

Ask HN: Using search ads to target potential employers Good or Bad? - taylorlb

Curious what HN thinks about targeting current employees of a startup where I would like to work with FB ads that express my desire to work there. My thinking is that anything that might help me stand out from other candidates can't hurt, but do you think this is too much? Potentially negative even?
======
patio11
Let's say that between thinking this up, questioning the utility of it, asking
HN, and actually implementing it takes only one hour.

You know what you could do in an hour, trivially? Find the person who can say
"Hire Taylorlb" and invite them to lunch or coffee. Alternatively, find
someone who they trust and get a warm intro like "Still looking for a $FOO?
You should talk to Taylorlb."

You can try more exotic ways to break into $TARGET but walking through the
open front door is a good place to start. Bonus points: many people competing
with you are pathologically unable to find the front door because they think
it is cheating.

~~~
taylorlb
I actually know one of the people hiring the position and have traded a couple
emails with him about my interest. I also had someone he respects recommend me
so perhaps I'm already doing better than I thought I was.

I put the ads on hold after reading a couple of these comments since no one
seemed to have a "totally. go for it" response. For what it's worth, the CTR
was actually really high. Hope those who clicked did so with a smile.

------
nostrademons
I think it would be creepy to target rank & file employees of your target
employer with FB ads. Most of them aren't in a position to help anyway.

It might be interesting to buy AdWords on your name so your preferred spiel
comes up when people Google you. I'm not sure if it's all that much more
effective than just having a decent homepage though.

------
WillyF
I actually "invented" this idea back in 2008 ( here's my post:
[http://www.onedayonejob.com/blog/use-facebook-ads-to-make-
em...](http://www.onedayonejob.com/blog/use-facebook-ads-to-make-employers-
hunt-you-down/) ). A lot of people have come up with it independently since.
Because it's done before, it's not nearly as interesting as when people were
first doing it, but it's great if you want to get into online advertising or
marketing--shows your skills.

If you're having trouble getting on people's radar, it's worth a try, but it's
probably not your best bet.

------
kirillzubovsky
What type of work do you want to do that startup? If it's something marketing
related, then use marketing tricks, but if you want to write code, then make
something useful for their startup and offer, perhaps, as open source. Unless
you are trying to brainwash them to remember your photo subconsciously, ads
aren't going to do any good.

~~~
taylorlb
It's a marketing position. I don't expect much to come from running ads, but I
am curious to see if it can give me some sort of mind share advantage perhaps.
Maybe someone unrelated to the position sees it and then emails someone who is
involved in that dept pointing out how "this guy is really eager". I'm more
than qualified for the position, but I'm concerned it's so competative I'll
get lost in the noise.

