One thing that I see consistently throughout not only my industry but other related industries is that too much weight is put on the resume. Don’t get me wrong, seeing whether or not someone was fired from a job is a good thing to do know – but more often than not companies now will even lie about references with specific people. “That doesn’t happen” – yes, it does. More often than not I see that consistently throughout a lot of people my age (younger 20′s) and employers just think that we’re kids that don’t know anything. People need to stop thinking that your pay grade is determined by your age and “experience”; as it should be more-so decided off of your skill and the effort that you put forth. I don’t care if you’re 18 or 38, if the 18 year old is bringing me 40% of my company’s profit and the 38 year old is bringing me 15%, I’m going to switch their positions and pay grades. Performance gets results, and results make money.
That’s the entire basis of Performance Marketing (also see PMA for good, reputable information regarding the “overall picture”) which I’m very focused in is to get rewarded by companies for how much success you bring them. If a company brings on a sales associate where they answer calls and try to convert leads, and you pay for the leads in the first place they shouldn’t get that high of a percentage. However, there are people like me, who will advertise not only products but generate leads for companies and get paid a lot more (sometimes up to 100% of the initial payment, 75% for the life of the customer, etc) due to the fact that the company doesn’t spend any money on chance. They only pay me if I generate them money. It’s basically the definition of “big risk, big reward” for my end – but on theirs it’s nothing but “I can’t lose!”. Side note, if you want to figure out what Affiliate and Performance Marketing is all about – attend an Affiliate Summit. I’ll see you there!
Continuing on … the bottom line comes down to more innovative approaches to not only hiring but keeping your employees happy. Do you have a team of computer programmers? Do you have any idea how much harder and happier they’ll be at work if you put in a mini-fridge with Redbull in it? For your salesmen, top salesmen for the month get to use the company lease’d car for the next month … which just happens to be a Ferrari. Keep their spirits and hopes higher, and they’ll put their blood, sweat and tears into the company and raise it from the ground up with you – not just consider it a position of “why isn’t lunchtime here yet”. Also having good incentives is easy to keep people motivated, if a salesmen brings in over $50,000 in profit from contracts they get a $10,000 bonus. A lot of traditional business owners will look at those figures and laugh uncontrollably because they’d never ever think about even attempting to try to do that for their employees. Do you think he someone brought in a $10,000 bonus they’d work harder next month? Of course.
Bottom line, your resume doesn’t mean squat. Show the employer why you’re worth hiring in the interview so he throws the resume away. If you’re an employer, keep what I said in mind and look for the out of the box thinkers – they may be the ones to help you buy a Lamborghini.
