CLASS: Headline Recruiting - Part 4 of 5

Posted by Jim Stroud

September 28, 2006

Headline Recruiting - a tutorial created by Jim Stroud

Free Blog Class: Headline Recruiting (Or… How to source passive candidates from online news resources!)
(C) 2006: Jim Stroud

[ Part 4 of 5 ]

For the past 3 days I have been focusing on MSN News as a good source for passive leads, now I’m going to switch gears a bit.

***

The best and sometimes aggravating thing about using the news for sourcing passive candidates is the sheer volume of information that this strategy produces. Keeping track of it all and staying abreast of new data can be a daunting task, but not an impossible one. The answer? RSS!

RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication” and it is a publishing format websites use to easily distribute content to a wide audience. For readers its a convenient way to keep up with updates from several sites by simply skimming through a series of headlines. Accessing RSS feeds and subscribing to them is simple and easy. All you need is a RSS reader, a search on Yahoo News and a keen eye. Let’s go through it step-by-step!

Step A: Get a news reader!

RSS readers are free and plentiful and available as both a web-based program and a downloadable program. The looks may differ but the basic functionality of RSS readers are the same.

Here is a list of popular RSS readers:

Bloglines (Web-based and my personal favorite)
Rojo (Web-based)
NewsGator(Outlook plug-in)
RSS Bandit(for Windows)
NetNewsWire (for Mac OS X)

Step B: Run a search on Yahoo News

For the sake of this example, I am seeking fresh Executives in the field of Internet Security. I simply visit Yahoo.com and input my search string. Afterwards, I click the News option (as shown by the arrow below).

This is the search string I used: (appointed OR “newly created position” OR “formerly of”) (Director OR Chief OR VP OR vice) security hacking

Here is a sample of what I found…

Mozilla’s New Security Chief: Dump Old Code

TechWeb via Yahoo! News - Sep 14 2:12 PM

Mozilla Corp. has hired a former Microsoft security strategist to help secure its open-source software, particularly its Firefox browser. Window Snyder, whose hiring was announced last week, takes the title of “Chief Security Something” —

Step C: Save the RSS feed

Of course, news sites are constantly updated; so it is quite conceivable that this same search could have more results just moments after you search it. To keep up with the latest results of this search look for the orange RSS button to the right of the search results. (As indicated by the arrow in the screenshot below.)

Clicking that button will bring you to the RSS feed for my search. You will see a lot of computer code that you may not understand, no big deal. From here, just take the URL (highlighted by the arrow in the screenshot below) and paste it into your RSS reader. This act will retrieve the top ten search results and deliver them to your RSS reader.

This is what the feed looks like in Bloglines. My saved searches are on the left and the latest headlines from my RSS feed are on the right. As with most RSS readers, you can add as many feeds and organize them in folders.