Heather Hernandez

inspiring women to be entrepreneurs

helping women network, find jobs, and be entrepreneurs

Free Certifications and Courses for Marketing Professionals

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When you’re looking for a job, you’re eager to add anything to your resume that will help you stand out among the crowd as the ideal candidate for a job. One thing that can help you stand out is having certifications. Where should you put these certifications on your resume? You can add them to your Marketing Skills section or if you have several you can create a new section called Certifications or Continuing Education. You also should add your certifications to your LinkedIn profile. Now many certifications you have to pay for, but I’ve found a few certifications for marketing professionals that are absolutely free!
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HubSpot offers 10 certifications – each certification course is a series of videos concluding with an exam
Inbound Certification – this is the first certificate you should try to get that includes 12 classes (should take less than 5 hours)
Social Media Certification
Email Marketing Certification
Inbound Marketing Certification
Content Marketing Certification
HubSpot Marketing Software Certification
Sales Enablement Certification
HubSpot Sales Software Certification
Inbound Sales Certification
Growth-Driven Design Certification
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Google Ads Certification – free study materials and there are two exams you need to pass:  Google Ads Fundamentals Assessment and your choice of Search Advertising, Display Advertising, Mobile Advertising Video Advertising or Shopping Advertising (your certification is valid for one year)
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Google Analytics Individual Qualification – free courses and study guides to prepare you to take the exam
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Bing Ads Accredited Professional – free courses that lead up to a 100 question exam focused on search engine marketing (your certification will be valid for one year)
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LinkedIn Learning – free courses (for those with LinkedIn Premium accounts) that when successfully completed appear on your LinkedIn profile so this is a valuable way to get certifications through LinkedIn
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SEMrush Academy – free courses you can take, although they don’t lead to a certification they do have exams to take so you can always list them on your resume in a Continuing Education section
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Do you know of any other FREE certifications that are useful for marketing professionals?

How I Handle Rejection in my Job Search (and why I feel like a Unicorn)

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Lately, during my job search, I’ve been experiencing the harshness of feeling rejected. Now it’s not because I’m actually being rejected by people, systems or companies but that to me their responses (or lack thereof) feels like rejection to me.  Here are some examples of recent events that have made me feel rejected:
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I meet someone in-person who works for a company I’d love to work for so I send a connection request on LinkedIn . . . and they never accept my connection request
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I interview with my former employer because they know me & love me (I think) . . . but they can’t create a position for me
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I call a staffing agency to request a resume critique because they are known for being extra helpful . . . and they never return my call
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I speak to someone who works for a company on my target list and they tell me they don’t have any marketing positions . . . one day later I see their company advertising a marketing position that I want to apply for and I notice it was posted five days ago?!?!
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I apply for the perfect job for me based on my experience and skill set . . . and I hear nothing but I can’t follow-up with the hiring manager because my LinkedIn connection request to them is still  “pending”
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Are these things only happening to me or are they happening during your job search too?
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So you can see why I’ve been feeling rejected lately. But how do I overcome this feeling and move forward with my job search with a smile on my face and a positive attitude in my mind?
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I remind myself that I’m the unicorn that everyone wants to hire but nobody knows exists. Clearly, even some of the people I’ve met in-person still don’t know I’m the unicorn!
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Why do I feel like a unicorn in a field of horses? I started my career as a civil engineer and practiced for seven years, obtaining the coveted Professional Engineer’s license before taking a break to have two children. When my youngest was one-year-old I accidentally became an entrepreneur by starting my own frugal lifestyle blog (Freebies 4 Mom). I fell in love with marketing and was able to support my family even while my husband was unemployed for two years.
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But the small business owner role was not a long-term career solution for me. I could make money, but I could not obtain good health insurance for my family. And mentally I found that blogging wasn’t challenging enough for me. I wanted to blog as a hobby or side hustle while I had a real job outside of the home. So I got a marketing job managing influencer marketing campaigns. I loved the work, loved the benefits and loved the challenge. In fact, I loved my new job so much that I decided I needed to formalize my career change from civil engineering to marketing by getting a Master’s degree in Marketing.
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I found a university in Texas that was featured as the most affordable Master’s in Science Marketing degree in the United States. I discovered that it was easier to apply and get accepted than I thought it would be and started my first class in June of 2018. At the end of June, my dream job came to an abrupt end when the parent company decided to close our division and I was laid off. Now I was unemployed and would be looking for a job while attending graduate school part-time.
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Quickly I discovered that this would be the most challenging job search of my entire life. Gone were the days where I could apply for a job advertised in the newspaper located across the country and land the job without knowing anyone who worked there. I was learning that job hunting had turned into a numbers game. You are one of hundreds or thousands of people applying for one open position. You must network to try to find a job through someone you know, and even then the job hunting process is brutal.
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So I just have to remind myself that I’m a unicorn and that eventually I will be discovered for all of my magnificence and land the perfect job.
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Time to spill your guts – how do you deal with the feeling of rejection in your job search?

Why You Shouldn’t Apply for Jobs through Linkedin

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I attended a Resume Building workshop at my local library, and I was shocked when they told me “Do not apply for jobs through Linkedin”. I mean, isn’t the point of technology to do things smarter and faster? Well here’s why they gave that recommendation and why I’m following it!

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Here’s the reasoning behind NOT applying for jobs through LinkedIn and instead using it as a tool to find job openings, and then visiting the company’s website to apply there:
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* When you apply for a job through LinkedIn there’s a limited amount of information you’re able to submit ~ that’s because they want to make it super easy for you to apply!
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* If you visit the company’s website and are able to apply for the job opening, this is always the better course of action to take. The reason is that you’re able to supply a lot more information including a Cover Letter.
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* Sometimes your able to subscribe to Job Alerts on the company website too in order to have new job openings that meet your search criteria to be emailed to you!
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* Of course not every company website is set-up to accept job applications, so in that case, you should apply through LinkedIn. But you’re almost always going to be better off applying directly through the company website so you can supply all of the information they request. Every company is different and they don’t all ask you for the exact same information!
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* Also you may not want LinkedIn to know which jobs you’re applying for if you have privacy concerns. Also the jobs you apply for effects the types of jobs that LinkedIn recommends to you.
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* Same applies for other job boards like Indeed, you should try to find where to apply for the job on the company’s website.
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Do you apply for jobs through LinkedIn or do you visit the company’s website to apply?

How I Apply Continuous Improvement to my Resume

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When I was in college for engineering, we learned how to apply continuous improvement to solve technical problems. I love the concept of continuous improvement so I try to apply it to all aspects of my life, including my resume! Here’s how I approach updating my resume to achieve continuous improvement:

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* When I go to any type of job search workshop, I bring my resume. That’s because while we’re talking about job searching, sometimes I think of some way I’d like to update my resume. If I have my resume with me, I can mark it up right then before I forget what I wanted to change.
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* Instead of making several versions of my resume, I treat each job I apply for as an opportunity to improve my resume.
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* My resume started as one page, but now it’s two pages. As I learn more about keywords for job descriptions and think about how best to describe my job experience, I’m adding to my resume. When I was in college it was drilled into my head that my resume had to be one page. But now it’s ok for your resume to be one or two pages.
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* I’m challenging myself to go into further detail on my resume each time I updated it. One example is my skills section, which used to be one section and now is three sections:  Marketing Skills, Professional Skills and Computer Skills.
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* Saving old versions of my resume in an “Old Resumes” folder is how I’m able to go back to look at previous versions. Sometimes I remove things from my resume and then change my mind and want to add them back. This way I don’t have to remember exactly what I removed, I can just go back and look!
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What do you apply continous improvement to?

Best College Student Discounts

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Now that I’m a college student, I’m happy that I’m eligible for student discounts! There don’t seem to be many out there, but these two discounts saved me a bunch of money. Instead of paying about $100 per month for cable TV I now pay $11.48 per month to stream Amazon Prime and Hulu (including Showtime) content on my smart TV.

If you’ve got a .edu email address, enjoy my favorite discounts for college students:

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Amazon Prime Student

I already had an Amazon Prime account by I was paying $12.99 per month for it. I was able to convert it to an Amazon Prime Student account to get it for FREE the first 6 months and then for only $6.49 a month after that. What a great deal!
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Spotify Premium for Students (includes Hulu with Showtime)

Ok, I wasn’t interested in getting Spotify BUT it includes Hulu along with Showtime so it was worth getting for $0.99 a month (for first 3 months) then $4.99 a month after that. After 12 months the price goes up to $9.99 a month.
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Any other college student discounts that you’re loving?