One of the most important (and often most neglected) aspects of search is clearly defining a target market – The market in which you will conduct your job search.

In order to conduct an effective job search, you MUST know precisely who you are trying to reach.

A clear, logical and practical definition of your target market, allows you to focus your search on specific organizations and ensures that you don’t waste time and resources. Without this focus to your search, you may spend a lot of time pursuing contacts and conducting research on companies that are less likely to lead you to the right position.

Establishing clear search criteria allows you to spend your time on targeted organizations. Staying focused (and consistent) with a well-defined a realistic target market can shorten your search by weeks or even months.

So, in essence, you want to establish a clear search criteria of the group of organizations you plan to pursue, record them in a marketing plan and have research and prepare a prioritized target list of the 40-50 organizations that you will pursue initially. 

You want to consider the following in your search criteria: Geographic boundaries, industries, size of companies and preferred organizational cultures.

One way to understand the value of defining your target market is to look at your job search project as if it were a new business venture; If you were planning to introduce a new product, you would first have to identify the group of customers who would most likely need and purchase your product, in order to focus your sales and marketing efforts. You would most likely to define that group using demographic factors such as age, income, gender and the like…

Many people initially underestimate the number of targets they need for a successful search. Study and research indicate that the average person in search talks to 20 - 30 different hiring managers at 20-30 different companies.

Questions to consider:

What organizations are most likely to be interested in me?

What organizations am I most interested in joining?

What geographic area do I prefer?

What industry do you prefer? Which industries are likely to consider me a strong candidate? 

What type of organizational culture do I prefer? What factors are important to me?

What resources will I need/use to build a list that is consistent with my target market?

Happy hunting Youfers .

For more info and more career resources, please visit the 189Xchange website.

Phakeme Mtheku: Founding Director of 189Xchange

https://189xchange.co.za/