Branding 1. Presentation skills: Once you know yourself, your target audience and the needed skill set, the next boost to your job search is personal branding. The market needs to know your value proposition: What do you bring to the table? Let it flow through your personal interactions, resume, online presence and other presentations. At its heart, branding is communicating what differentiates you from everyone else. To brand yourself effectively for a job search, you need to understand what appeals to your audience and find a way to authentically communicate what you can offer that audience as a job candidate. Consistency is key. If you have two or more types of target roles for your search, find a way to appeal to the different audiences without confusing or diluting your message. This may mean tailoring your resume and in-person pitch to each individual role but straddling across both messages on your LinkedIn profile and other social media, for example. It is quite an art, so invest the time in research and revisions to get it right. 2. Positive outlook: Job seekers can get so intensely focused on their search that they let other aspects of their lives slip. Keep up the things that get your endorphins firing, even if it takes some time away from your search. Otherwise, your personal branding will miss the most essential element: presenting yourself as an energized candidate ready to take on projects and do what it takes to build up an organization. While job search may be -- and, if you are unemployed, often should be -- a full-time job, it should not be your entire life. Whether your search is a marathon or a sprint, you will need those endorphins to give you a boost, both to create opportunities and to ensure you “show up” in your best light when opportunities do present themselves. No one wants to hire a job candidate that is mired in anxiety. We all want people on our teams who bring out the best in us, so continue to bring out the best in yourself so you can carry that energy into your search. Getting In Front Of Decision Makers In any job search, the goal is to convince decision makers to hire you for an open role or create opportunities for you. In almost all cases, this requires knowing the right connection to reach decisionmakers, such as recruiters, networking contacts or the individuals directly. Nowadays, the vast majority of jobs are found through networking, which means that candidates who get in front of decision makers through a trusted contact who can vouch for them are much more likely to be hired. If you have spent years building a strong network or advancing your career to a place where you are poised to help others or be attractive to recruiters, it will be easier to make the right contacts to get in front of decision makers. This is where many job seekers get stuck, not only introverts and others who are not natural networkers. If not, it can be tempting to view networking as a transactional exercise -- a m