iGoogle-Craigslist Job Search Dashboard

By Jonathan Roseland

Connect

Craigslist.org has more jobs than any other destination online. Save time by using a free iGoogle account to set up a dashboard that instantaneously feeds you exactly the kinds of jobs you are looking for.

Using Craigslist to set up the ultimate job search monitor.
1. Set up an iGoogle Account
iGoogle is a customizable home page browser dashboard. You will need a Gmail account. Head over to http://www.google.com/ig to set up your free dashboard.
2. Create Tabs
On the left side of the screen you will see the home tab. Click on it, then click on the little drop down arrow, click Add a tab. Name this tab something like Job Search Monitor.
3. Get the Craigslist Monitor
Now we want to add a gadget that will feed us our Job Search listings off CL. Click Add a Gadget button in the upper right hand of the iGoogle dashboard. I recommend the Craigslist Monitor. Click add it now and you will now see it in your iGoogle Job Search Tab. I recommend adding 3-5 of these gadgets to the Job Search tab.
4. Get CL Search URLs
Now it's time to head over the Jobs for rent section of craigslist for your city. In the search field enter some criteria of what you are looking for, such as; industry, job title, full time, qaulifications, etc. You will notice that each result creates a unique URL address. For example, a search for 'Denver tech sales' produces this URL: http://denver.craigslist.org/search/jjj?query=Denver+tech+sales&srchType=A
What's really cool is that as new jobs are added to CL that match this search description this URL page will update to show the new jobs instantaneously. Find 3-5 search phrases that target the kind of job you want.
5. Add the Job Feeds to iGoogle
Now go back to your Job Search iGoogle tab and click the little drop down gear button in the upper right hand corner of the Craigslist Monitor gadget, click Edit settings. For Title enter a short description of feed (Denver Tech Sales), for URL enter the complete URL address you got from the search you did in step 4 (make sure to include the http://). Click save and voila! Now a real time feed of the most recently added jobs matching the search are going to be in your iGoogle dashboard.
While this might sound a little complicated to set up it's actually pretty easy to do and it saves you a huge amount of time over searching through CL's job section. It takes literally a few seconds to glance at your iGoogle dashboard and see the new jobs posted in the last few days or hours. A few other things to keep in mind:
• Respond immediately to postings that you are interested in. Craigslist's jobs section gets a huge amount of traffic so you can be sure that a lot of other people will see the job you a interested in. The faster you can contact the employer the better your chances are of getting it. If a listing contains a phone number always call that directly after sending your resume.

Dirty Trick: If you see a particularly good job come across your job search monitor you may want to minimize your competition. After you respond to the CL posting you may want to flag (upper right of the CL posting) it so that CL deletes the posting. Flag it from your browser, then use a website like Pagewash.com to block your IP address and flag it again, you may also want to flag it from your smartphone browser or a friends computer to ensure it gets removed from Craigslist.

Skills Required

• Medium internet and computer proficiency
• Gmail & iGoogle Account

Time to Completion 30 Minutes to set up, several minutes a day to monitor Creator of Life Hack Jonathan Roseland