The Business of Online Marketing

Important Places to Find Team Members

In this chapter we're going to discuss about where to find good team members. First of all you have to know that finding good people is not an easy task is probably one of the hardest things in your entire business actually. After all your interest in your brand and your work and even your own reputation in the hands of other people and sometimes it's scary especially as an entrepreneur with that super hero syndrome wanting to do everything yourself.

It is hard to let go of the reins. But like I said in order to grow in order to make more money you have to hire a good team. And it all goes back to the system that you have in place. That's why it's so important to put this system in place and then it goes into how well you're able to train and then lead your team. So where do you choose to find your staff is up to you.

If you're thinking domestic the first and best place to start is of book with your own network. Just put the word out that you're hiring and you should be able to get a great head start. That went from there. You can try places like Monster and other traditional job posting web sites and I've found that Craigslist and LinkedIn are have proven to be very effective places to find good candidates as well.

Just be ready to pull your ad after you get hundreds of applications in one day. Not even joking it it's happened a lot of times when you throw up an ad on Craigslist and it has an appealing job duty and especially if it uses the words like a remote work agreement or arrangement or work from home that kind of thing or telecommuting.

You're going to get a lot of job applications that you're going to have to sort through. So that's the catch with that. If you're looking to utilize amazing talent internationally or even domestically oDesk and Elance now actually they're both the same company.

They're both great places to find people. Also Chris Ducker I mentioned in the last chapter in the last chapter he has a program called virtual staff finder. And what they'll do is they'll actually find people for you of book for a fee it's like a headhunting service.

They'll find people for you. And I've had great luck personally when using this service. So when using Web sites like oDesk and Elance you can get a head start by screening the applicants by searching with certain parameters that you set. You can refine your search to country and you can include years of experience the hours that you've logged and so forth.

In fact in many cases you can even take a look at someone's portfolio or before contacting them. So it's a great way to get a head start on finding some great people. When you decide to post your job screening excuse me once you decide I'm reading ahead. Be ruthless in your screen and that's what I'm going to tell you. Once you decided to post your job opening you want to be.

You're going to be you've got to be prepared to get a lot of applicants. And so to be effective with your time you've got to be ruthless in your screening. If the applicant doesn't have the exact qualities that you're looking for them just delete them from the list.

That seems harsh but for your own sake of your own time you've got to do that you've got to just be ruthless. So when you've narrowed down your list to around 10 applicants or so it's time to start interacting a bit with them. And what she can do is you can send them a quick note letting them know that you're interested in them and then ask them some very specific questions.

Also what you can do is ask them to do something specific and make sure that they're to make sure that their details are detail oriented. So here's an example. A friend of mine asks applicants to put the name of their favorite animal in that e-mail subject line. He'll embed his request deep into the message so that he knows that they're really reading everything that he says and that they can follow simple instructions.

Also if he gets a reply then from that person and that animal isn't in the e-mail line he automatically deletes it because it's clear to him that they didn't follow even the simplest of instructions. So in addition to an applicant's answers and also taking a look at the portfolio and other details you want to pay attention to their response time.

If they're quick to get back to you this should move them to the head of the line if they're taking a little while to get back to you. Not a good sign especially from the start when they're trying to get a job. So again you've got to be ruthless when you're screening people.

But the good thing is there's a ton of great talent out there shouldn't have any problem finding anybody. So finally you want to narrow it down to your top three candidates when you have a list narrowed down to the top three candidates and you're going to do a personal interview with them.

If they're in another country or if they're working remote then you can do an interview over Skype. And this works perfectly. You can also use Google Hangouts if you like or face them whatever you want to do. That's Scott is kind of the default communication for people that are living abroad.

Usually this is the final step. And when you're able to discuss with somebody and you're able to interact with them. And so that face to face so to speak this usually let you know who are the best candidate it is and sometimes it's hard but you have to go with your gut and make your hire.

The last time that I made to hire myself I had to narrow it down to three candidates and there were two people that I thought were great and one guy that I am not as much. I got on the phone with them I got on Skype with them and the guy that I was ranking third became the guy that I hired because I was impressed with him why I was able to see him and to speak with him.

So you've got to go get sometimes and then make your hire that way. Then what you've got to do is get busy plugging them into this system that you've already created. And we've discussed about that a little bit and now we're going to discuss a little bit more about some effective sales and marketing strategies to really scale up your business.