So that is another space we operate in and demand, I’d say already we’re getting phone calls about do we have iPad developers. So it’s actually pretty cool.

Peter: Josh, let’s talk a little bit about SEO — search engine optimization. Is this still a hot place to be if I’m an Internet marketer?
Josh: Yeah, Peter. Absolutely. It’s still a hot place to be for many reasons. Actually SEMPO – Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization – just released a study this past week that companies are overwhelmingly moving spend from print to online. A huge portion of that is in SEO. On top of that, of the SEMPO companies that were reported that are already spending money on the internet, almost 50% of them said they were going to increase spend. So just that alone as far as increasing spend into personnel to build your in house SEO team or with agencies, or on your page search, increasing the spend in internet marketing is going to be huge just in the dynamics for SEO.
Another statistic to look at is just the demand for SEO. A company called Conductor recently released a study stating that only about 25% of the Fortune 500’s targeted paid keywords – meaning all of those keywords that they’re spending money on, about $3.4 million a day actually – only 25% of those ranked in the top 50 natural search results. That’s staggering, if you really think about the demand that’s needed in the Fortune 500 for an SEO professional and the amount of money that’s going to be spent across the board out of all these companies that are surveyed, that means the demand is very high, and we’re seeing that reflected in the amount of jobs that we’re getting as a company and the amount of candidates we’re continuing to place.

Peter: And Josh, if you were to give me the top three professions that you are seeing the greatest demand for right now, what would they be?

Josh: SEO is one of them but another thing that I want to mention, social media. Social media is very hot right now. And it’s not just about SEO; it’s about maximizing your marketing strategy around all forms of online. Social media, it’s predictably it’s the new hot skill. It’s really what SEO was three years ago. Three years ago if you could spell SEO, you were making a ton of money and you were getting a raise and you w ere getting offers all over the place.

There’s actually a great website, just an interesting stat that came out – I love statistics – but naturalsearchblog.com, about three years ago, they announced some of the top in house SEOs. They just did a new posting – I think it was today – came out today, April 9th is when we’re recording this – 46 of the people that were on the top in house SEO sheet moved, 22 stayed. There were 68 listed, 46 of them moved and they moved… if you look at the position titles, they were all an increase in title.

So, that’s pretty interesting to show that online marketers have gotten an increase from three years ago where SEO was really the hottest item; they have all advanced in their career and social media is really where that is right now. Social media SEO, those are really the acquisition pieces.

The other high demand area is once the customer or the user gets to the site, it’s about the experience. So we’re doing a lot of work with information architecture and user experience. It’s all about converting the customer once they get to the site. And that’s very high in demand as well, as well as Flash. That goes with the user experience, but if you’re a Flash developer, call us because we have jobs for you in every major metro.

Peter: There’s something you brought up that I think is really interesting. There’s a new job title, which is social media manager. Nobody had one of those a year ago, and now you go to these corporations and they’ve “got to somebody on this Twitter thing,” you know. So, I think you’re absolutely right; there’s all of these interesting dynamics.

Ken, let’s talk a little bit more about the economy and what tips you would give a job seeker today, given what you’re seeing?

Ken: Probably the number one thing that you have to think about if you’re looking for a job right now is that over the last 18 months, companies got a heck of a lot smarter. And what I mean by that is they got used to being in an environment where there was a lot more supply out there in terms of folks looking for jobs, and they got smarter on how specific and how high their standards are around hiring, and they are a lot more demanding.

So, when you’re looking for a job right now, probably the number one pointer that I’d recommend is you have to be able to really effectively demonstrate how you bring an impact and you bring an ROI to an organization.

If you’re going into an interview just trying to win it on your charming personality and smile with not a lot of meat behind it, it’s going to be tough because over the last 18 months, there was such a high inventory of people in the marketplace, companies got really good at narrowing down to only the best of the best. That’s number one of what I would say.

The second thing is, despite the optimism that, I think Josh and I have expressed in this podcast, you still have to realize that the economy is recovering, it’s not recovered. And what that means is you need to be flexible, you need to be aggressive in your job search. The days of throwing in a resume or an email and waiting for phone callback are certainly not going to be here for awhile. So, you still have to attack it and have a strategy around it.

Peter: I think that’s really important and to your point of showing an ROI because a lot of the people you deal with are creative professionals and they get really cranked up about this cool new thing they’re able to do in Flash, but what they really have to do is demonstrate that as an ROI.

Ken: Absolutely, and on the creative side in particular, and luckily, most Flash developers do a great job of this, but you have to have a really winning portfolio to get the job that you want.

Peter: Josh?

Josh: Yeah, Ken hit it on the head with the winning portfolio. Differentiate yourself somehow. If you’re a jobseeker right now and you’re looking for your next new role, differentiate yourself in the channels that the hiring manager lives in. Do something on your blog that’s creative. But then you’ve got to get your blog in front of him. How are you going to do that? Don’t just send it to him in an email; send it to him, phone call, send a handwritten note, go knock on the door if you have to. You definitely have to differentiate yourself, but don’t just do it the old school way by phone call and a handwritten note. Do something online in one of these new media formats that is going to grab somebody’s attention.

Create an iPhone application if you have some time. If you’re a developer, create an iPhone application about finding a job and send it to everybody. It might not necessarily get published but you can maybe have a demo version out there. Do something different.

The final part is network, network, and network. Don’t be afraid to network. There are events. If you go to meetup.com or if you go to LinkedIn, there’s networking meet-up groups for every single discipline out there right now. So go to those groups, network online and in person. That would be one of my biggest suggestions.

Peter: Okay, so let’s talk about some hot jobs that you have right now, Josh. You mentioned that you’re really looking for Flash developers. Can you give us some real specifics on some really hot jobs that you are looking to place right now?

Josh: Yeah, I mean, Flash developers everywhere. Every single market of ours is looking for Flash designers and developers. Some specifics – we have VP group account director, social and mobile for a major agency in New York City. That’s a hot opening that we’re working on. Also in the city, we’re working for a web developer, web master for a large financial services organization. We’re looking for information architects in Boston across agencies and on the financial services side.

Interactive designers are also needed everywhere on the agency and corporate side. I would say the financial services world; if you have financial services experience on the creative side, give us a call because that’s an area that they’re all making money again. The gloom and doom for them is way over and they’re back to making the big bucks, and they’re spending it too. So, give us a call because they are all redesigning their websites and they’re doing great iPhone applications and it’s all around the user experience.

And then search marketers, like we kicked off this conversation, every single company needs a search engine marketer of some form – SEO, PPC or also social media.

If you go to our website jobs.onwardsearch.com, you could see a list of all the active openings that we have right now, or follow us on Twitter, you get all of our most recent updates.

Peter: Josh and Ken, thanks so much for taking time to speak with us again. Great information and great advice.

Ken: Thanks Peter, we enjoyed it.

Thank you for tuning in to Onward Search Career Cast. For more information on the career opportunities available through Onward Search, you should visit us online at onwardsearch.com or call 1-800-829-0072 and speak with an experienced recruiter. And you should also follow Onward Search on Twitter at twitter.com/onwardsearch.

Onward Search Career Cast #5

Executive Jobs and Hiring Trends in Internet Marketing

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The latest edition of the Onward Search Career Cast covers topics relevant to job seekers and companies seeking to hire senior level directors and executives to manage Internet marketing operations for a business.(download mp3)

Tom Hull, the vice president of Executive Search at Onward Search and Josh Gampel, vice president of Onward Search discuss the types of permanent positions that are available and how the process works compared short-term engagement contracts.

Host Peter Clayton guides us through what both job seekers and companies can expect when working with an executive placement firm.

TRANSCRIPT

We’re back in Wilton, Connecticut today with Josh Gampel who is the vice president and Tom Hull, The VP of executive search for Onward Search, and we’re going to talk a little bit about the current job market for interactive marketing at the executive level and to understand what a candidate needs to do to find the right next step in their career.

Tom and Josh, obviously we’ve had a big economic change, thank God, over the past 18 months, and if I’m a VP or a C-level interactive marketing candidate in the job market right now, what does the job market look like, Josh?

Josh: Thanks Peter. To say it short and sweet, the job market right now is great. I know it’s a sigh of relief for everyone to hear that. Our open job count is at the highest it’s ever been. Statistically speaking, for positions such as search engine optimization, from year over year, there has been about 100% job growth for job boards and ads that are online. Social media, there’s been about a 300% job growth. iPhone, I mean, it’s absolutely through the roof for the amount of open jobs that we’re seeing across the board, across the company, across the country, for many different type of acquisition marketing roles.

Basically, companies are reinvesting into their acquisition marketing strategy. There’s been a lot of cutbacks over the past several years, and really about six months ago, we started to see a drastic shift in okay the recession is over and we need to start hiring again, and marketing is one of the first areas that people are starting to invest in, specifically interactive and online marketing. We are really excited for where the market is going and have a lot of openings. We’re looking for talent everyday right now.

Peter: That’s really great news and, of course, most of our shows here on Onward Search Career Cast have focused on the temp market or the project-based, go in, do an assignment three months, whatever, and get out, but today, we’re really focusing on those permanent jobs and that’s really what Tom Hull, who is the VP of Executive Search focuses on.

Tom, talk to us a little bit about the executive search team, and how you work and interact with the contingency based team.

Tom: Hi Peter, thank you very much. It’s nice to be here. For our group, we focus exclusively on the permanent placement hires, those senior level executives that will really impact the business and lead the growth for years to come. The typical clients that we work with are companies that are usually frustrated by not having a committed partner, who don’t understand the business issues or have limited access to the right candidates, and that’s really where we come in.

What we’ve seen over the past year and a half or so is an improving job market. We’re starting to see a shift from what we say is a client-driven market where there is not as many jobs open that would see a lot of candidates for each position, where now where they’re looking to hire, there is not as many qualified people to get access to.

Choosing the right search partner is critical for business success, that’s really where we see our executive search team coming in to find the right talent.

Peter: We’ve talked in past episodes here about going from temp to perm. Do you ever get involved with the temp side, the project side of Onward Search when you start doing a candidate search for full-time employees?

Tom: What we do is we work with our clients to really determine what works best for them. In some circumstances, the temp model works great for them. In others, especially at the more senior level, bringing in executive strictly from a permanent basis makes the more sense for them. So, we really work with the client to understand what their needs are and we can work our business model around that.

Peter: If I’m a candidate or a client, why would I choose to work with a recruiter?

Tom: The short answer to that that covers both the client and the candidate is access. From the client’s perspective, the way that businesses grow is through talent and through money, and we offer the talent piece of that. We specialize in our marketplace for internet marketing creative, that’s the space to work in a daily basis, we know where the talent sits, and we know how to get access to them. We find those candidates that are passive, those that are not looking for their next opportunity. We constantly keep them aware of the opportunities in the marketplace, and then they can decide if it makes sense for them to make a change. Those are the ones that truly impact the business.

From a candidate perspective, same thing, access is supremely important. We have jobs that they’re not going to hear of to any other resource. For exclusive reasons or replacement of an incumbent, where it needs to be a confidential search, we’ll have access to those jobs. Looking for a job is almost like a full time job, so when you work with a trusted partner in an executive search firm, what we’re going to do is proactively keep you aware of opportunities that will match your skill set, your personality, and offer you that next step in your career that you wouldn’t hear about otherwise.

Peter: Josh, if I’m an active candidate looking for a new position, and I approach Onward Search, is there any cost to me in getting involved with you guys?

Josh: Great question, Peter. On the candidate side, there’s no cost at all. Basically, the clients pay for our services. On the executive permanent placement side, there’s a couple of different pricing models that we have but at the end of the day, we price it off of a percentage of the candidate’s salary.

If you’re a candidate looking for a job, you reach out to us, we get to really understand what you’re looking for, where you’re based out of, a lot of times we deal with relocation, are you willing to relocate for the right opportunity. We really looked to understand what you’re looking for as that next step in your career, what skill sets you have, and then we match that up with our client’s needs. If we put you into a position with our client, they pay the fee.

There’s never any charge to work with us, the benefit is to get access to the jobs that we’re working on it this time and many are not on the job boards. Our clients partner with us because of our relationships to really find them the best talent for the specific need that they have.

Peter: To expand on that a little bit, what are some of the segments and categories that employers are looking for right now, Tom?

Tom: Well, what we’ve seen specifically for within our niche in internet marketing creative, emerging technology, and mobile is enormous. You put the social media category in their a couple of years ago, everyone wanted to use social as part of what their strategy was going to be and unfortunately, it was basically put on hold. They said we’re going to focus on our course strategy, we know we want to do social but we can’t measure it, we don’t know how it’s going to impact the business, so we’re going to put it on hold. However now it is a core piece of everyone’s business. There’s a dearth of talent in this area, and finding somebody that can impact the business through social or mobile is in high demand.

Peter: Josh, can you give us three tips for a job seeker in 2010? What are some of the things that if I’m out there and I’m actively looking for a job, what are the main things that I need to concentrate on?

Josh: Another great question, Peter. It goes along with what Tom said about what the clients are looking for right now. As Tom mentioned, they’re looking for a lot of experience in the social and the mobile piece. Clients are looking for what have you done to attract customers and increase sales. They want to know what type of online marketing techniques have you used, and if you have used cutting edge or emerging technologies to help gain customers and increase revenue. That’s the hottest thing.

If you’re really doing the just print direct marketing world, a lot of companies are phasing out that spend and really going into the online marketing space.

From a three-tips perspective, your resume needs to reflect your online internet marketing experience as well as creative, also statistics are huge. You need to show revenue growth, you need to show quarter over quarter growth, new leads, return on investment, you need to speak the language that the internet marketers are speaking. Also throughout your career, make sure that your resume shows proven career growth every change and every step that you’ve made from an increased responsibility standpoint.

The next tip I would say is Twitter. A lot of people have made a lot of jokes about Twitter. If you haven’t already, jump on the bandwagon, jump on the bandwagon, start following people, and then start tweeting yourself. The most important part about that is myself as a recruiter, and Tom as a recruiter, and other employers out there are looking at it now. They’re looking at it, they’re seeing what type of things you’re saying, and if you start providing valuable content to your followers in regards to marketing, they know that you get it, and that you live and breathe in that space.

The final tip I would say is update your LinkedIn profile. LinkedIn has become a massive resource for recruiters, hiring managers, really anybody in this space is on LinkedIn. Recently LinkedIn has added the functionality where it updates, your Twitter account at the same time, so Twitter and LinkedIn really coincide with each other, talked to your LinkedIn community, join groups, be active in the groups, provide content for them, and myself as a recruiter if I see you’re on LinkedIn and you’re commenting on different group boards, and you’re answering questions, I know that you understand what you’re talking about when I look at your resume, I’ll see your proven revenue growth year over year, I’m going to want to talk to you, learn more about what you’re looking for, and really dig in deeper into that.

With a dearth of candidates out in the marketplace, you need to stand apart from the rest and LinkedIn, Twitter, and statistics on your resume are the top three things that I would suggest just to be noticed.

Peter: I think that’s some great advice, so sort of the old, either how you’re going to save me money or how you’re going to make me money, right?

Josh: Yeah, exactly.

Peter: Tom, tell me about some of the hot jobs that you’re working on right now?

Tom: You’re going to see some general themes coming along with the jobs. When we focused within our niche market and we’re saying where we’re seeing some of the newest opportunities coming in, we’re working in mobile, we’re working in social, we’re working in search, we are working with e-commerce companies for their internet marketing needs, and we’re also working in web analytics.

Currently, we’re working with a major digital agency in Manhattan. They’re looking for a mobile marketing strategist. This is somebody who’s going to sit on the executive team and they’re going to develop the mobile strategy for major blue chip clients.

On the internet retail side, we’re dealing with the multi-channel organization that is looking specifically for a creative director who is responsible for the artistic direction and design oversight for the e-commerce activities. In conjunction, we’re working with them to find them their next VP of digital marketing, who is in charge of growing the business through social, through their affiliate network, through search, and through mobile.

That’s a real quick checklist of some of the things that we’re working on but it’s national. We’re working with blue chip companies that everyone has heard of, small entrepreneurial firms, major agencies as well.

Peter: That’s great, and these are all six-figure plus jobs, right?

Tom: Yes. They’re all permanent placement at the executive level.

Peter: This has been really interesting and I really appreciate your time today. Any last minute thoughts, Josh?

Josh: Get your resume out there if you are interested in any of the jobs that we have on our website. We also have @Onward Search, @SEO jobs and @PPC jobs – Twitter accounts, check those out. If you’re interested in anything, email us, reach out to Tom or myself, or one of our recruiters.

What we’re going to do is we’re going to have a conversation with you, understand what you’re looking for, check on what we have right now that may be a fit. We may not have anything right now, but our main goal would be really to establish a relationship for the future so when that right opportunity comes that meets our client’s needs and your needs, we’ll be able to make a match.

Peter: That’s great.

Thank you for tuning in for Onward Search Career Cast. For more information on the career opportunities available through Onward Search, you should visit us online at onwardsearch.com or call 1-800-829-0072 and speak with an experienced recruiter. You should also follow Onward Search on Twitter @Twitter.com/onwardsearch.

Onward Search Career Cast #4

OS CareerCast #4: A Job Seeker’s Guide to Internet Marketing Conferences

Peter Clayton: Welcome to an exciting new episode of the Onward Search Career Cast.  I’m here with Josh Gampel, Vice President of Onward Search and Tim Dineen who is Vice President of Internet Marketing for Onward Search. as we head into the week here, it marks the start of the interactive marketing tradeshow season and we thought it would be a great time to sit down and discuss a few of the different ways to maximize your experience at conferences across the country. Josh, why don’t you kind of just give us a little overview of some of the events that are coming up in the spring? DOWNLOAD MP3

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Josh: Thanks Peter and thanks for having us.  One of the most recent events is SMX, it stands for Search Marketing Expo.  That’s going to be out in California.  Ad:tech is coming up pretty soon.  PubCon, which is typically in Las Vegas every year is actually going to be doing PubCon Dallas in April, and there’s also SES or Search Engine Strategies which comes to New York City.  A lot of shows, those are some of the major ones.  There are some smaller venues that are a little bit more on the advanced topics but those are some of the main ones that we’re going to be at at least over the next few months.

Peter: I know a lot of these shows like SES, have multiple shows throughout the year in major markets.  So, it’s not just the show in New York but it shows across the country, is that right?

Josh: Yeah.  SMX is going to be out in California, Ad:tech is out in San Francisco, PubCon is in Dallas.  It has been in Austin.  It’s always in Las Vegas every year and then SES, they’re all over the place.  They’re in Chicago, they’re in New York, they’re out in the West Coast, they’re overseas.  If you’re in the search engine marketing industry, there’s s conference coming to you real soon.

Peter: And I know you’re going to be speaking at SMX out on the West Coast.  Does Onward Search have a booth as well?

Josh: Yes, we have a booth.  I’m going to be actually speaking a few times.  There’s going to be theater presentation on Tuesday about how to find “SEO Rock Stars” and I’m also going to be speaking on Thursday, really talking about how to build an in-house PPC team. We’re excited to be presenting and sharing some ideas that we have in the industry and we’ll also have a booth, so if you’re there, come on up, ask us any questions and we’d love to get to know you.

Peter:  Josh, this is a really great opportunity because of the number of shows that you have participated in over the last couple of years.  From a job seeker’s perspective, is this a good investment of time and money to attend these shows?

Josh: Absolutely.  Coincidently, as we sit here and I’m here with Tim, that’s how I met him.  I have been attending shows for years as Tim has and he and I met each other several years ago at a networking function at PubCon Las Vegas probably three, four years ago, didn’t really get to know each other then but we had met, shook hands, and last year, we met again at PubCon again in Austin.  I was speaking on a panel and Tim came up to me and asked me a few questions afterwards and we got to know each other and we are able to build up a good rapport and I didn’t ever think of the ability to hire Tim for Onward Search at that point.  It wasn’t until he called me several months later that he was going to be out into the active job market and we happened to have an opportunity at that time.

Just by building up that relationship with Tim, we were able to hire him… A great success for Onward Search on our corporate side.

Peter: That’s a really great story.  Tim, can you share with us from your perspective — how did this all happen and how did you connect with Josh to get this job offer?

Tim: Sure.  I’ve attended a number of conferences over the years, probably about two a year, maybe three.  I met Josh, I’d seen the Onward Search booth, and I’ve used conferences as a learning experience – in that go out and attend as many sessions as I could and meet as many people as I could. I never really looked at it from a job seeking perspective but I did meet a whole lot of people, different people at every show, and when the time came to look for a job myself, I had a network that I could rely on and one of those happened to be Josh, so I gave him a call first.

Peter: Let’s talk about the kinds of things you should prepare to do before going to one of these conferences to really maximize your time and what you’re able to accomplish at a show.

Josh, can you give us some tips on things that specifically a job seeker should consider and plan ahead of time?

Josh: The best thing I would recommend if you are an active job seeker, you’re going to one of these conferences, you need to have a plan.  The plan has to be around understanding what your goals are and executing them, like all plans are.  Understand who you want to meet based on the speaker roster.  Every website has a list of speakers, you can see the companies that they work for.  If you’re  willing to relocate, you can talk to a lot of people.  If you’re not willing to relocate, understand which speakers work at companies that are located near you so you can really target those people.

Bring your resume with you; that’s important.  Have it ready to go or at least be ready to send it to somebody very quickly from your iPhone or whatever mobile device you’re using so they get that right in front of them.  Have your 30-second commercial of yourself down pat.

What do I mean by that?  It’s your elevator pitch.  Be prepared in 30 seconds or less to tell somebody what you do, what you’re looking for, what your strengths are, and keep in mind to include a little bit of that wow factor.  You want a hiring manager – a potential hiring manager – to think about your background, maybe not have an opportunity for you at that moment, but be very excited that he/she met you and that you know what, I might just have something for them and I almost want to create role because this person’s really good and they’re available now.

The other thing I would do is leverage social media tools.  Twitter for example, every show is using Twitter.  If you’re not at a show or if you want to follow all of the events, let’s use PubCon as an example as we’ve talked about that one, follow HashTag #PubCon and you’re going to see everything going on in every conference for the networking events, you’re going to really be able to know where you need to be to maximize your exposure.

Another idea is to find a sponsor.  What I mean by that is get to know somebody that’s connected and very well networked and if they trust you, if they can vouch for your and know your skills, they’re going to introduce you to a lot of people that you normally might not have had the chance to.  At networking events, if you can have a sponsor, you know, really walk you around, introduce you to some key people, that’s all you need.

Actually just last year, I remember I was at one of the conferences, there was somebody that actually came up to our booth with their resume in hand and was doing a great job, actually probably followed all of those tips that I mentioned and I went to call her up about a week after the show because we have a few opportunities that I wanted to introduce her to and she had three job offers.  Three job offers, one week after spending her own money to go to a tradeshow and that was really impressive.  The ROI in the show has paid off because she got a great job.  It was a great success story for the networking piece.

Peter: I think that’s some great advice and you know, people joke a lot about Twitter but I’ll tell you that, talk about a stealth application,  especially at a conference and as you mentioned, using a Hashtag and putting in #PubCon or #SESNYC, you’re going to see real time, and be able to follow all of these people and all of these activities that are going on at these events and really do a better job of planning what you’re going to be doing there.

Tim, talk to us about how you recommend someone go about figuring out which of the conference events to attend.  As you know, a lot of these shows are really big, they have multiple tracks, so how do you decide which speaker you go see and….

Tim: Do them all!  It’s so hard to pick because these shows are so big now.  There are five different tracks, SEM, SEO, pay-per-click, social media, affiliate marketing, there’s so many different tracks now that they – it’s incredibly hard to pick but obviously you have to.

The way that I look at it is I try to go by the speakers.  There could be a topic that I really feel I need to learn, obviously, I’d choose that one first.  Secondly, I’d look at the speaker list.  If there are speakers from a search engine for example, you get the opportunity to hear information right from the source that are usually very useful and then  if there’s somebody who’s speaking who’s in your industry, in your particular niche, that’s always a good idea to attend that.  And then having gone for a few years, you get to learn who the good speakers are and who gives away information.

Peter: We’re talking about a number of really high profile, very valuable conferences here.  So how do you go about picking and choosing which events to attend?

Tim: It’s really a good idea to just mix them up.  Personally, I don’t go to the same show every year, year after year but I like to pick a couple of different shows one year and then go to different two or three shows the following year.  After a few years of doing that, you get to learn that sometimes you’ll learn a certain subset of information at a PubCon that you wouldn’t learn at an SES New York.

One way to look at it is from your own skill set.  SES may be a good show, a good starter show if you’ve never been to a show before.  New York is also pretty commonly targeted to advertising whereas SMX, SMX Advanced, some of the West Coast shows including PubCon would be more SEO focused and more technical.

Josh: If I can add on that Peter, budget obviously if you’re a job seeker and you’re very cost-conscious, budget is going to be important for you, so you want to look at the hotel prices in the area.  Also, from a job seeker’s perspective, networking events.  Every conference has a list of networking events.  Sometimes you can find a blog, talking about the different events.  If you really want to maximize your exposure to different people, make sure you go to one that has a lot of organized, open networking events.  You also want to look at local shows coming to you and if you’re not going really to be able to afford the pass to go to the whole show, at least get the Expo Hall pass or buy the $50 networking pass that allows you to go to the cocktail hour with the cheese and crackers and the really long lines but at least you get to talk to people.  So, look at the networking events, look at the ability to get in front of the most amount of people and really maximize your time.

Peter: That’s great.  Josh, let’s talk about some of the hot jobs that Onward Search is working on right now.

Josh: We’re busy.  Across the board on our temp staffing and our executive search space, we have more and more jobs coming in every day.  A simple quick solution, go to Onward Search, go to our jobs page, you can see the most up-to-date jobs for some of our hot jobs that we have.

Right now for instance, we’re working with a major digital marketing agency.  Actually the job is going to be headquartered in Chicago.  It’s going to be a VP of Search Engine Marketing that’s going to really spearhead a major financial services account.  We have iPhone developer jobs all over the place.  We have some that are for agencies that are you know, going to really do fun, cool iPhone apps.  We also have another financial service iPhone application that we’re looking to develop that requires somebody to have significant, enterprise-wide iPhone application development experience.

We’re looking for SEO copywriters, Flash developers, interactive designers.  We have several e-commerce companies right now that are going to be redesigning their website.

The latest thing in 2010 is internet retailers are going to redesign their website and the biggest thing is to increase conversions.  So, if you’re a web designer out there that has had experience redesigning a website for landing page optimization, increasing conversions, anything that’s going to help an ROI, CEOs want to know who you are and they want to hire you so give us a call and we’ll help you out.

Peter: That’s great news.  On our last show, we talked a lot about the new iPad; are you getting some calls and some inquiries about that at this point?

Josh: We’re getting a lot of inquiries.  Not everybody knows what it’s going to turn into.  iPhone developers have been all the rage and you have to get your hands on one because you need to develop an iPhone app, just because you do.

iPad is the next big thing.  It’s just a matter of time before we’re going to do a lot more on Android application development because they are really growing.  We really try to stay focused in everything that’s cutting edge and emerging technology.  So, take a look at our website, follow us on Twitter at Onward Search, follow some of our list, you really get to see some of the things that we recommend and there’s a lot of industry news out there that we try to share with everyone to keep you up to date on what’s going on in the growth of the job market across everything internet marketing and creative.

Peter: Josh and Tim, thanks so much for taking time to speak with us again on Onward Search Career Cast and we really recommend and encourage all of the listeners to check out some of these tradeshows we’ve been talking about today; I’m sure you’ll find some really valuable information to help you in your job search.

Thank you for tuning in to Onward Search Career Cast.  For more information on the career opportunities available through Onward Search, you should visit us online at OnwardSearch.com or call 1-800-829-0072, and speak with an experienced recruiter.  And you should follow Onward Search on Twitter at Twitter.com/onwardsearch.