Posting Your Resume on Craigslist

Recently I was scanning through the resumes listed on craigslist and noticed something very surprising. Most of the listings weren’t resumes at all. They were job seekers begging and pleading for a job. Once I pulled myself up off the floor from falling out of my chair in disbelief I said something has to be done! So here is a brief list of rules to remember when posting your resume (or anything for that matter) to the resumes category on craigslist.

1. Just because you can write a novel about yourself doesn’t mean you should. Do NOT give the reader your entire life history. It seriously is not pertinent to the job you are trying to obtain. Unless you’re trying to be a Pastor in which your whole life story may be relevant but most likely not.

2. NEVER post your age on your craigslist ad. This is a HUGE HUGE HUGE mistake. First, you are setting yourself up for age discrimination (whether you are old, young, or in between). And secondly, it is very unprofessional. You don’t walk in to an interview and say Hi, I’m 32 when you introduce yourself, and you certainly don’t put your age on your resume. And if you are STOP.

3. Do not beg, plead, sob, or sound desperate in your listing. Yes we all know these are desperate times and desperate times call for desperate measures but this does not mean begging for a job. Remember when you were young and dating and desperation was such a turn off… in fact it made you run from the other person as fast as you humanly could? It’s the same thing in the job search game. Desperation is appealing to no one and will make the employer run in the opposite direction.

4. It is a resume category for a reason. POST YOUR RESUME. Not a narrative paragraph statement about what type of job you need, want, or your life story. Take you resume turn it into a plain text version and post that. Nothing else just your resume. Anything else doesn’t belong in the resume category.

5. Protect your personal information. This is craigslist people… anyone in the world can get on it and see your name, address, and phone number. DO NOT POST THIS INFORMATION!!! Leave only your name and e-mail address where they can reach you and the best bet is not to leave your best e-mail address or the one you use every day. Create an e-mail address for your job search only and give all job search related sites and postings this e-mail address. Which brings me to my next point.

6. Do not use some crazy e-mail address on your craigslist ad, job applications, or resume for that matter. I don’t want to see that you are a skatefreek09, dogluver00, or cheaptrix@email.com. That will kill a job search on impact. Go to one of the million free email sites and create something professional like: John.Smith@gmail.com, jsmith09@yahoo.com, or JS2009@hotmail.com. Use a combination of name or name and number for the most professional impact.

Lastly, don’t expect a real response from your craigslist posting. In my experience most employers aren’t using craigslist to seek out workers but using it to post jobs for free. With the recent economic downturn employers are moving away from costly subscriptions to places like Monster and Careerbuilder and moving towards something less expensive like the free job boards and craigslist. Your best bet is to send your resume to positions posted on craigslist. Be careful, craigslist doesn’t police these listings and some are scams! That is a whole other blog… maybe later or tomorrow.

For now, be smart about your listing and be creative in your job search. You can do it!