Introduction to Affiliate Marketing for Resume Writers

I get a lot of questions from resume writers about how to avoid the "Time for Dollars" Trap -- that is, how to unlink your income from billable hours. Affiliate marketing is one way to start this journey.

You may be doing affiliate marketing without even knowing it. For example, if you write a resume and refer your client to Bob Bronstein at Profile Research to research employers and distribute the resume and cover letter, you’re engaging in affiliate marketing. If your client mentions that you referred them to Bob, he will send you a check for a percentage of the order. That’s affiliate marketing.

Affiliate marketing is a revenue sharing opportunity between two companies. Business one (the “advertiser”) pays business two, the “publisher” (that’s you) for sending new customers to them. They may pay you for “traffic” — which is visits to your site; they may pay you for “leads” — which are qualified customer names who may end up purchasing their products or services; or they may only pay for sales, or when a purchase is actually made.

You can choose to be an affiliate for an individual company (on their website, look at the very bottom of the page and you might find a link for “Affiliates”) or join an affiliate network. Affiliate networks connect advertisers with publishers. Companies that offer their affiliate programs through networks often are making a significant commitment to their affiliate program, because they’re paying anywhere from $500 to $6000 or more to be a part of that affiliate network. Advertisers that also have a dedicated individual to serve as their affiliate relationship manager are also more committed to the success of their affiliate program — which means more support for you.

You can also work with individual providers. Profile Research is an example of this. Bob tracks the business you refer to him without the use of an affiliate network, and without a formal affiliate program. If you are a resume writer, you might also set up this type of relationship with a career coach, if you don’t offer career coaching yourself. The client mentions they were referred by you, and the career coach might pay you a flat fee or percentage of the client’s order. The same might be true if you are a career coach who refers to a resume writer. (If you're interested in pursuing this type of informal relationship, I suggest the "Developing Strategic Alliances and Partnerships with Recruiters" Special Report, which also covers developing referral relationships with other third parties, including career coaches.)

There is also a third type of affiliate program. I mentioned the terms “advertiser” and “publisher” to describe the companies. The placement of ads on your online content is also a type of affiliate marketing. The most common of these relationships is with Google’s AdSense program. Any business can purchase ads through Google’s AdWords program. If your website or blog matches the demographics of the customer the advertiser is looking to reach, his or her ads will appear on your content, and you’ll get paid for people who look at the ad … and you’ll get paid more when they click on the ad.

P.S. One of my most popular blog posts was an interview I conducted with Steve Shellist with ResumeSpider.com on affiliate marketing for resume writers. Check it out here.

Career Directors International 2010 TORI Award Nominees/Winners

Each year since 2000, Career Directors International (CDI) has sponsored the Toast of the Resume Industry(tm) (TORI) resume writing competition. Here are the 2009 winners.

The director of the TORI Awards is Gayle Howard, of Top Margin Career Marketing.

First-tier judges include:
Cheryl Lynch Simpson, Executive Resume Rescue
Robin Schlinger, Robin's Resumes
Tamara Dowling, SeekingSuccess.com
Barbara Safani, Career Solvers

Second-tier judges are:
Susan Guarneri, AssessmentGoddess.com
Tony Deblauwe, HR4Change
Susan Joyce, Job-Hunt.org
Marty Weitzman, Gilbert Resumes
Sharon Williams, JobRockit

The 2010 Toast of the Resume Industry Nominees and Winners are...

Best Career Change Resume Nominees
Laura Smith-Proulx, An Expert Resume
Mary DeLuca, Preferred Résumé® Group, LLC
Maureen McCann, ProMotion Career Solutions
Wayne Pagani, W.P. Consulting & Associates
August Cohen, Get Hired Stay Hired, LLC

Best Cover Letter Nominees
Holly Reslink, EmpowerLink, LLC
Karen Bartell, Best-in-Class Resumes
Patricia Duckers, CareerPro Global Inc.
Surranna Sandy, Resume Solutions
Camille Roberts, CC Career Services
Doug Morrison, Career Power

Best Creative Resume Nominees
Rosa Vargas, Creating Prints
August Cohen, Get Hired Stay Hired, LLC
Jeri Hird Dutcher, Workwrite
Kris Plantrich, ResumeWonders Writing and Career Coaching Services
Michelle Riklan, Riklan Resources

Best Executive Resume Nominees
Alexander Kofman, Resume Pros 4 Less
Laura Smith-Proulx, An Expert Resume
Rosa Vargas, Creating Prints
August Cohen, Get Hired Stay Hired, LLC
Erin Kennedy, Professional Resume Services
Holly Reslink, EmpowerLink, LLC
Jennifer Rushton, Keraijen

Best New Graduate Resume Nominees
Ginger Korljan, Take Charge Coaching
Jennifer Rushton, Keraijen
Laura Smith-Proulx, An Expert Resume
August Cohen, Get Hired Stay Hired, LLC
Barb Poole, Hire Imaging, LLC

Best International Resume Nominees
Beverley Neil, d'Scriptive Words
Debra Mills, Pro-CV Writing Services
Kim Mohiuddin, Movin' On Up Resumes
August Cohen, Get Hired Stay Hired, LLC
Peter Hill, P.H.I. Consulting

Best Military Conversion Resume Nominees
Mark Holmes, CareerPro Global, Inc.
Michael Kranes, Resume Slayer
Terrie Osborn, Resumes Etc.
Camille Roberts, CC Career Services
Debra Mills, Pro-CV Writing Services
Fran Sheridan, CareerPro Global, Inc.

Best Sales/Marketing Resume Nominees
Laura Smith-Proulx, An Expert Resume

Surranna Sandy, Resume Solutions

Karen D'Anna, Write On Resume Services
Holly Reslink, EmpowerLink, LLC
Jennifer Rushton, Keraijen

Best Technical Resume Nominees
Cheryl Milmoe, Career Management Solutions
Jennifer Rushton, Keraijen
Laura Smith-Proulx, An Expert Resume
August Cohen, Get Hired Stay Hired, LLC
Alexander Kofman, Resume Pros 4 Less

* * * *

Winners were announced at CDI's Award Ceremony at the 2010 Career Empowerment Summit last October in San Diego. First-place winners are identified in bold-italics (above).

Learn more about the TORI Award competition.

Happy Birthday, Justin Bieber!

Okay, so I'm not 14 years old. But I have seen Justin Bieber's movie (in 3D, no less!) -- Never Say Never.

I didn't know much about JB before I saw the movie -- other that what I read in People magazine, for the most part. But my brother has five little girls (ages 4-13) and they've seen the movie seven times now, so Jon and I came along to see it for my niece (& goddaughter) Lauren's birthday in mid-February.

I have to say, I'm impressed. The kid has talent -- and beyond that, he has something to teach resume writers about branding, social media, and (client) relationship management.

As a brand, he's a force. Seven million+ followers on Twitter. More than 6,000 Tweets sent (I'm sure by now he has a social media team helping him with it, but in the early days, it was all him!) More than 22 MILLION Facebook fans for his brand page. And when he cut his hair, he (reportedly) lost 80,000 Twitter followers. Amazing.

A guest post on the TechCrunch blog today gets it: "What Every Entrepreneur Could Learn from Justin Bieber." The BrittInspired blog opines on "What Justin Bieber Taught Me About Social Media."

My favorite bit of wisdom from that post:
 The Bieb’s career started when a talent manager found a video of him singing on YouTube. That’s all it takes. One great piece of content. One person to notice you and unimaginable things can happen. No one is going to notice you if they don’t know you’re there.

Plus, the kid is inspiring. So is the movie. Go see it.
Happy 17th Birthday, Justin Bieber!

Resume Writers Digest 2008 Subcontractor Survey

I have just updated the "Making Money as a Resume Subcontractor" Special Report with the results of the more recent 2009 Resume Writers' Digest Subcontractor Survey. (I will be conducting the 2010/2011 survey in the next few weeks.)

Because the information was replaced in the report, I've decided to "archive" the 2008 results writeup in this blog post.

As you might expect, for many resume writers, subcontracting is a way to smooth out the peaks and valleys of self-employment, at least according to the responses in the Resume Writers’ Digest 2008 Subcontracting Survey.

Sixty-six resume writers completed the survey. Of those, 56 percent are currently subcontract writers, either for an individual or a firm. The rest used to write resumes as a contractor, but are not currently doing so.

More than half of those responding have been subcontracting for at least three years, and fully half of those responding only write for one individual or firm. Most writers produce 1-2 projects per week as a subcontractor.

Compensation

The opportunity to earn extra income is often the driving force behind the decision to subcontract. Interestingly, the average pay for nearly half of all writers was between $51-$150 per project. Nearly three- quarters of writers are paid a flat fee for each project they accept, receiving 21-35% of the client’s charge, in most cases.

Typical projects include a resume and cover letter together (55 percent), followed by a resume only (18 percent). Other services include bios, thank you/follow-up notes, interview preparation training, KSAs, and ASCII text conversions.

Project Management

Most subcontracting projects are assigned via e-mail (61 percent), although a substantial number are also assigned over the phone (17 percent) or through a web portal (12 percent).

The average turnaround time is 3-5 days (33 percent), although shorter timeframes (24-48 hours — 23 percent; 48-72 hours — 28 percent) are not uncommon.

Because standardization is one key to working with a large volume of clients, it’s not surprising that 35 percent of resume writers work with clients via e-mail contact only, transforming old résumés and client worksheets into new documents.

What the writer produces is also fairly uniform — 56 percent of writers work with the client from the draft production through project finalization, working directly with the client to make changes. Seventeen percent produce a draft version only, and 20 percent create the draft but then work with the contracting individual or firm to finalize the project.

Some contracting firms supply templates (24 percent), while most prefer the writer produce the document entirely from scratch (46 percent).

Most subcontract writers are generalists; however, for those that specialize, they most often identify themselves as experts in writing executive resumes.

Substantial growth in subcontracting opportunities exists for resume writers who specialize in federal resumes, as only three percent of survey respondents reported they specialize in this area, and demand from firms seeking subcontractors who have expertise in writing federal resumes continues to grow.