Is Monster not really a monster at all...?

January 24, 2006 9:47 AM

MonsterFilter: I've had my resume up on Monster for at least 6 months now and I've only had 17 hits - is this normal, are there a bunch of tricks I don't know about, or are employers only using Monster to post vacancies, as opposed to using it to search for prospective employees?

I work in the DVD industry so my line is pretty unique, and if I search for jobs using "DVD" as a keyword, I get 11 hits for this month in the US. Also, I can log in to monster.co.uk, monster.de and monster.fr using the same username/ password, so I'm assuming that my resume is viewable/ searchable internationally, and I have cited the US, UK, France and Germany as locations I'd like to work. So all things considered, 17 hits does seem rather low - can anyone shed any light on this?

posted by forallmankind to work & money (10 comments total)

I know that the more often I update my resume, the more hits I get. By re-saving it once a week or so I went from 19 hits to 80 hits in about 2 months.
posted by denimflavored at 9:54 AM on January 24, 2006

Update your resume and add keywords for your industry (this is huge). Everytime I update, I get alot more action. And when I add keywords, I actually get email offers for more information and interviews.

But then, I'm in Public Relations so there's more market for me to explore.

Good luck.
posted by fenriq at 10:08 AM on January 24, 2006

I've worked in the job board industry for years now, and if it's one thing I've learned, it's that employers/recruiters are lazy. They've paid their money to post jobs and will expend almost no effort other than that.

They aren't going to seek you out, so you need to make sure that you get to them in the easiest possible way. fenriq's suggestion is good, but basically you need to assume that -no one- will look at your resume and it's entirely your responsibility to push it into the hands of prospective employers.
posted by Kickstart70 at 10:32 AM on January 24, 2006

Update every day. Make sure all your keywords and acronyms are in there. Monster's keyword line, when I'm searching resumes, looks like kind of a title for the resume. Things like "I love a challenge!" and "resume bob2" make you look like a tool.

Have someone else run a fine-toothed comb over your resume. I am hiring right now and I just cannot look at resumes that make my eyes hurt. Monster's native format blows to look at anyway, so view your work there to make sure there are enough line breaks and no crazy indenting and your bullets haven't turned into crime scenes (my boss tosses for the crappy formatting that comes from pasting directly from Word without tweaking). I need that resume to appeal to me in the first two seconds, because I'm not enjoying this. If you have vital certifications or whatnot, get 'em up top.

Spelling errors? I stop reading and toss it, because if you're not going to proof your resume, you're obviously not going to proof the reports you send to our CEO either.

Do not use an email address like [e-mail] as your contact email. Webmail accounts are free, help yourself to one that is simply made out of your name. Dignity is truly sexy.

And I'd like to work in France, too, but I don't have a chance in hell of getting a Euro work permit. And it looks junky on your resume and kind of flaky to me when I'm considering you for a US job. Make different resumes for each country if you think there's actually a possibility that could work out for you. I'm searching for where you live, though, not where you want to work. We use the 50-mile dropdown, but we know what traffic is like and won't go past about 30. I would hope that, if your field is that sparse, potential employers are casting wider nets, but if your field is that sparse they may expect you to come to them.

Good luck. Some of it is just right time/right place and you can't do anything about it, but do try to be as clean and polished as you can.
posted by Lyn Never at 10:50 AM on January 24, 2006

Unless we go back to the heady days of the late '90s, I'd say you will be contacting employers, not vice versa.

This is not an employee's market -- at least not where I live and in my field. Every job I apply for has literally dozens of other people competing with me. On the few jobs that I really want, and that require a somewhat specialized skill set, I've still been told that I'm 1 of ten or 12.

Updating your resume will help, but unless and until the job market changes, you will be begging them.
posted by teece at 10:52 AM on January 24, 2006

I have never known anyone who had any success at all with Monster.com or any of the bit job-posting boards. I have never had success there myself, neither as a someone looking to hire, nor as someone looking to be hired. You might as well throw resumes out the window.

If Monster.com isn't working, then you need to try other tactics. Cold-calling, cold-mailing, networking.
posted by Mo Nickels at 10:55 AM on January 24, 2006

teece is right, but my advice stands if you're going to use Monster to apply for jobs. I finally got a job posted, so people are contacting me, and I like it when they do it through Monster because it's all kept track of in the hiring section there as well as in my email. They look awful in email, and I get a banner right at the top that tells me whether you meet my criteria (distance, experience, etc).
posted by Lyn Never at 10:58 AM on January 24, 2006

Not excactly super sleuthing, but if you would like an idea of what the job poster is using on the other end, check out the following:
Monster Job Posting Help
CareerBuilder Job Posting Help

The Monster page is a media file and the CB is web page. Both have a few good pieces of info. ymmw
posted by lampshade at 12:06 PM on January 24, 2006

I found two jobs on Monster during really, really crappy job-hunting times, or rather, two jobs found me through my posted resume. Of course, I am a consultant, so it's not like I'm very specialized. I didn't actually get very many hits at all the second time around, so I think my employer finding me was kind of a fluke. If I were you, I'd definitely take a more active approach to job hunting -- it really is all about approaching the employer yourself, networking, etc. Out of all the people that I've known that have been job hunting lately, there's only a very teeny tiny percentage of us that found our jobs through an online job board.
posted by echo0720 at 1:00 PM on January 24, 2006

There are some companies that monitor monster for new or updated resumes, so you'll always have a certain number of hits every time you update a resume. I've never had any luck with the site, though. Just some emails from headhunters asking if I know anyone for jobs that would be entirely unsuitable for me.
posted by dilettante at 2:06 PM on January 24, 2006