Befoundjobs.com takes advantage of job seekers.
For a fee of $500 (advertised as a huge discount), Befoundjobs offers the service of sharing and implementing "secrets" of utilizing LinkedIn to increase one's LinkedIn visibility and be "sought after" by professional and company recruiters seeking candidates. There are two Befoundjobs "suggestions"that I and others feel actually are counter-productive.
1) LinkedIn has a section for reason (s) contacting the LinkedIn member. Befoundjobs' suggestion
is that the LinkedIn member includes "seeking career opportunities" as one of the reasons for contacting the member. From a great deal of "job seeking" research, the vast majority opinion it is not in the best interest of a job seeker blatantly advertising himself as seeking career opportunities. As this may seem counter-intuitive, it suggests that the LinkedIn member is either out of work or is desperate to leave his current position. The majority of job seeking advice is that both professional and company recruiters are looking forsuccessfulcandidates and unfortunately people out of work are viewed as being less successful.
2) Befoundjobs also suggests that if one is out of work, he should create a LinkedIn group where he is the founder and use a title such as Founder and Leader of Supply Chain Professionals Group As it is great to start a new group, having the job title and function of being the founder of a group usually does not get by the highly sophisticated recruiter that this person is hiding that he is out of work.
3) The only personal one-on-one service is a one hour discussion with a Befoundjobs job seeking coach who makes suggestions in how to improve the LinkedIn profile. I and others have found that these suggestions are at times detrimental to LinkedIn members profile. Many LinkedIn members have found with a little LinkedIn research through the Internet is enough to enhance ones profile and visibility.
My biggest complaint with Befoundjobs is that Befoundjobs contacts LinkedIn members and invites the members to a free webinar about the secrets of utilizing LinkedIn. The persuasive webinar can easily make one feel that the silver bullet has been found, but a high cost. The webinar jams four hours of information into a one hour presentation. Many people have shared that they have been set up to see Befoundjobs several wonderful suggestions as overwhelming and the time
commitment in following through with these suggestions are considerable. At this point, in closing the Webinar, Befoundjobs points out that its services that can do most of this work professionally for a fee of $500. This fee of $500 may seem reasonable, but for professionals that have been out of work for a number of months, even years and have become financially vulnerable and the $500 expense is relatively high with little or no return.
As in most challenging situations, secrets or techniques are not enough to overcome the obstacles of looking for a job in a highly competitive environment. As Befoundjobs provides customer testimonials, it does not from what I can see provide success rate statistics. Befoundjobs skillfully makes the LinkedIn member think that these secrets and techniques will provide an enormous competitive advantage.
Almost all job seeker advisors have come to a consensus that building a professional network is the most effective and efficient method of finding a job and the Befoundjobs service does not provide that advice. That advice can easily be found throughout the Internet at no expense.
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