PartnerHacker Daily #29: Spray and Pray May Kill You
What the job-hunt reveals about ecosystems
I come from the early-career space. In over a decade helping people win jobs, I've seen a pattern.
No matter how little it works, people prefer to keep at the "spray and pray" approach of blasting resumes with one-click apps on generic jobs boards. Because it feels like they're doing something. "I sent 20 resumes today" feels like real work you can check off your list.
But activity doesn't equal results. It's not a numbers game, it's an attention and trust game.
What actually works is going deep, not broad.
Picking just a few companies you really love. Researching them. Following their employees on social. Striking up convos. Exploring their products. Talking to their customers. Then creating a project, deck, landing page, or video pitch tailored to them and emailing it directly to the hiring manager and other decision makers.
One in three pitches result in a job offer, in an overage of 18 days. Resume blasting results in an offer for every 150 sent, in an average of nearly 6 months. Yes, you read that right.
Yet job-seekers still fall back on the old resume blast approach. Because it feels too indirect, too scary, not enough leads in the funnel to spend time immersing yourself in the ecosystem of just one or two companies at a time.
It feels that way in the day-to-day, but the ROI over weeks or months is no comparison.
A winning partner strategy is the same.
Deep beats broad in a networked world.
Influencers matter, so get to know them
Jason Lawson making a repeat appearance in PhD this week.
This time it's about that dreaded, cheesy word, "influencer".
But really all it means is that reputation - what people say about you when you're not around - is becoming an ever-larger factor in B2B sales.
How to work with that reality instead of against it?
It's the long play.
It takes real investment.
But those who get started early will win in the end!
Quote of the Day
"He who does not trust enough will not be trusted."
-- Lao Tzu
Let's deepen the pool
Share PhD with a friend and grow the pie of partner-pilled people!
One more thing - a FREE T-SHIRT!
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Register with the PartnerHacker link and you'll get $50 off your ticket price.
But wait, there's more!
We're giving away a few brand-spanking-new PartnerHacker T-shirts to the first 5 people to register via the link between now and April 1.
What are you waiting for, claim your destiny (and your T-shirt)!