After experiencing significant digital transformation in 2020, job hunting in 2021 looks a bit different than it did in prior years.
Namely, the entire process has moved online. In the past, a candidate may have initiated the process online by viewing and applying to online job listings, which would eventually convert to in-person interviews. However, in 2021 the entire interview process takes place virtually — including the interview, psychometric testing, and the final-stage offer negotiation.
This means it’s important that job hunters today are prepared for a fully digital experience from start to finish. To help, we’ve compiled a list of some of the key online tools facilitating the job hunt in 2021.
If you’re not already familiar with these, it’s well worth taking the time to get to know them. These key tools help navigate the new fully digital recruitment process so that you can get the most out of your job search.
This one should come as no surprise. LinkedIn has been a stalwart in the job search for several years now. Building your professional network is important to maintaining visibility and staying informed about the latest hiring news. Engaging on LinkedIn regularly means you can stay connected to and informed about job opportunities posted by people within your network.
Employers outside of your network also frequently post job listings on LinkedIn Jobs, where you can update your settings to filter job listings that match certain specifications, such as relating to your current job title and profile, or based on custom settings if you’re looking to career-shift.
If you want recruiters to contact you on LinkedIn when you’re looking for a job, make sure your LinkedIn profile is complete and optimised. It’s easy to improve your LinkedIn profile: simply fill in every field (e.g., work history, education, etc.) with updated information, include relevant keywords that employers may be searching for, and ask for recommendations and endorsements from former managers and colleagues.
Doing all of this can help rank your profile higher in LinkedIn search results, ensuring that you come across recruiters’ attention and increase your chances of finding a job.
Additionally, LinkedIn has also launched a new “open to work” feature, which allows you to add a frame to your profile picture that lets employers know you’re looking for work. When it comes to the jobs marketplace, LinkedIn remains the top starting point.
Glassdoor
Glassdoor is a website where current and former employees anonymously review companies, providing feedback on what it is like to work there, as well as providing salary information for their particular role.
This can be useful when looking for your next role. You can view the companies you’d like to work with and see what the experience of others has been so that you can make an informed decision about whether the company is a good fit for you. During the final stages of an interview process, Glassdoor’s salary information can also be useful in the salary negotiation process.
In addition to providing user-generated information, Glassdoor also has its own listings page, Glassdoor Jobs, where you can filter and search for jobs according to sector, location, salary and more.
Jobscan
Many large companies hiring today use a keyword-based algorithm to filter and rank CVs based on keywords.
As a job seeker, in order to make it through different company filters, this means you would have to tailor your CV to each application in order to be noticed.
Obviously, this can be an arduous process. That’s why Jobscan was created — it automates the process, giving applicants the power of large applicant tracking systems.
With Jobscan, you can optimise your CV to give it the best chance of making it through the filtering process as you apply for your dream job.
Hunter
One of the most cost-effective ways to apply for jobs is via email. With the help of Hunter’s Email Finder, you can find professional email addresses and use them for cold outreach.
Just add the first and last name of the person you need to reach out to and the website’s domain. You’ll get the result in seconds. This tool also comes with a Chrome extension that can find the email addresses of a website with a single click. It can also perform bulk email lookups for a list of people and is available in the API.
Sign up for a free account and get 25 free email searches, and 50 free email verifications per month.
Slik
Logically, most job seekers go about the process of finding a new role by responding to existing job ads. However, sometimes it’s worthwhile to contact a company even when they aren’t actively hiring. This way, you can bring your CV to the attention of the HR department before a role is actively advertised. That’s where tools like Slik can be helpful.
Describing itself as “fully managed sales data for your growth engine”, Slik was built for sales people looking to connect with prospects. But it’s also useful for job hunters trying to get in front of the right person.
Slik offers a browser extension for Google’s Chrome browser, which allows you to find anyone’s email on LinkedIn. This can be very useful for job hunters who may wish to reach out to the HR department of a company that isn’t actively hiring.
Shapr
Whether or not you believe that landing the right role is “all about who you know,” you probably acknowledge the important role that networking plays in the job search process.
Shapr provides a new way to network. Its platform connects professionals, including job seekers, employers, and mentors in one place. Each day, the Shapr app suggests new people to connect with, based on your mutual interests, industries and aspirations.
Whether you’re a professional exploring job opportunities or an entrepreneur seeking co-founders to share ideas with, Shapr helps you build your network in just one minute per day by swiping suitable profiles.
Idealist
Are you driven by a desire to change the world? Do you prefer to work with charities or NGOs that are making actionable change within the world to increase social justice, improve the environment, or help vulnerable populations? Then Idealist may just be the right job marketplace for furthering your social impact career.
Idealist is a global job marketplace that offers paid roles, internships, and volunteer positions — all centred around making the world a better place.
In the past 25 years, Idealist has connected more than 130,000 organizations with tens of millions of people. If social impact is the focus of your career, Idealist is definitely a platform worth engaging with.
Phantombuster
If you’re looking to uplevel your networking, Phantombuster might just be the right tool for you. It allows you to automate a number of digital actions, including automatically sending LinkedIn invitations to the people you’re trying to reach, or auto-following people on Twitter and Instagram.
While intended as a business tool, Phatombuster can be useful to savvy job seekers looking to collate data and automate the networking portion of their job hunt.
Using Phantombuster’s LinkedIn Profile Scraper tool, you can collect every data from a list of LinkedIn profiles, including email, so that you reach the right people on your job search.
The job search has come a long way from the days of simply sending your CV as an email attachment and waiting for a phone call. The above are just a few of the many exciting tools that exist to power today’s digitally-led job search, taking place fully online.
According to experts, virtual recruitment, including virtual job interviews, is here to stay, even as we ease out of the pandemic. With tools like Zoom and Microsoft Teams making virtual meetings easier than ever, candidates must prepare for a future where virtual interviews remain the default.
This means not only making sure you are well-versed with the new rules of Zoom etiquette for job interviews, but being prepared to expertly navigate the entire process, from start to finish, digitally.
In addition to driving the job search process, digital tools are also a great way of showcasing your skills, personality and projects that you’ve worked on in the past. That’s why at PitchMe, our unique SmartMe profile incorporates your digital data with your CV creating a unique digital profile that overcomes the limitations of the traditional CV by providing a 360-degree view of who you are as a candidate.
SmartMe takes a data-driven approach to candidate profiling. It combines traditional sources, such as a CV, with a candidate’s digital data to build the most complete, real-time, dynamic profile of each candidate’s skills.
You can build your SmartMe profile in minutes by uploading your CV and giving it a boost by including a link to your personal or business websites, any social profiles, blogs, online games and more (it’s up to you to choose which digital data to include).
You’ll then be matched with the right role that best incorporates all of your skills, with each employer able to see all of the skills and attributes that you bring to the role.
Get started with SmartMe right now by clicking here.
We hope you find these tools useful — you may just find that they have the power to transform your job search.