My most successful student to date

I recently had a student who graduated our undergrad program in April get a job at Apple in California as a senior front-end software engineer. The curious can see the salary range here. I won't reveal the figure here. If you're from the midwest, in particular Michigan, where we've had a 10 year recession with median income dropping by $10,000 during that period, you'll be astonished. It's easy for a person in my student's current career to earn 4X to 5X the Michigan median income.

Was he a typical student? No,

• he started a company (that didn't succeed) while he was at school;
• he was remarkably inquisitive and constantly pushing;
• he took my spring/summer web marketing practicum course;
• he went to California on speculation that he could get a job in a startup; not for a job but on speculation he could find one.

That said, the job search strategies he used are available to anyone and consisted of networking. Here's the particular approach he used:

• He created his portfolio and published it on his own branded web site, which you can find here. A key feature of the site is that it is targeted at his potential employers, stating exactly what it is he wanted to do and showing what he could bring to the table.
• He covered the waterfront. He sent his resume to all companies that were his target market; then heard nothing.
• However, one person did respond on the basis of the web portfolio, and my student met with him individually, and showed him something he had built. Every successful student I've had has been so because they showed a relevant work product with results either from one of my class projects or from something they did on the side. As this student puts it,

so out of mild desperation I took the source code from an application I had developed, and retrofitted my portfolio with it  and I met with this guy, and instead of having a formal interview about the job I had applied  I told him "Let me show you something I've built".

• He used all of his background but put it in the context of the jobs he was applying for. For instance, his search marketing coursework was discussed in the context of building a new search marketing platform at one company.
• From there, it exploded. Ultimately, he had companies competing for him.

In sum, the key here is that the student created a strong story and then communicated it. That obviously took first creating the story, but he also had to know how to communicate it.

Non-profit AdWords Internship Opportunity

This is a great opportunity for a student looking to build his or her skills. The pay starts out reasonably for someone who has not yet garnered significant professional experience. If you succeed at opportunities like this one, expect your pay to go up over by a good multiple over a short period of time.

If you're interested, contact me, and I will forward you the contact person.

Here's the job description:

Per our conversation in March, I am very interested in recruiting one or two of your students to work with several of the organizations participating in our federally funded nonprofit capacity building project. See the list of these organizations below.

We are looking for students who have done well in your class on Google marketing and want additional hands-on experience.  We have budget to pay them $12 per hour.  Based on my conversation with you we are projecting that each organization would need an average of two to three hours per week of onsite support and assistance. This could vary by organization, given the range of experience and sophistication in marketing, and use of the Internet by the staff at these organizations.

This “internship” or consulting assignment would begin in late April or by May 1 with the first two organizations on the list below. We hope that the next three would have their official acceptance and account established sometime between mid-May and the beginning of June.

The work schedule, days of the week and hours per week, time onsite vs offsite, would be worked-out with each organization.

This opportunity would continue through the Fall term, although the work in the Fall would likely be less intensive.  In the Fall the hourly compensation rate would be increased.

Our objective is to help the organizations build their own capacity to continue to use this marketing channel, and to make maximum use of the Google AdWords dollars.

Organizations:

Accepted, final information submitted, and awaiting  account set-up:

1. Grandmont-Rosedale Community Development Corporation

2. Mercy Education Project

Awaiting acceptance into the AdWords program (expected very soon - applied September 2010):

1. Jefferson East Business Association

2. Abayomi Community Development Corporation

3. POWER Inc.

I appreciate you sharing this with your students, and welcome any recommendations you may care to make as to students who would be particularly appropriate for this opportunity.

Your students should contact me if they are interested.

Fluency Media is hiring, and we have a contact

I met with a former student from Fluency Media, a growing digital marketing firm in Ann Arbor. They're currently going from a firm of 20 to 24. If you're wondering about the type of clients they have, Fluency Media handles the the digital side of the Pure Michigan campaign among others.

Here's the link to Fluency Media's employment page. In this time when most are firms are talking about layoffs or "shared sacrifice", it's great to see an industry where many firms are willing to compete for the right talent.

Who is the right talent? From my talk with the student, the following are definite pluses:

• Google certification (this applies to a number of students from last year's web marketing practicum)
• Social media
• Multimedia (youtube, video, interactive)

If you're a current or former student, a great way to proceed is to email Search, Social, and Mobile, and I'll connect you.