JOB FAIRS: REAL HELP OR WORTHLESS WASTE OF TIME?

How to succeed at a job fair
By TALI ARBEL – 7 hours ago

JOB FAIR STRATEGIES: Career fairs — geared to students, specialized industries and the general public — are drawing record crowds as job losses keep coming.

Even so, your odds of landing a job through a general fair aren't high, said CareerCast.com publisher Tony Lee. If you're mid-career, a specialized career fair will be a better bet. In the meantime, what's the best strategy for mining a general-interest job fair? Prepare beforehand and hone in on the position you want, experts say.

_ Perfect your "elevator pitch." This is a 45-second statement about how well you would mesh with the organization and what skills you'd bring to a position that needs to be filled. "The key is to be tailored to their specific opening," said Lee, who has been to hundreds of fairs over the past two decades. "If your elevator pitch is just about you, it is not as effective as how you can benefit them."

To make that sell, do research on the company so that you know what specific opening it is looking to fill. Even with a large fair with 60 companies, it would take you about a day to figure out which ones have openings that best suit you by checking out their Web sites, Lee said. Just by doing that and narrowing down the recruiters you approach, you'll probably be more prepared than most of the other job seekers at the fair, he said.

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