The obvious place to look is Linkedin but Google is a great resource also. Once you are clear about the type of organisation that you feel you can offer the most value and the ones that you enjoy working within, you’ll be able to define;
o Size of company (revenue/ employee numbers/ both)
o The sector that they operate within
o HQ location or Regional Offices
Using the basic Linkedin company search will help you to identify an initial list of potential targets. To expand this, go to Google and search for industry specific conferences within your preferred location. So for instance, if you’re preferred sector was Social Housing across the UK, the search would be “conference directory” AND “social housing” AND “UK”
You may have to go onto pages 2 or 3 but you will typically find brochures and/or delegate lists available – these provide ideal foundations on which to dig a little deeper to find the name of the person that could hire you (and also their boss).
Once you have found the relevant person, go back to Google and Linkedin and search “name of individual” “name of organisation” – this is likely to pull up contact details (email/ phone numbers) as well as articles/ news stories etc that they have featured in.
Keep a copy of these so that you can mention them in any letters/ emails that you send them in future.
The best jobs are never advertised. As such, it is your responsibility to position yourself with the right person, in the right way to get the opportunity to open up discussions and explore possibilities.
To succeed, you need high impact self marketing, you need to provide proof and authority that you are the right person and you need to be making active connections within organisations, working on your relationships and actively ‘tapping’ these connections for potential job/ role opportunities.
Join associations/ groups that your ‘Jane Doe’ attends, introduce yourself and ask others what it’s like working with Jane Doe/ Jane’s organisation – demonstrate curiosity and spend time building up your relationships.
This shouldn’t stop when you’ve secured a new job/ project – you should be spending time each and every day building up your profile – in this way, you’ll immediately spring to mind when Jane Doe is looking for someone to help her.
The next session will focus on how you can best approach Jane Doe.