Top 10 Googled Career Pivot Posts
Every year I like to highlight the top pages/posts that were found by people searching using Google. Check out last year’s list and you tell me what you see different.
The Career Pivot website was googled over 151,000 times in 2017 and that is up from 111,000 in 2016. Search traffic continues to grow at a healthy rate year over year.
Let’s look at the top 10 Googled posts to see what it tells us about what people want to know.
#1 Googled Post: “What If You Are Not Passionate About Anything? [Updated]”
What If You Are Not Passionate About Anything?[Updated] was written back in 2012 but is still googled at a whopping rate of 140 times a day. I updated this post just last week. This has been the #1 Googled post two years in a row.
When I originally wrote this post, I received two kinds of comments:
Don’t you have a pulse? You have to be passionate about something!
Gosh, I am not alone! There are others like me.
I am a multipotentialite, which means I have so many interests that I am not overly passionate about any one thing. You will find a post on this list about being a multipotentialite.
Multipotentialites make up 10-15% of the population, but society wants to say we are broken. We are not.
#2 Googled Post: “College Degree After 50 – Worth It?”
College Degree After 50 – Worth It? was written in March of 2015.
I wrote this post based on my observations of so many in the baby boomer generation who went back to college to re-invent themselves and who mostly gained nothing but student loan debt.
This post generates more comments and questions than any other on the website.
#3 Googled Post: “Talents versus Skills – Do you know the difference?”
Talents versus Skills – Do you know the difference? was written back in 2013, but was googled over 40 times a day in 2017.
So many of us who are in the 2nd half of life have no idea what our talents are or are able to differentiate our skills from our talents. Just because we can do something does not mean we want or should to do it.
#4 Googled Post: “3 Steps to Get the Hiring Manager or Recruiter to Respond”
3 Steps to Get the Hiring Manager or Recruiter to Respond was written back in 2015 and is new to the ‘Top 10’ list.
You are sitting around waiting to hear from a hiring manager or recruiter and it is nerve-racking. This post discusses clear, concrete actions you can take to get them to respond and hopefully relieve some of your nerves.
#5 Googled Post: “Are you a Multipotentialite?”
Are you a Multipotentialite? was written in August of 2015 and it dropped a notch from #4 to #5 in 2017.
Multipotentialites are people who have many interests, get bored easily and love to learn. I am one of these and, therefore, I have changed jobs or areas every 3-5 years throughout my career and took lots of lateral moves.
This article is directly related to the #1 post on this list, What If You Are Not Passionate About Anything?
#6 Googled Post: “What is Your Current Salary? How to Answer! [Updated]”
What is Your Current Salary? How to Answer! [Updated] was originally written back in 2014 and was updated in 2017.
This post has climbed the list significantly because the economy is getting better and this has become a hot legal topic as it relates to the gender pay gap.
I suspect this will continue to climb the list in 2018.
#7 Googled Post: “Perfect Fit for the Position? Expect to Lose! [Updated]”
Perfect Fit for the Position? Expect to Lose! [Updated] was written in 2014 and updated in 2018. This post was written based on a presentation given by a well-respected recruiter at Launch Pad Job Club, where I serve on the board of directors.
The presenter said, “If you are a perfect fit, we ain’t going to hire you. We want to hire someone at a lower starting salary but who can grow into the job. If you are a perfect fit, we assume you will leave when you find something better.”
This is even more relevant today than ever before.
#8 Googled Post: “Who is Really Making the Hiring Decision?”
Who is Really Making the Hiring Decision? was written in 2015 and is part of the Negotiators Job Search Series which is based on concepts from Jim Camp’s book, Start with NO…The Negotiating Tools that the Pros Don’t Want You to Know.
I take the concepts and techniques that Camp describes and apply them to the job search. In this installment, I discuss how you determine who really is the decision maker.
This is the first year this post made the list.
#9 Googled Post: “Re-entering the Workforce – Marketable Skills After 50 [Guest Post]”
Re-entering the Workforce – Marketable Skills After 50 was written in 2015. Along with the post, College Degree After 50 – Worth It? There must be a lot of baby boomers looking for information on how to prepare themselves.
#10 Googled Post: “3 Signs You Are Institutionalized Like Brooks at Shawshank”
3 Signs You Are Institutionalized Like Brooks at Shawshank was written back in 2015 and is one of my personal favorites.
I still run into individuals who have spent 25, 30, 35 or more years at companies and are so surprised when they are offered early retirement packages, or more likely, laid off. They have no idea what a career would be like outside of the company where they worked for so many years.
What Does This Tell You?
Search traffic to Career Pivot continued to grow at a healthy pace in 2017. The growth continues in 2018 but it appears to be slowing. Search traffic was up 35% in 2017 and it appears to be up half of that in 2018.
Those of us in the 2nd half of life continue to search for answers to our career questions. Most of us will not be retiring like our parents did anywhere in the near future. We want to continue to work -but on our terms.
What does this list tell you?
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Thank you and happy father’s day. Item #2 college degree after 50 is right on I will repost that on my blog and comment on pursuing a certificate or other online alternative to the traditional college degree. Technology, health care are the growth areas a certificate will suffice.