My students ask if anyone knows a good website for college essay writing?

Wish I'd seen this and been able to help you when you posted this 8 days ago. Guess we don't have many executive jobhunting experts available...but anyhow this will help going forward: This is your chance to stand out. Be memorable. Make them say, "We have to talk to this person!" Don't be bland. Don't write what "everyone else" would. Hit the highlights and hit them early. What makes you different? What makes you special? Tie this back to the role. Most cover letters aren't read...but when they are, the opportunity to become differentiated in the employer's eyes is open. All they need is ONE key reason to call you--remember that. And the cover letter can encourage them to read your resume in more detail. If your resume isn't being scanned by an optical reader for keywords, then the employer will be scanning it. This is just as important to know. They won't be READING it. Understand this. They will scan through the top third of Page One of your resume...and if you don't give them a reason to keep scanning, your resume will be thrown in the trash. So use your real estate wisely. People try to pack everything into a resume. This is a mistake. The purpose of your cover letter & resume is to Get You The Interview. That's it. Not to be a full backup of your life. So hit 'em hard up front. "Wait...what? I need to read that *again*" is the reaction we want. Not a nodding of the head...because all that will lead to is you in a pile with a million other candidates. We're not after "reasonable" here...we want "outstanding". I have several times had employers create jobs for me that did not exist before I showed up. http://www.modbee.com/2014/01/30/3162000/workwise-maverick-moves-for-job.html This is not my opinion, or unproven ideas. If I was in your shoes, I would make a small website. A few pages of video and written content demonstrating how I awesomely do what I do. And my cover letter would hit them early with What Makes Me Different...and then link to the multimedia for more. Think about it...if they go to that link, and invest the time to watch what you've put up--and it should take you a day to create--are they going to call you? Of course they are. Who else will have done something like this? Who else are they going to feel they know (at least a little)? People are in "I'll take anything" mode when it comes to employment. This is wrong. Focus, choose what you want and go for it with the killer instinct. Do what nobody else would do. What I suggested here isn't wild or crazy or even difficult...but hardly anyone Means It enough to put in the effort. And that's why someone like me will get the interview even if I don't have all the qualifications...and get the job. Because once I get into the interview, it's a whole new ballgame and anything can happen. So: > Big benefit and differentiator up front > Some "feel safe" content -- bullet points on your skills/experience matching their qualification requirements, for instance > Link to external content that further differentiates you and develops the "relationship" > Closing on why this is your dream opportunity and how you want to meet to discuss it in more detail. NO DESPERATION, though! Add phone # to arrange interview. Keep it brief and punchy, like a good marketing email. If you sound like everyone else, you'll get treated like everyone else.

This sort of depends on how established or large your company is, and what you want as your messaging. A good copywriter can certainly help you find *a* "why", though it might not be *the* "why" you actually began with. For example, if a web hosting company got started because two college roommates needed money to pay for tuition, that's a very important story, but it doesn't really sell as a "why". A good copywriter would come in and put some spin on it like "Steve and Dave knew starting their own business together would be hard, so they wanted to create something that would make entrepreneurship easier for others. At ACME web hosting, we make this our mission every day". It's now a great story, and sounds like a caring company... and it can even be true... but it's not actually the real reason the company started. A good strategy is to cast your mind back to the feelings you had when you started your company. Just write them down as one word emotions, and then on a separate page, write down the emotions you feel about your company *now*. A good copywriter should be able to find a story in there, and help you position your company in the best possible light, even if through rose-tinted lenses.

Writing skills are best learned through practice, critique, and revision. Curriculum is a waste, in my opinion – that is, listening to generalizations about how to write something other than the task at hand. Only the actual words on the page are worth discussing. Not rules. Maybe courses would be worthwhile if they entail a lot of hands-on interaction with a brutally honest, pragmatic instructor. What your team would really learn from, I suspect, is watching someone perform surgery on their copy, pausing to explain why the guts are being ripped out here, why the sutures are stitched up in such and such a manner there, etc. Consider hiring someone to workshop in person with your team. No prearranged abstract curriculum. Just critique.

A few approaches I'm currently using: 1) StumbleUpon Once you create an account, add in some interests. These can be general (e.g. "Technology") or more specific (e.g. "User Interface"). Then, at the top of the page is a big dropdown that by default says "All Interests." Pop that open then poke on the interest you're looking to get ideas for. Start stumbling and see what comes up. 2) Facebook Create a new Facebook page for yourself. It doesn't need to be public. Then, when on that page, open the "Edit Page" menu at top and choose the last item, "Use Facebook as PAGENAME." Then, use search or whatever means to find pages that post like-minded content to what you're looking for and "Like" these pages. {NOTE: Because you are "acting as" your page, YOU are NOT liking these pages, your page is liking them.} Okay, so now you should have a page that you're acting as, and you've liked some other pages. Now if you go to the FB homepage, you'll see a custom newsfeed of posts from JUST those pages that you liked (plus ads). Over on the left (in today's interface at least) there's a little arrow next to Newsfeed. Click that and switch to most recent. Voila, the freshests posts from the pages you like. You can switch back to "Use Facebook as YOURNAME" using the arrow at the very top right of the desktop interface. 3) Sharegrab.com This is from the EdgeRank Checker people. Basically, you log in and create Pods (read: groups or lists) of FB pages. Then, you can choose a pod, and a date range, and it'll show you the most "shareworthy" posts from those pages. Hope this is helpful. Please feel free to reach out to me if you need any assistance implementing these ideas, or creating a custom blended RSS feed (which is still a fantastic way to achieve your goal). https://clarity.fm/toddlevy

The highest quality and cost is https://contently.com/ - $200+ per post. Alternatively, I've uses http://jobs.problogger.net/ job board to post an opportunity, and then create a simple "test" for the writers. If they read the instructions and the content is great, try em' out .. if not, then pass. It takes time but you can find great people who will blog for $30-50 per post. Another way - not fast but high quality - is to approach existing blogs in your vertical with smaller audiences ... ask them to guest post or ghostwrite for you .. they already know the subject matter and blogging + if they have an audience you can incentivize them to promote the content via their social channel (by paying social share bonuses). Hope that helps.