Unemployee Break Room

Online Tool Review: Top Prospect

 

what is it?

An online tool called Top Prospect that helps you connect your friends with job opportunities in their field and pick up some extra cash in the process. It's essentially Online Social Recruiting. But more than just a dumb online tool, Top Prospect aggregates all interested candidates for each position and ranks them for the employer based on number of recommendations, ratings, work experience, education and skills. They also handle the getting paid part for you.

The good

Top Propsect will do a lot of the work required in matching people from your ever-growing Facebook contacts or Linkedin network to jobs that they have on file, based on the information that those people provided in their Linkedin/Facebook profiles. It also makes it fairly easy to send an email to those people with a, "Hey, didn't you mention that you hate your job? Here's a new one for you," message. According to the site, you can make $2K, $5K, or $20K if this works out for everyone involved. That's no small chunk of cheese and is the main reason I'm bringing it to your attention. 

If you really want to invest in this, you can take the time to tag your friends based on their skills and profession for better matching. You can also label your most talented contacts as "great".

The smartest part of the offering, to me, is that the weighting of your recommendation is partially based on the quality of your previous recommendations. If you're sending unqualified people through, your recommendations will be deprioritized. That's a good incentive to only recommend solid candidates.

The bad:

Don't get too excited, you don't get to keep the full bounty. Top Prospect takes a cut. That actually seems fair to me, but they're not terribly up front about it on their site. Also, if you're one of ten people that recommended your friend Tim and Tim scored the job, you have to split the bounty 10 ways (11 if you count Top Prospsect). Also fair, but not exactly obvious. Your money shows up via check within 30 days of your friend's hire date.

The site is in beta right now and they only have about 113 employers with 420 jobs in 31 cities, all but nine of which are in California. Clearly they have a lot of work to do to be relevant to unemployees and companies.

The bottom line:

Top Prospect is a cool idea that's worth checking out. Signing up is on the easier side of things. Obviously, the more people become members, the more employers will play there. But it needs significant time before it'll truly pay off for you, your friends and the world at large.

Research Department: Pre-Interview Diligence

Your success as an unemployee is inextricably linked to how well you know your prospects and their business. And company knowledge isn't just for interview day either. It will come into play when you craft your cover letter and customize your resume as well. Once you see an interesting job, your research department should kick into high gear.

That said, try not to OVER DO it. Some people can really waste a lot of time on this step. Basically, you should know how long the company has been around, how big it is, what they sell, who they sell it to, who they compete against and what their rep is.  Be able to describe in a few sentences what their overall business model is.

First, the obvious:

1) Read the "about" page of the company's website.

2) If they have them, read the company bios to get to know the important people.

3) Read the company's press releases on their site and any "in the news" news. 

4) Read the company's blog.

Less obvious:

1) Look up the company's stock ticker if they have one and see how they've been doing over the last month, six months, two years and five years.

2) Type the name of the company's product or service into your search engine along with the word "reviews" to see what people are saying about it.

3) Research the company's whole industry by typing the industry name (e.g. fitness) and then the words "industry trends" into your search engine.

4) Use Linkedin to see if you have any people in your network's network who work there. If you have a secondary contact who does work at the company, ask your mutual contact to introduce you and then ask that person if for an informational interview so you can get the lowdown.

5) If you do have an interview, it doesn't hurt to research the people that you're interviewing with at places like Linkedin. But it's probably best if you don't let those folks know that you know they went to UVM and majored in Bio Chem. Because that's a bit creepy.

Your suggestions:

1)

2)

3)

I'm sure you have them...

How Much Time Do You Spend Job Hunting?

Job hunting can be an emotional drain for some while others choose to think of it as a game. Which are you? How much time can you spend job hunting every week without getting burned out? Some experts recommend 25 hours a week maximum - or 5 hours every day. How does that strike you? 

Personally, I can only spend about 30 hours a week job hunting. That's the only way that I can maintain my optimism and stay focused on the prize. We will have more posts presenting ideas about productive ways to spend those five hours.

 

 

Welcome To The Unemployee Break Room

Hi there. Come on in.

If you are currently unemployed, or know someone who is, then this place is for you. Grab a seat, get comfortable and tell us your story. Got a question? Feel free to post it in the comments section and someone will answer it. Have a good answer to someone else's question? Well, you know what to do.

We're all on the same team here.

Throughout the course of your time here in the Unemployee Break Room, you'll be introduced to various members of the staff: the benefits team, the sales people, the marketing smarties, the finance group and the research organization. They are here to help you. And by "they" I mean me (Todd Anthony). That's essentially what the unmployee experience is all about -- making the transition from being one member of a big organization with one specific funtion to being one person, all alone, with a multitude of functions. That's not a transition that's easy to make - which is why we/I are/am here for you. I've done it many times and I'd like to do my best to help other people get through it.

Want some coffee? There's a fesh pot on.

 

The Unemployee Manifesto

We stand for hope. But since hope isn’t a viable business strategy, we also stand for careful research, planning, attention to detail and follow through. That said, it’s hope that keeps us on track, makes us competitive and keeps fuel in the tank of our self-esteem. We believe in the luck of the optimist, that fortune favors the bold, and that to be successful, you simply must be the most attractive version of yourself that you can be.