Since opening our doors, we’ve placed over 630 candidates with 170 different partners. Conversations, feedback, and many other factors make these connections happen, including staying on top of the constantly-evolving job market.
What does the current landscape look like? Where’s it headed? What are the biggest challenges affecting both job seekers and employers? To be able to answer these questions, we combine what we’re hearing from our candidates with the latest data available.
Today, we’re sharing five tips for job seekers of all industries, education levels, and backgrounds, based on this data. Hopefully, they’ll be the secret ingredients you need to land your next dream job as quickly, easily, and safely as possible.
5 data-backed ways to land your next job
1. SEO optimize your LinkedIn page
Did you know that eight people are hired on LinkedIn every minute? This is a helpful reminder that as you look for your next job, recruiters offering that job are looking for you too.
By optimizing your LinkedIn page for the types of roles you’re trying to land, you make it easier for these recruiters to find you through LinkedIn’s search engine.
This mainly means adding relevant keywords to your profile headline, summary, skills, and experience sections. These sections should also include:
- Your name
- Locations (for example, “chef” + “job” + “Toronto” + “Canada” if you’re trying to get hired as a chef in Toronto)
- Industry keywords
- The word “jobs”
Learn more about how to improve your LinkedIn SEO.
2. Be more selective in applying (and clearly show how you’re qualified)
As simple as it sounds, in a world of spray and pray applying, being more selective in the roles you apply for—and formatting your applications the right way—can be a faster route to getting hired.
This comes from unqualified talent being reported as a top-five issue for nearly half of employers. There are all sorts of possible reasons for this, but one of them is mass, unscrupulous applications by job seekers.
Taking a little extra time to make sure you’re qualified for the roles you’re applying for can help you stand out from the crowd.
Sometimes the problem isn’t that you’re underqualified but that your resume, cover letter, and portfolio don’t present you in the right light. To effectively show your qualification, cover how your experience relates to the specific prerequisites included in the job description, down to using the same language.
For example, if the job description says “must have relevant team management experience”, you might include somewhere in your CV “I have relevant team management experience doing x, y, and z”.
More generally, include as much of the language from job descriptions in your CV as possible (only where it’s natural, avoid stuffing keywords). This will help show relevant experience but also optimize your applications for the software recruiters use to sort through their applications.
3. Be aware of employment scams
When you worry about being scammed, banking or renting likely come to mind. But with the Better Business Bureau reporting an increase in job scams in the past several years, job seeking now needs to also be on your radar.
Through phishing attacks, malware, and other methods, scammers are stealing passwords, financial information, and other personal details from job seekers.
Fake, slightly misspelled websites are often used to carry this out. For example, “Pepsii.com” instead of “Pepsi.com”. The appearance of these fake sites is also nearly identical to the real ones.
Another scam is fake employers sending you links to click on or files to download, which contain malware. This malware can then monitor keystrokes, take screenshots, and steal passwords from a variety of applications.
Other signs that you may be dealing with a fake employer are too-good-to-be-true benefits and a faster than usually hiring and onboarding process. For example, asking for your bank information first thing to send a generous home office stipend.
All of this is to say that, while job scams are still rare, they are happening more and more. To stay safe in your job search, watch out for the signs above and others like them.
4. Stay current with job growth by industry
In terms of where job growth is happening, Stats Canada reported the following industries as having the most new openings in June:
- Wholesale and retail trade (+33,000 jobs)
- Manufacturing (+27,000)
- Health care and social assistance (+21,000)
- Transportation and warehousing (+10,000)
This is where the demand is headed. Even if you’re not originally trained in these areas, if you’re interested, it could be worth seeing how you can pivot your skillset to apply to one of them.
Meanwhile, declines happened in the following industries:
- Construction (-14,000 jobs)
- Educational services (-14,000)
- Agriculture (-6,000)
This doesn’t mean you won’t land a job in these industries, just that you’ll be competing for fewer open positions.
5. Stay current with job growth by location
If you’re not tied to one area of the country, relocating could be the key to landing your next role.
For example, 93% of Canada’s job growth is happening in Ontario. You read that right: 93%! If you want to be in the belly of the beast for Canadian job growth, Ontario is where it’s at.
Or, if your role is remote-friendly, you might not even need to move; just expand your search to also include Ontario-based roles.
6. Consider high-paying jobs that don’t need degrees
Not having the right education doesn’t have to stand in the way of getting a high-paying job.
According to Indeed, here are Canada’s top-paying jobs that don’t require a university degree:
- Warehouse Worker: $34,236/year
- Receptionist: $35,235/year
- Accounting Clerk: $44,220/year
- Landscape Technician: $44,262/year
- Miner: $45,156/year
- Theatre Practitioner: $48,318/year
- Translator: $49,316/year
- Dental Assistant: $49,753/year
- Claims Adjuster: $51,987/year
- Executive Chef: $63,788/year
- Maintenance Manager: $76,025/year
- Mobile Developer: $80,778/year
- Train Conductor: $85,393/year
- Nuclear Power Reactor Operator: $88,253/year
Keep in mind that the names of these roles can differ slightly. If a role sounds similar but doesn’t match exactly, it could still be worth applying to.
Hopefully, using these tips, this is the year you land the perfect role. Improve your chances even more by taking advantage of our free resources for job seekers (scroll to the bottom of the page).
For more help making your next job the right one, consider hiring a recruitment partner like ML6. From intake to offer, and beyond, we help provide you with a job search solution that’s tailored to your interests and desires, and motivations.
About ML6
ML6 Search + Talent Advisory is a recruitment and talent advisory firm located in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA). We provide customized solutions to support our clients throughout the employee lifecycle. We help our clients attract and retain talent by advising on people programs, processes, and best practices.
