Providing job ready skills – how to find the audience?

[Cindy ODea]

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Hi everyone,
I’m an HR Consultant in Hobart (and still working full time as an HR professional) and wanting to assist job seekers, particularly those with more hurdles than others to get into the job market (mature age, people from non-English speaking backgrounds, people with disability etc.) with job-ready skills such as writing resumes and selection criteria, job interview skills and so on. I have a website with free info, I write blogs, I post on FB (on my own page and 1 jobs group) but don’t have much of a following, I’ve cold called places that I might be able to partner with, I’ve run sessions at libraries ($10 per participant per hour and was hard to market and didn’t have many takers) and still struggling to get any traction. I know there are so many who need the skills and people who provide this info but not many with HR backgrounds. I’m still keen to do this and really want to do it as a f2f training. Any thoughts on where to next?
Thanks
Cindy

[Paul – FS Concierge]

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Hi Cindy,

I am guessing that you developed your ideas and business without testing to see if the market wanted and was willing to pay for your services at the price point that will make you a profit and a living.

Please let me know if I am wrong.

In the meantime, it is important to validate your business ideas.

The best way I know how is to read this book

Just on super face value, I feel it is a very tough market you are in and your niche makes it even more difficult for reasons of target market having no to very limited budgets, it is crowded and it will take a long time to get exposure.

If you want to go down that track, you could try to be a key note speaker at conferences, create your own podcast, be a guest on popular podcasts, be a guest blogger on complimentary websites etc.

There are a lot of ways to develop a profile and all of them take a lot of time and work.

I hope I am not being Danny Downer here but rather a lightning rod to think about the right questions to ask as a business person.

Cheers

[bb1]

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Cindy ODea, post: 270376, member: 77806 wrote:

Hi everyone,
I’m an HR Consultant in Hobart (and still working full time as an HR professional) and wanting to assist job seekers, particularly those with more hurdles than others to get into the job market (mature age, people from non-English speaking backgrounds, people with disability etc.) with job-ready skills such as writing resumes and selection criteria, job interview skills and so on. I have a website with free info, I write blogs, I post on FB (on my own page and 1 jobs group) but don’t have much of a following, I’ve cold called places that I might be able to partner with, I’ve run sessions at libraries ($10 per participant per hour and was hard to market and didn’t have many takers) and still struggling to get any traction. I know there are so many who need the skills and people who provide this info but not many with HR backgrounds. I’m still keen to do this and really want to do it as a f2f training. Any thoughts on where to next?
Thanks
Cindy

Maybe being in the HR market has really made you unsuitable for your target market, sorry sounds a bit rough, but I have just taken a look at your website, and every word you say and blog you write is targeted at the upper end of the market.

You need to remove your HR hat, and think what your target market needs, not what you think they need. Talk to them in their language not HR double speak.

The sales pitch doesnt match what you say.

[VoIPSmart]

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Your call to actions on your website are not very clear. I personnaly would have the following:

– Call now
– Upload your resume for a free assessement

And these need to be almost on all pages.

In saying that, check out Airtasker. There are hundreds of people doing what you do (update resume, cover letters & selection criteria), if you are good at what to do, maybe start with Airtasker, it would be a good way to make extra $$

[Zarabasiri]

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Cindy ODea, post: 270376, member: 77806 wrote:

Hi everyone,
I’m an HR Consultant in Hobart (and still working full time as an HR professional) and wanting to assist job seekers, particularly those with more hurdles than others to get into the job market (mature age, people from non-English speaking backgrounds, people with disability etc.) with job-ready skills such as writing resumes and selection criteria, job interview skills and so on. I have a website with free info, I write blogs, I post on FB (on my own page and 1 jobs group) but don’t have much of a following, I’ve cold called places that I might be able to partner with, I’ve run sessions at libraries ($10 per participant per hour and was hard to market and didn’t have many takers) and still struggling to get any traction. I know there are so many who need the skills and people who provide this info but not many with HR backgrounds. I’m still keen to do this and really want to do it as a f2f training. Any thoughts on where to next?
Thanks
Cindy

One way is to join facebook groups for Jobs and share valuable tips as well as exclusive post introducing how you can help and if anyone interested to reach out to you. There are plenty of groups with huge member numbers. for example “Jobs in Melbourne”.

[Cindy ODea]

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VoIPSmart, post: 270385, member: 117957 wrote:

Your call to actions on your website are not very clear. I personnaly would have the following:

– Call now
– Upload your resume for a free assessement

And these need to be almost on all pages.

In saying that, check out Airtasker. There are hundreds of people doing what you do (update resume, cover letters & selection criteria), if you are good at what to do, maybe start with Airtasker, it would be a good way to make extra $$

Paul – FS Concierge, post: 270379, member: 78928 wrote:

Hi Cindy,

I am guessing that you developed your ideas and business without testing to see if the market wanted and was willing to pay for your services at the price point that will make you a profit and a living.

Please let me know if I am wrong.

In the meantime, it is important to validate your business ideas.

The best way I know how is to read this book

Just on super face value, I feel it is a very tough market you are in and your niche makes it even more difficult for reasons of target market having no to very limited budgets, it is crowded and it will take a long time to get exposure.

If you want to go down that track, you could try to be a key note speaker at conferences, create your own podcast, be a guest on popular podcasts, be a guest blogger on complimentary websites etc.

There are a lot of ways to develop a profile and all of them take a lot of time and work.

I hope I am not being Danny Downer here but rather a lightning rod to think about the right questions to ask as a business person.

Cheers

Thanks for your ideas Paul.
Cindy

[Cindy ODea]

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VoIPSmart, post: 270385, member: 117957 wrote:

Your call to actions on your website are not very clear. I personnaly would have the following:

– Call now
– Upload your resume for a free assessement

And these need to be almost on all pages.

In saying that, check out Airtasker. There are hundreds of people doing what you do (update resume, cover letters & selection criteria), if you are good at what to do, maybe start with Airtasker, it would be a good way to make extra $$

Thanks Damien,
Sorry I don’t think my question wasn’t very clear. I’m not actually wanting to write resumes for people, I want to provide training sessions so people can write their own. I understand the point about a call to action, I’ll need to have a think about the sorts of businesses that I could run training for.
Cindy

[Cindy ODea]

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bb1, post: 270382, member: 53375 wrote:

Maybe being in the HR market has really made you unsuitable for your target market, sorry sounds a bit rough, but I have just taken a look at your website, and every word you say and blog you write is targeted at the upper end of the market.

You need to remove your HR hat, and think what your target market needs, not what you think they need. Talk to them in their language not HR double speak.

The sales pitch doesnt match what you say.

Hi Bert,

Not sure what you mean about my being in HR makes me unsuitable for my target market. I think it is my experience in recruiting people that gives me the best knowledge of what businesses are looking for when they receive resumes. I’d like to know a bit more about what you mean about my sales pitch not matching what I say.
Thanks
Cindy

[Cindy ODea]

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Zarabasiri, post: 270408, member: 83840 wrote:

One way is to join facebook groups for Jobs and share valuable tips as well as exclusive post introducing how you can help and if anyone interested to reach out to you. There are plenty of groups with huge member numbers. for example “Jobs in Melbourne”.

Thanks Zara,
I’ve actually been trying that but not getting all my posts approvedand not getting much interaction, even though I’m not selling anything, just offering free resources.
Cindy

[Paul – FS Concierge]

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Cindy ODea, post: 270490, member: 77806 wrote:

Thanks Zara,
I’ve actually been trying that but not getting all my posts approvedand not getting much interaction, even though I’m not selling anything, just offering free resources.
Cindy
If you want to “fix” this you can.

In groups, self promotion is frowned on.

You have to be a genuinely helpful person in your group so directly promoting your business does not work even providing a link unless it is super relevant can just look like self promotion.

Just be genuinely helpful, share your insights and expertise and people will seek you out/look you up.

In the meantime, you will have helped some people.

Cheers
Paul

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