Web designers and job seekers share similar goals:

• Stand out from the crowd
• Maximize exposure
• Promote a personal brand
• Generate interest

All are ways to insure the success of a website and all are ways to insure your resume doesn’t end up in File 13.

So how DO you manage to stand out? How do you supercharge your employment opportunities? The same way you design a website for success:

Great Content

Your resume must have the content a hiring manager needs or wants. You probably don’t spend time on websites that don’t interest you, and the same holds true for hiring managers. Uninteresting resumes go to the shredder. Your resume must grab and hold that hiring manager’s interest.

How do you grab that interest? Research. You have to know what challenges the firm is facing and how your education or experience can help meet those challenges.

Getting Indexed

To rise in the rankings, a site needs to get indexed by the major search engines. Your resume needs to be indexed as well, but you’re the one to do the indexing by sending it to recruiters and the hiring managers that work for the firms you’ve targeted.

Great Design

A site must have a pleasing design, otherwise the visitors won’t spend any time on it. Likewise, your resume has to be easy on the eyes. It must be grammatically correct, free of spelling errors. and must have a natural flow. It has to make sense chronologically and your experience must be applicable to the needs of the firm.

Keyword Rich

Well designed sites have appropriate keywords strategically sprinkled throughout. You should approach your resume with the same idea. Many resumes are scanned into large databases and guess what they’re looking for? Keywords. Integrate keywords into the entire document to make your resume stand out in these electronic searches.

Here’s a tip: look at different job postings for your targeted position. Eliminate any pronouns, article adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, and adjectives. From the words that are left, you should select several key words that will directly apply to the position you want. Use these in your resume in a natural way so that they flow and make sense.

White Hat vs. Black Hat

White Hat SEO applies to actions that are above board and ethical whereas Black Hat generally refers to actions that are sneaky or manipulative. No matter what, always insure that your resume and any job application you fill out is truthful and honest. Never compromise your integrity by lying about education, experience, dates of previous employment, or references.

Here are a few other good ideas:

• Use a professional e-mail address and file naming system
• Store your resume on a thumb drive
• Bring several paper resumes to all in-person interviews

No matter whether you’re writing for a website or writing your resume, you can use different SEO techniques to help you succeed. So supercharge your employment opportunities like you search engine optimize your site!