Top 10 Websites for Your Career – And They’re Not What You Think!

Every year Forbes magazine publishes a list of the best websites for your career. This past year it was the 100 Best Websites for Your Career. Of that list, they typically break down the top ten. I was reading the 10 Best Websites for Your Career article this morning, and I saw one MAJOR issue—out of the top 10 sites, eight of them were job boards or job search aggregators.

WHAT’S THE PROBLEM?

What’s the issue with that, you ask? Less than 20% of positions are filled through job boards; it’s misleading to inform people their best resources for a search are at job boards. I’m astonished to see that 80% of their recommendations were for sites that offer little in return to job seekers. I hear from job seekers on a consistent basis that they feel frustrated and hopeless because they’re applying to position after position on job boards and getting no response.

TELL ME AGAIN … WHY ARE JOB BOARDS BAD?

Job boards are not bad; they’re overused! And job seekers have a tendency to put all their job search eggs into this one basket. To combat this stress and frustration, I wrote an article about the one mistake that leads to longer job searches and more stress—namely overuse of job boards! You can check that article out here: https://greatresumesfast.com/2014/09/02/job-search-mistake-leads-to-longer-search/.

Without my rehashing that article, if you’re wondering why job boards create more stress and frustration, I recommend you check it out.

IS IT REALLY WHAT’S BEST?

Forbes provides lots of great information to job seekers—and I’m a big fan of their writing. If you’ve been following my Hope for Your Job Search series, then you know I’ve linked back to multiple articles they’ve written about varying job search techniques and the hidden job market. So I’m not criticizing the magazine—just their choice of “best” websites for your career.

In my opinion, if you want to tell job seekers the BEST websites for their careers, then you choose sites that help them tap into the other methods for finding the other 80% of jobs! If job boards account for people finding only 20% of jobs—and the other 80% are found through other means such as referrals, networking, and accessing the hidden job market—I think it’s only fair to focus on leading people to those sites and ways to find those jobs.

So I guess now that I’ve gone through explaining why their top-10 list was flawed, I should give you some better alternatives! So, based on their original 100 choices, here are my top alternatives:

LINKEDIN: Forbes listed LinkedIn as #1. I would definitely leave this site ON the list as it’s extremely beneficial to your job search. Not only can you find jobs listed through groups and other online postings, you can optimize your profile so that you get placed at the top of search results—and companies and recruiters contact you. Additionally, there are many opportunities to network, share your expertise, and read GREAT tips and advice from career experts on finding a position.

INDEED: If you’re going to leave one job board on the list—and you should because it should still make up 20% of your job search—I’d leave this one. INDEED’s a job search aggregator, so it scours the web to find the position you’re after on all types of websites and job boards. While I am a proponent of leaving this on the list, I do so with a word of caution—please do not spend all your time on it. If you set aside five hours a week to search, spend 20% of that time on it, and invest the rest of your time in other methods.

ALTERNATIVE #1: Http://www.Careerealism.com  (ADVICE) If you’re looking for advice about job searching, this website is the mother lode. Experts from all over with all different specialties offer their best advice to job seekers. Everything from resumes and cover letters to LinkedIn, the hidden job market, networking, internships, and more.

ALTERNATIVE #2: Job-Hunt: http://www.job-hunt.org/ (ADVICE) – Another website with a compilation of excellent, tried-and-true job search advice. You’ll be hard pressed to find anything overly promotional within this site—just great, honest advice for your search.

ALTERNATIVE #3: http://www.JobBait.com (DIRECT MAIL/VALUE PROPOSITION LETTERS) – While the man behind the site is no longer with us, the site is still the Mecca of information when it comes to value proposition letters and direct mail campaigns. There’s so much amazing information on this site that if you spent a bit of time reading and watching his YouTube channel videos you’d know how to create, compile, and execute your own direct mail campaign with an incredible 85% success rate—securing a new position (in 90 days or less!). I’ve researched his methods and utilized them extensively with my own clients—and I can tell you they’ve proven very successful for my clients.

ALTERNATIVE #4: http://www.careercloud.com/ (HIDDEN JOB MARKET/NETWORKING) – CareerCloud helps you to tap into business announcements and growth plans in your area so you can see which companies will be expanding in the future and reach out to them BEFORE they start hiring and advertising jobs—thus avoiding the competition and essentially beating your competitors to the punch. This site also lets you see where your friends and connections on social media sites like Facebook and LinkedIn work, and whether their organizations may have any openings.

ALTERNATIVE #5: http://gm4jh.com/ – Guerrilla Marketing for Job Hunters (STRATEGIES, TIPS, IDEAS YOU CAN USE NOW) – I have to tell you how much I admire this site and the information they provide job seekers. If you’re comfortable breaking out of the monotonous job search box of doing the same thing everyone else does, this site is for you. Read the books, use the tips, ideas, and ESPECIALLY the scripts. They work! I’ve had so many people contact me through LinkedIn, sharing about their experience using the tips and advice here and how easy it was to find their next job.

ALTERNATIVE #6: PERSONAL BRANDING BLOG http://www.personalbrandingblog.com/ (Personal Branding) – Critically important to your job search success is knowing your brand and your value proposition—and having your elevator speech ready. Know who you are, what you offer, and why they should choose you over someone else. Need help figuring that out? There’s some great info on this site.

ALTERNATIVE #7: JIBBERJOBBER http://www.jibberjobber.com/login.php (NETWORKING/ADVICE) – Organize your job search and network better than anyone else: personal relationship management. Go check it out. Seriously.

ALTERNATIVE #8: http://www.neighbors-helping-neighbors.com/ (NETWORKING/REFERRAL) This site may not look as fancy as the other sites, but considering recent stats have proven 80% of jobs are filled through referrals and word-of-mouth recommendations, I’d say this site is an asset to your job search!

Two other sites I’ll recommend as honorable mentions: 1) www.glassdoor.com—because knowing WHO you want to work for is just as important as finding a job and: 2) www.payscale.com—because knowing what you’re worth and negotiating a fair salary are vital to your future success!

Now that I’ve probably overloaded you with advice on networking, why don’t we go ahead and connect on the #1 website for your career—LinkedIn! Feel free to send me an invite here.