The 5 Best Free Apps to Help Your Job Hunt Now
Get the career edge on yourself.
photo credit: Sarah Natasha Photography
JOB HUNT.
There are few words that cause such considerable strain, anxiety, and YES! Heartache. Searching for the right job is as time consuming as searching for Mr. or Mrs. Right. But just as the dating world has gone the way of the app, so has the job search. And these 5 apps will help you land the career of your dreams instead of your career of right now.
We have faith in the system.
Good & Co.
Cost: Free
Let’s start at the beginning. Maybe you have NO IDEA what you want to do. The good news is, you can’t be stuck in a career rut, until you find yourself a career. Good & Co. wants to help you get there (to the career, not the rut.)
"Good news: you can’t be stuck in a career rut, until you find yourself a career."
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This app is designed to help you find a cultural company fit. What does that mean? It’s a personality quiz that asks you a series of questions based on measuring eight personality factors, including the academic, clinical, and organizational psychology gold standard ‘Big Five’ – the five basic building blocks of personality, supported by a wealth of empirical research reaching back many decades.
It’s like career day at school, but the counselor has been replaced by an app.
According to the Wall Street Journal, it’s a “personality test that raises the bar” and hopefully your salary when you find your niche and hit your career stride.
Resume Star
Cost: Free
Writing a resume doesn’t have to be difficult, but it is a crucial component of the job-seeking process.
Resume Star is credited as one of the easiest (and free!) resume builders on the app market. It is a precision targeted and professionally typeset resume-- which, two LA-recruiters will tell you is key to scoring the interview. (Find their tips on NAILING that interview here.)
You type in your information and Resume Star produces a clean, correctly formatted PDF that you can email, post, or print. It’s the first step in standing out.
Jobr.
Cost: Free
Swipe right on your career? That’s the idea with Jobr.
Jobr lets you advance your career by easily browsing for jobs and connecting with employers without the hassle of a formal job search. Engage with recruiters at top companies and only spend time on those interested in hiring you! Jobr shows you positions it thinks you’d be interesting and allows you to anonymously “Like” or “Pass.” If a hiring manager is interesting in you, Jobr makes the introduction and allows you to chat within the app. It works the same way for recruiters.
It’s a simple and informal way to get to weed out jobs that don’t make sense and chat through the ones that do.
BumbleBizz
Cost: Free, but Bumble does have plans to monetize their apps in the future
This one is from the genius of Whitney Wolfe. The Founder of Bumble wants to help you network, professionally. With Bizz, every swipe you make is an opportunity to expand your professional landscape and make empowered career moves.
BumbleBizz, like Bumble, will require the female users to initiate conversation. The app will exist within the Bumble framework and users will be able to move back and forth between dating on Bumble, career contacts on Bizz, or making friends on BumbleBFF. (Who needs to go outside!?)
This is one beehive that wants you connecting and making plans for your future-- in more ways than one.
Glassdoor
Cost: Free
Do you know what your earning potential is? Glassdoor job search not only gives you the latest job listing, it also provides applicants with an inside look at company reviews, salaries, benefits, and office photos by those who know the company from the inside out-- the employees.
It’s a comprehensive career community that gives you the edge on yourself.
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Your Digital Diet: What Platforms Can You Nix Now?
We're leaving behind a digital graveyard, but what can we bury once and for all?
Call this your digital diet - in today’s digital age, you need to be on social media to stay relevant, but what matters the most is who you stay relevant to. Everyone’s brand is targeted to a certain demographic, so where exactly is your audience?
A lot of brands and companies make the mistake of making sure that they’re on EVERY PLATFORM KNOWN TO MAN (who even keeps up with Ello still anyways?), but the rule of thumb is to never stretch yourself too thin, especially with platforms that aren’t doing anything to grow your brand.
You don't need to create content for platforms that no one is paying attention to. (Which, is why we aren't including Instagram. You need an Instagram.) To figure out where you should focus your efforts and where you can cut back, below is a guide that will help you narrow it down.
"You don't need to create content for platforms that no one is paying attention to."
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DEMO: 20.5% of users are aged 25-34, followed by 16.7% of users who are 18-24
USAGE: 72% of all internet users (77% women, 66% men)
BEST FOR: Video content and news updates
WHO SHOULD BE ON IT: Everyone, especially now that Facebook Live serves as an alternative to reach a wider and established audience, compared to Twitter. The platform, that launched in 2004, is also refocusing on video content as an alternative to YouTube.
Despite the fact that your grandparents are on Facebook, it may surprise you that the main user-base is still under 30.
Oh, and Facebook owns Instagram. Instagram’s per-follower engagement rate for brands is 58 times higher than on Facebook and 120 times higher than on Twitter. Instagram users are two and a half times more likely to click on ads than on other social media platforms.
DELETE IF: You want to move off the grid and say goodbye to the modern world.
DEMO: 37% of users are aged 18 to 29, followed by 25% of users who are 30-49
USAGE: 23% of all internet users (25% men, 21% women)
BEST FOR: News outlets and blogs nabbing readers' attention with a 140-character hook (AKA, getting people to READ)
Twitter has what founder Jack Dorsey called, "of-the-moment brevity." And it's powerful.
Great for live chats to engage with audience and start a real time online conversation with the use of one hashtag.
Perfect for immediate customer service and engaging with followers.
It is also important to note that the gender gap on Twitter is much less pronounced than other social media sites, showing an almost equal number of male and female users.
DELETE IF: There's no reason to "delete" Twitter, but if you haven't yet amassed a following and you're not a news site or a brand looking to convert clicks to sales, you could be saving your energy and using it for something else.
DEMO: 23% of users are aged 18 to 29, followed by 31% of users who are 30 to 49
LinkedIn is the only major social media platform for which usage rates are higher among 30-to 49-year-olds than among 18- to 29-year-olds.
USAGE: 25% of all internet users (25% women, 26% men)
BEST FOR: Business pages who are sharing updates about their company.
Brands that want to built thought-leaders out of their CEOs and top executives.
Businesses that are looking to hire.
Good for businesses that want to be an influencer in their space and be ahead of the curve in news and research.
Businesses looking to publish stories.
DELETE IF: There's no reason to delete your LinkedIn, especially if you are a brand that is looking to built out their reputation as an authority.
If you end up moving jobs or need a reference, it's a great way to connect. (See new site WorkGrades as well for fast and efficient references.) However, if you aren't a "brand," LinkedIn isn't a platform that you need to be active on.
SNAPCHAT
DEMO: 45% of users are aged 13-24 and over 60% are 13-34
Millennials account for 70% of all Snapchat users
USAGE: 18% of all internet users (70% female, 30% male)
BEST FOR: Ideal for behind-the-scenes and exclusive content, Snapchat is "intimacy at scale," and if you want to reach the Millennial audience, this is how you do it.
DELETE IF: Your demographic is 34 and up, especially now that Instagram has launched Stories. The stats are yet to be seen for who engages on IG Stories, but considering the platform's 300 million daily active users, there's a high probability Stories is going to be a major player. Snapchat won't become obsolete, but pick the platform where you have more followers and focus on building that.
TUMBLR
DEMO: 27.7% of users are aged 25-34, followed by 23.5% of users who are aged18-34
BEST FOR: Fashion brands with a demo of teens or millennials
Can be used as a blog outlet for brands, but if you're serious about building your content or blog, there are better solutions, like SquareSpace.
DELETE IF: Your demo is not teens or if you're an established brand. There is no reason to have a Tumblr at this point. People aren't using Tumblr to find new and interesting information or brands. Save the space hit delete.
DEMO: 34% of users are aged 18 to 29, followed by 28% of users who are aged 30 to 49
USAGE: 28% of all internet users (42% women, 13% men)
BEST FOR: Brands with DIY audiences looking to find inspiration for home and lifestyle
Brands looking to drive traffic to their consumer sites-- conversion rates from Pinterest are reported very high among bloggers.
Brands can use this platform to share their blog content in a visual way with “click bait”-like headlines
DELETE IF: If you're a tech brand, there's really no need for you to have Pinterest. Lifestyle, Fashion, Beauty, Food, Design-- this is for you. No one is going to Pinterest to find the newest Silicon Valley updates.
VINE
DEMO: 71% of users are millennials, and 28% of users are 18-24
BEST FOR: Actors, comedians, and social media influencers who are looking to grow their audience
Brands have to make sure that their content is able to compete with Vine influencers who post funny content, or partner with influencers to drive views to their own profile
DELETE IF: Vine is a (somewhat) dying platform, as a lot of Vine influencers are moving to Facebook and YouTube to post longer content and get a higher amount of views on their videos and reach a bigger audience.
Sites that you can say goodbye to for good: Ello, Periscope, MySpace, Flickr, and FourSquare (even if you are the Mayor of Taco Town).
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Instagram Just Released Snapchat-Like Feature, But Here’s Why You’ll Use It
Carbon copy cat? Maybe. But it's in the prime position to work.
Gather 'round, it's story time kids.
This morning Instagram introduced Instagram Stories, a new feature that lets you share all the moments of your day, not just the ones you want to keep on your profile. As you share multiple photos and videos, they appear together in a slideshow format: your story.
In a blog post the app announced, "With Instagram Stories, you don’t have to worry about over-posting. Instead, you can share as much as you want throughout the day — with as much creativity as you want. You can bring your story to life in new ways with text and drawing tools. The photos and videos will disappear after 24 hours and won’t appear on your profile grid or in feed."
Instagram has long been the "curated" social media. It's where users, brands, and influencers give the public a highlight reel of their life. No more. TechCrunch scored an interview with IG CEO Kevin Systrom who admitted to publication, “They deserve all the credit,” while insisting, “This isn’t about who invented something. This is about a format, and how you take it to a network and put your own spin on it.”
Stories is the spot where you can upload all of the stuff that isn't great for your grid-- because from a brand and gaining follower perspective we've heard over and over again how important it is to "get your grid right."
With Stories you can doodle, draw, and like Snapchat, they'll disappear after 24-hours.
At the top of your feed there will be a bar featuring stories from your best friends and favorite accounts. When the user adds something new to their story the profile will have a colorful ring around it. To see said story you tap the profile photo.
The feature follows the privacy settings on your account. You can also hide Stories from followers you don't want checking in.
According to the post, "Instagram has always been a place to share the moments you want to remember. Now you can share your highlights and everything in between, too."
It also solves the "too many apps, NO MORE!" crisis that many people have expressed anxiety over. Instagram Stories is the first useful attempt to consolidate the overwhelm of social. Clone or not, people will use it simply out of convenience. Snapchat showed that people wanted more than a highlight reel-- IG followed the crowd.
"Instagram Stories is the first useful attempt to consolidate the overwhelm of social."
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It will also prove useful for brands hiring influencers for campaigns to engage followers in BTS footage or event photos. Bloggers and influencers wont have to switch back-and-forth between apps and they'll be able to share moments on their IG without overcrowding the feed.
However, unlike regular posts there are no likes or public comments, so for the time being it might be difficult to measure engagement. But that's not going to stop the social platform's 500 million users from jumping on board.
Instagram Stories will be rolling out globally over the next few weeks on iOS and Android. Your move Evan Spiegel.
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