I'm continuing to interview successful job seekers and have just posted my interview with Ross Dreher. Check out what he did to find a job. You might even learn a thing or two.

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Ross -

Thanks again for being a part of this little social job search experience.

First, can you give a brief over view of your background and the circumstances that led to your unemployment?

My background is in IT sales, specifically as a software sales executive in my most most recent position. The company is national and my territory was the southeast USA. Due to the declining US economy and the effects on the company my position was eliminated as part of a company-wide reduction in force.

That sounds like a story that has unfortunately been repeated many times. What was the first thing you did when you started looking for a job?

The first thing I did when I got laid off was to update my resume and started using job boards like Indeed.com and SimplyHired.com that pull job listings from multiple boards. I posted my resume to traditional boards like Monster and Careerbuilder. I did a Google search in the first couple of weeks to find networking events in the area and started attending events from there.

You decided to go the more traditional route. What was the most valuable or successful thing you did to land the job?

Utilizing the contacts I met at the networking events as well as using LinkedIn are the most valuable things I did to land my new job. The job was posted in the Jobs section of LinkedIn and I was able to learn a tremendous amount about the position before the interview from an insider at the company who I also met through LinkedIn. I would not have met the insider through LinkedIn without developing relationships at the networking events, so networking is the most valuable.

How long were you unemployed?

I was unemployed for about 3 months.

What advice, based on what you've gone through, would you give someone who is looking?

I would recommend to post your resume to Monster and Careerbuilder but not browse their job postings. I used Indeed.com once or twice a day to present a compilation of postings from several boards and company websites. There are recruiters that look up resumes on job boards, so you should still have your resume out there. Attending local networking events is crucial. At every event I attended I either met someone that could help with my specific job search or I learned something new. Even if you don't meet someone that can help or learn any new information, you still meet people that you can connect to on LinkedIn. The more contacts you have in LinkedIn, the more likely one of your contacts is connected to someone at a target company. You need to find an insider at every company or organization that you apply to if you expect to be contacted. There are hundreds or thousands of other people that apply to the same job and you have to somehow jump to the front of the line.

So here we have someone that used job boards, networking and social sites (ie LinkedIn) to actually find a job. Good to hear from someone who has had success using these tools.