During the first six months I was unemployed, before my sign board experience, I had been satisfied with a standard format resume, a basic LinkedIn profile and a casual Facebook profile. I did not have a personal brand, a blog or a cohesive marketing platform.
I was not thinking in terms of marketing at all.
I was thinking about job boards, phone calls and networking—essential aspects of any job search—but unless you use them effectively by first developing a brand, marketing platform and strategy, you will need to be very lucky to find a job, especially during a weak economy.
I was not lucky with my job search and did not find a job.
Instead, my family and I got prepared to leave our apartment, put our belongings in storage and face an uncertain future.
Then came my moment of inspiration when I decided to stand out on Park Avenue wearing a sign board and hand out resumes.
It was a wonderful idea, but I did not think of it in terms of marketing or publicity—that was my wife’s idea.
If Cindy had not thought of taking a photograph and sending it out with a press release to several local newspapers, and if her friend Matt Hagan of Bulldog Public Relations had not advise her on how to go about doing that in a professional and effective manner, I doubt I would have gotten much publicity, if any at all—and it certainly would not have happened so fast.
I did not go out to Park Avenue wearing a sign board in order to generate publicity. I was not even prepared for that. I went out to distribute my resume, generate a few new leads and find a job.
Once my picture, story and contact information was in newspapers and magazines, on television and popular Internet sites nationally and internationally, I started receiving hundreds of telephone calls and emails from around the world.
Dear Mr. Persky:
Hello. My name is Sun Young living in South Korea.
(It take almost 13 hours to travel from USA to Korea, my country.)
I am just writing to let you know one woman is cheering you in Korea.
Also she is very impressed by your braveness and positive attitude about your life.
I happened on the article about you at Naver, one of the most popular web sites in Korea. It was the time just after visiting Career Center.
My consultant advised me to make a clear goal in my life.
I felt there was no way I could go to.
After reading the article about you, I think I will encourage myself.
I hope you will get a good position soon.
Please remember this. Finally you will win because you are brave and positive.
God will take care of you.
2008.6.26
Sun, your new friend in Korea
Dear Mr. Persky,
I don’t know whether the mail reaches you but I have the strong need to write you some words. I saw the “Weltspiegel” report on unemployment and poverty in New York yesterday on TV in Germany. On the one hand I asked myself why everybody must live in NYC, on the other hand, being an American I could imagine to do so as well.
I was very very impressed by your way trying to solve the problem. I am aware that you don’t need other people to feel sorry for you but I did so in the most positive sense. I would like to let you know that I have seen you and that I will not forget you just for the way in which you present yourself and the courage and pride which you emanate just standing there on Park Ave.
Mr. Persky, I would be very happy if you could let me know when you have found the job you and your family needs so much. Please give my regards and best wishes to your wife and your children and I press my thumbs!
Sincerely, Klaus
Hi 珀 斯 基,
I am a Chinese boy in Hangzhou (周 宁). I'm 19 years old. I have just finished the high school university exams this June and now I'm waiting for the high school admission. I learned your story from our local newspaper. I really admire your courage to put down your status to find job in the street like the people during 1929 to 1933 in your country. Whatever others people says, don't care at all .他 们 只 是 说 风 凉 话 罢 了.Keep up your courage and be yourself.
Good luck with your finding your job.
By the way, when you are tired, I introduce you some Chinese music which will makes you relaxed. I hope you like them.
Please give a reply when you receive my e-mail.
Hi Joshua
Am a guy from Cyprus my name is Christodoulos, not gona offer you a job - sorry. Just wanted to let you know that i personally believe what you are doing is courageous and smart and descent and inspirational. What a better way to find a job. Most people would not have the balls to do what you did. But everyone is wearing a label. The only difference is that you are exposing it to potential employers n if they are smart n thinking outside the box, they’ll hire you. Plus, it seems much more time efficient than e-mailing your CV n cover letter to them, we all know what long procedure and that is n how depressing it can get especially if you are not fresh out from the university. You’ll get a job if you haven’t already am positive. Hey if i saw your ad hear in a Cyprus newspaper, then you have written history my friend, you may even found a new way of searching for a job. I think I’ll print a t-shirt of mine with my CV all over it. Nowadays, everyone can have access on my personal data anyways through Google, Hi5, Facebook n God knows what else. Keep up the good work man. You are not alone now. You owe it to the world to find a job, make a difference at your work n become successful so that new generations can get inspired by you.
Planet love
Christodoulos
Joshua,
Read about you today on NY TIMES -- that is incredibly brave of you and I hope you will find something soon for you and your family.
I just graduated with my MBA and am finding the job market real tough, myself!
Best of luck -- in the meantime, let's get linked in!!
~ Dan
I saw the article about you on AOL...very ingenious...if I were looking to hire someone in your field I would definitely give you a try just based on your creativity and ingenuity...did you get any interviews?
Michael
I saw you on Fox News this morning rather creatively promoting yourself to potential employers. I just wanted to wish you good luck in your endeavors. I'm sure thinking outside of the box is going to pay off for you (especially with the promotion you got from Fox!).
Dear Josh,
I am sorry to see that you have been affected by the down turn but your genius idea has probably landed you many job offers by now. Maybe you should think of being in a creative job like PR or Advertising.
Joshua,
Hats off to you for your creativity, boldness and chutzpah. I certainly could never do what you are doing.
Joshua, I caught your photo in my local paper (Temple, Texas) after they picked it up from AP. I applaud your effort and courage. I am sure you have now been blessed with thousands of offers.
You are an inspiration!
The calls and emails were encouraging, but I had not planned on getting so much publicity and was not sure what to do with the calls and emails that were not job leads—which was the overwhelming majority of them.
My inclination was to respond to each person, so that’s what I did.
At my wife’s urging, I kept my communications brief, so I could concentrate on finding a job—but I made lots of new email pals, Facebook friends and LinkedIn contacts and spoke with many fascinating people from around the world.
It was amazing to get calls from India, China, Malaysia, Japan and Korea, as well as from Argentina, Brazil and Columbia.
Many of the people who contacted me and many of the media people who interviewed me assumed my extensive publicity would immediately lead to re-employment, but that was not the case.
I had not expected the publicity and had not been prepared for it.
I kept doing exactly what I had been doing before—sending out resumes, making phone calls and setting up meetings and interviews. Other than having a lot of public exposure, the only difference was that I had much larger network and half a dozen new and exciting leads.
As far as I was concerned, that was a great success—as that had been my goal all along.
Yet, a few weeks after my initial and intense publicity, my fame continued to blossom, but my job leads did not lead anywhere.
One by one, my job leads fizzled out—or due to business travel, vacations or the worsening economic environment, follow-up meetings were pushed off until late August or early September.
Perhaps if I had developed a cohesive marketing platform to reinforce my resume, experience and personal communications skills, I would have been able to quickly leverage my publicity into a job offer—but that was yet to happen.
Fortunately, by the end of July so many people from all over the country and all around the world had contacted me and continued to contact me with words of encouragement—and my communications with them had become so time-consuming—I knew I had to do something.
I had never considered starting a blog before, but many of the people who called and wrote to me asked me to let them know how things turned out.
Also, many of the journalists who interviewed me asked me to let them know as soon as I found a job.
I also wanted to keep a diary of my media exposure, write about my job hunting experience and the interesting people and opportunities I was encountering, post my resume, find a job—and perhaps even derive some advertising income.
Blogging was getting a lot of media attention and seemed more suitable to my needs than a static web site. My only problem was that I had no idea what blogging might involve or how to get started.
Almost instinctually, I did a search on LinkedIn and contacted a fellow in San Francisco named Brandon Peele whose profile stated he was a consultant in business development and social networking.
I wrote him a brief description of my situation and requested to connect with him.
Brandon quickly accepted my request and replied, “Joshua, Yes, definitely. Get started with a blog. I use TypePad because it’s easy to get started and you can add a ton of features.”
He also included his telephone number, so I called him to learn more—and he was extremely helpful and encouraging.
After speaking with Brandon, I was certainly closer to taking the leap, but I still had hesitations.
Was it really as simple and as inexpensive as he claimed—or was it going to end up being a costly and time-consuming technical nightmare? Would I have enough compelling content to maintain an interesting blog? Would a blog help me or distract me from finding a job?
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