How can you stand out from the crowd

Dated: 15 Jan, 2020

How can you stand out from the crowd

 

My 13-year-old daughter has recently started to sell second-hand goods on the internet.  She started this herself, created her own account including PayPal account, she writes a marketing piece to promote the item, researches competitor prices, pays attention to detail with photos, liaises with potential buyers using a little persuasion and she takes care of her presentation with packaging.  She also has a distribution day and ensures goods are payed for before distributing and she thinks about what is going to sell well and she will often talk to me about profit she has made against costs.

 

I said to her yesterday – You know, you are running a business.  She said – Not really, I am just selling second-hand stuff.  I then replied – No you will be learning skills without knowing – Marketing, costing, sales, distribution and administration as well as customer service and running a business analysing profit against costs thus creating business acumen.  This I said is important and when you get older all these things will go in your favour on a CV.

 

Exams, qualifications and actual job experience are important but outside interests and add on bits can make the difference on your CV or in an interview.  Quite often I speak with people and we get talking and they will tell me something that is interesting and could help them get the job, but they didn’t think it was relevant. 

 

It is important to go beyond what is on your CV – What makes you interesting, what outside interests could you associate with the job, how can you show that you actually are motivated, how can you show that this motivation is deep rooted and in-grained.  Always remember the add on bits.