5 Reasons To Have Your Blog On Your Resume

Hello friends! I recently landed a dream job of mine and I wanted to share my experience with you on how I got the job: my blog! Before I walked in the door for my first interview, the employers had my resume along with my website pulled up with many questions prepared for me: So you speak french? Your theme looks difficult – how do you manage your WordPress by yourself? How is going to New York Fashion Week? As the Social Media Coordinator for a marketing agency I could not have been better prepared for my role. Between managing social media, a website and newsletters for myself – I could easily apply these competences to my new position. My blogging and social media endeavors of Stop, Drop & Vogue without a doubt landed me my job. In this post I’m sharing 5 reasons why you need to have your blog on your resume:

blog on your resume

1. Show that you can build a social following – Not many people know what it takes to maintain and grow a social following. It’s not as simple as posting a picture and getting a bunch of new followers and likes. It’s understanding the algorithms, researching ideal post times, curating lists of relevant hashtags, and much, much more. Show your new employer that you can help achieve their goals of growing an engaged and bulky number of followers, just with the techniques you’ve learned while blogging! After all, if you can grow your personal brand into a namesake of its own, you can most definitely do it for another company!

2. Show that you are creative – Make a professional binder of your portfolio, be it photography or writing samples. EVERY interview I went to I did not show up empty handed. I made mock media plans for the business, I showed them magazine snippets of my journalism, I printed out blog posts and I showed them my NYFW photography. Make a collage of your best flatlays to show the company how you have an eye for being creative. Or print out a blog post that went viral and highlight key aspects that helped it gain traction. Having something tangible to give to an employer will help you stick out, and it will show them how creative you are – in actuality, not many people do this!! So take advantage over that.

3. Show that you can track data – If you aren’t tracking your data, you are doing something wrong. The skills you learn from blogging and social media can be applied to a wide variety of communications, marketing, business management, advertising and logistics. Businesses LOVE big data, and the better you are at analyzing web traffic, clicks, likes and the different demographics of audiences – you have a skill set that sets you apart from your peers. Show the brand why you named your blog post what it is because you used Google Adwords to track how many people have been searching key words. Track the number of likes, followers, clicks, posts, etc. in an excel spreadsheet and give a monthly report of your loss/growth. As mentioned before, data is everything and numbers are the most important thing to a business. Being able to read, understand and translate data into effective business methods makes you an incredible asset to a company.

4. Show that your blog can stand as a resume on its own – I truly believe having a blog can share more about you than any employer can read on your resume. While resume’s are great for listing job experience, blogs will not only showcase your success, but they will also showcase YOU. It’s a great way for a business to get you know you before an interview – that being said don’t put too much of your life out there – always keep it professional. I knew a guy (who knew a guy) who got a starting position inside the John Hancock building in Boston as a financial analyst because in college he started a blog about finance, which impressed a lot of people when he was applying to jobs. He wrote about financial trends and his opinions on them, which to an employer is like striking a gold mine. Blogs are the perfect space to showcase yourself – be it your work experience, your savviness or your creativity.

5. Show you understand branding – In today’s social world corporate identity is extremely important. Brands want to set themselves apart and in order to do so they need to create an identity that is both unique and fitting for the brand. According to Investopedia, “a company’s brand identity is how that business wants to be perceived by consumers. The components of the brand (name, logo, tone, tagline, typeface) are created by the business to reflect the value the company is trying to bring to the market and to appeal to its customers.” In fashion blogging, branding is everything. It helps us stand apart from the crowd of other bloggers, it helps us create an aesthetic, and it helps us define who we are to the world. Whether it’s a color scheme on your Instagram, the typeface you use in your logo, or the design of your website – all of these skills and traits can be applied to another business. After all, we do this successfully with our blogs. Being able to apply this creativity to another organization will blow their minds!

blog on your resume

Image sources: 1 (unknown) 2 (Pink Peonies)

Here is a snippet from my resume on a word document. I normally use a creative PDF template that I edit on Photoshop, which is more focused on details and bullet points rather than sentences. I always have a word document copy available since I can add more information about my experiences. Sometimes I send both over since one is a quick read and the other is more detailed. I assess which one the employer would value more and send it over. In addition, I customize each skill to the job description I am applying for. You should never be sending the same resume out twice, switch it up for every job you are applying for:

blog on your resume