Blog Post: How to follow up after the Career Expo

How many times have you (job seeker) applied to a job or had a conversation with a recruiter at a job fair only to hear nothing back, not a call, not a letter, not even an auto response to say thank you for your resume? Sound like a familiar occurrence? Probably not surprising as many recruiters and hiring managers are inundated with resumes. They get resumes from their online job postings, their postings that are on their websites, from 100 other candidates that stopped by their booth (including you) that particular day at that job fair. "So what!", you say, "They should still be able to contact me to tell me they are not interested in me so I can move on, or tell me that it may be a few day, weeks till I hear something". But instead of waiting to hear back, if you want to increase your chances of getting that position or of getting that interview, you should be the one who follows up.

I've spoken with many recruiters and I wanted to share with you some of their advice for the best way to follow up. So don't take my word for it take theirs, as they are the ones who you need to impress. Here is some advice for a good follow up:

"Try to gauge the level of interest that a company has in them and their resume at the event. We often want to see if people will have the follow up and follow through to get back in touch with us - our interaction with them will determine how/if we want follow up."

"It impresses me when a candidate expresses with some degree of enthusiasm
that they've applied for the position and that they are following up in
order to ensure that their application/resume has been received. I like to
hear them ask questions about the position in regards to duties, skills
required, schedule, etc. They need not be too long-winded when they follow
up nor should they assume they are calling to set an interview time."

"An e-mail stating who the person is, where we met (i.e. Jobing.com Career Expo), their interest level.

2. In the e-mail include all documents the employer requested at the fair or on their website (for us this is resume, transcripts, 3-5 professional contacts)

3. These two items above will give the employer a refresher in addition to showing initiative from providing the documents needed for an employer to proceed to the next step.

4. In any recruitment meeting candidates should follow up as discussed with the employer. That could mean sending documents, doing more research etc."

So you see there are many things that recruiters are looking for. Good luck at our next event and keep watching the list of employers and make sure you do your pre-event research!