A Site for Your Eyes

By Rick Fromme 

Computer Setup (Photo credit: Paul Mayne)

As many of you know who’ve been reading my blogs (and my bio at the end of them) I’ve had a successful career in the medical industry for over a decade, mostly dealing with medical device sales.

Like many in the health care profession,  I had joined, and still belong to, several social media and professional networking sites. I would also periodically visit several job board sites, some of them generic, others slanted towards the health care profession. While I felt some of them were fairly well conceived and designed, I still thought that none of them were optimized for today’s busy health care professional. Especially in this era of Web 2.0, where the emphasis is on participation, sharing, collaboration, and recommendation; as well as blogging, audio/video, being user-centric and easy to use.

So I started thinking: "If I were to build my own site geared for health care professionals, one that combined the best features of an industry specific job board and social media website, what are the key elements and components I’d like it to have?" 

• First, I thought the site should provide a robust social network for the medical community. One that would also act as a directory for users to find and connect with each other based on their specialty within the health care industry.

• The site would also facilitate members’ ability to collaborate with each other, share ideas, and join networking groups pertinent to their interests and work specialties.

• It would be a dynamic, interactive online portal where members could join networking groups specific and exclusive to their interests, acumen, and area(s) of expertise. For example, recruiter-only groups, doctor-only groups, medical sales-only groups, etc.

• As far as job board functionality, individual members could also find career opportunities, get leads, and locate people and products. It would also allow companies and recruiters to source active and passive members looking for jobs specific to the medical and health care industries.

• The site would allow health care and medical community job seekers to join a networking community that was outside the labeling of traditional job boards.  Since social networks are more popular these days, they could post their profile, specialties and résumé (printed and video) — without worrying about a manager wondering if they’re really looking for other jobs. 

• A key feature I wasn’t seeing on other sites were opportunities for professional development and career advancement. I envisioned this new site would provide an area to learn new skills, evaluate one’s current skills and provide users with supporting material to help with their career advancement.

Network (Photo credit: michael.heiss)

• It would also offer employers and recruiters the ability to objectively evaluate candidates based upon measurable benchmark assessments, not just relying on someone’s résumé, or how well he or she interviewed, etc.

• The site would allow providers to find products (we haven’t implemented this yet) they’re seeking and also locate associated vendor providers and product distibutors.

Hence, the birth and ongoing development of MedMasters.com, which has become the nation’s premier niche job board and social media site designed by and exclusively for health care professionals. Again, since we operate in the world of Web 2.0, there are currently a dozen or so videos we’ve created to answer specific questions for potential members, individual members, and recruiter members, and new employer members. As with our dedicated blog site, Medical Social Network News, we’re always adding new content to our video library as well. 

Here are some key questions and issues some of current our videos address:

What are the Principal Elements of an Effective Niche Job Board & Social Media Site?

A truly functional niche job board and social media site should enhance your ability to reach out to and connect with medical professionals, as well as allow you to locate and take advantage of industry specific services.  For job seekers, it should also facilitate — from a variety of approaches and services — your ability to research and apply for new career opportunities. For recruiters, it should provide a comprehensive database from which to research, evaluate and even assess a wealth of qualified candidates. In short, it should function as the most comprehensive networking and career management site in the health care community today.

The site should further your ability to reach your professional aspirations as well as expand your network of fellow health care and medical professionals.  

Especially for the current job candidate, the site should allow medical professionals to connect with and keep their name and qualifications in front of business associates, medical recruiters, employers, distributors and decision makers.

MedMasters: Real-time Opportunities, Real-time Results

How to Build Your Network Online?

Ever since humans engaged in commercial enterprises, creating a professional network has been essential to anyone in nearly any profession. That’s why there used to be guilds, even pubs and taverns specifically associated with a particular profession; because they facilitated and encouraged networking … tankerd in hand or not. Today, it’s particularly important for health care professionals to have an online “organic” network that works for them around the clock. A good niche job board/social media site should help you to expand your network in a variety of ways.  

First, you should be able to invite any professional medical contact you know to join the site to become part of your own network.  That way, you grow your own network while concurrently helping them to expand their network on the site. Remember, “givers gain.”

Secondly, you should be able to search a site’s member database by name or category (i.e., nurse practitioner, pharmaceutical sales representative, internist, etc.) Once you’ve identified that person, it should be easy to reach out and contact them.

Thirdly, when another member reaches out to you, it should be easy to see who they are, what their specialty is, and can easily accept their invitation to connect with them.

Building Your Network on MedMasters

How Can Recruiters Search for Applicants and Post Job-Specific Openings?

Professionals across a broad range of specialties such as a medical sales representative, allied health professional, doctor, or health care IT, etc., should be accessible by medical industry job recruiters. Likewise, job applicants should have the ability to network with recruiters that focus on their specialty or area of practice.  

The savvier job seeker can utilize a well-designed niche job board to expand their professional networking opportunities, have access to industry specific recruiter networks, and can post or look for job openings posted on the site. This enables them to promote themselves and their qualifications to hundreds of recruiters and thousands of other health care professionals.

Health Care Recruiters Can Post and Find Applicants on MedMasters

In this article, I shared with you my ideas on what would make an ideal niche job board and social network site geared specifically for the health care community.  I also shared with you several of the videos we created specifically for potential members, individual members and recruiter . If you found the content and videos helpful, please leave a comment below. FYI: If you’d like to check out MedMasters’ other videos, visit my YouTube Channel.

Rick Fromme combines entrepreneurial enthusiasm with an insider's knowledge of the medical industry to co-found MedMasters.com. Both his drive and perspective helps provide health care professionals with a superior mechanism with which to communicate, network and market their strengths. Prior to founding MedMasters.com, Rick operated a highly successful medical device distributorship. Other milestones in his 12-year career in the medical industry include a key position at a medical device start-up company that was later sold to the Ethicon Endo division of Johnson & Johnson. You may also reach Rick by connecting with him on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn and YouTube. 

Three D’s (Do’s) for Medical Sales Reps Who Are Job Hunting

By Hector Cisneros

Fitness Model 1 (Photo credit: ★ spunkinator)

Most medical sales reps, having worked in the health care field, understand the importance of being responsible for their own health and well-being. Consequently, they know about the "Three D's (Dos)" to achieve and maintain a healthy lifestyle: exercise regularly, consume nutritious food and drink plenty of water, as well as getting adequate sleep each night.

Similarly, every medical sales rep who is job hunting needs to do the following activities on a consistent basis: network effectively, join niche job boards, and have a Rolodex of recruiters with whom to be in contact.

Networking Know-How

When it comes to obtaining gainful employment in the health care industry, priority one is to connect with as many health care industry professionals as possible. As the old adage goes, it's often not what you know, but who you know. Face-to-face networking -- attending conferences; convocations; seminars; business events; even a friendly, social out-and-about with your peers -- are some ways to go about it. Also, if you have the time, volunteer, join health care professional associations, participate in events, write blogs ... anything that favorably gets your name and face in front of others.

Online Networking is Essential

You also need to be networking online as well. This is where professional networking sites such as LinkedIn and other social media sites like Facebook, Google+ and Twitter can prove useful.  Better still are industry specific job board/networking sites, such as MedMasters.com, which allow you to target your professional social media profile and job search efforts in the health care industry. You can even narrow down your category to pharmaceutical or medical device sales.

Focus Your Online Search/Presence with Niche Job Boards  

Unofficial 80cm FITA archery target. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Looking for a medical sales job? Going to Monster, CareerBuilder, Indeed or SimplyHired works great if you’re looking for a position in sales, marketing, retail and some other fields. But it isn’t the best strategy for medical sales reps. There are several reasons why specialty or niche job boards are better. These large job boards don't aggregate all their listings. Furthermore, smaller, more industry focused sites usually include openings that don't show up on generic job boards. These specialty boards sometimes include specific contact information, such as how to directly reach the hiring manager, which is far more advantageous than being herded through a generic application process. I mean, who has the time to spend hours filling these things out? More often than not, these produce little in the way of favorable results. Being on a niche site also means you are more likely to be found, rather than disappearing into the slag among thousands of other medical sales applicants.

Generally speaking, smaller companies and skill-specific industries such as medical sales prefer using niche boards to target applicants because they tend to get responses from higher quality and more experienced candidates. In turn, this reduces the time involved in the selection process which is a win-win for applicants and hiring companies.

There are many niche job boards out there, sometimes two or three for a specific industry. Ask others in the health care industry which sites they may have used. You can also ask hiring managers and recruiters about choice niche sites for posting positions and recruiting. If you choose to search online, type "medical sales" followed by "jobs." Usually, if a niche site appears on the first one two pages, it's worth checking out. If you encounter a site that's over-populated with Google ads or other offers not related to employment, chances are they're more spammy and should be avoided.

Blogger logo. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Some good quality niche job sites also post informative videos, blogs and tweets, so it behooves you to search through YouTube, Vimeo, Blogger, WordPress, Twitter and others that may contain content that was created by health care recruiters.

Recruiters: Stay in Their Radar

Knowing key recruiters and HR professionals who specialize in the health care industry and medical sales recruitment is also advantageous. In many cases, these specialized recruiters act as the primary communication link between a health care employers and a potential job candidate. Recruiters are responsible for reviewing résumés, conducting interviews, and ensuring the medical organization is paired with the right candidate who will ultimately meet and fulfill the needs of the employer or organization -- ideally you! According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), recruitment specialists are knowledgeable about the organization(s) they're representing or to which they belong, and consequently can skillfully locate and recruit the proper candidates for each requisite job opening.

Medical sales recruiters must conduct thorough interviews in order to gauge the suitability of the candidate for the position. Other duties of a medical sales recruiter may include:

• Reviewing applicants' résumés/curriculum vitae 
• Placing and assigning employees at medical/health care facilities
• Communicating efficiently with employers and employees, ensuring the needs of both are met timely and effectively
• Performing background checks on potential employees, as well as checking given references, credentials, transcripts, etc.  
• Negotiating salary, problem-solving, and counseling, therein establishing a rapport with the job candidate

Use Recommendations (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Obviously, given their critical gate-keeping/door-opening role, the more industry specific recruiters you can get your résumé and credentials in front of, the better. Networking effectively and posting your professional profile on appropriate niche job board sites, will both enable you to effectively prospect for employment.

In this article, I discussed the three main activities anyone seeking medical sales job perform consistently and skillfully: networking, joining industry specific niche sites, and communicating with recruiters.  If you found this article useful, please leave a relevant comment below and feel free to share and repost it.


Hector Cisneros is a co-partner, COO and social media director for W Squared Media Group based in Jacksonville, FL. He is also the co-host of Blog Talk Radio’s “Working the Web to Win,” where he and Carl Weiss make working the Web to win simple for every business. Hector is a syndicated writer for Ezine Online, an active blogger (including ghost writing), and is a published author of three projects, “60 Seconds to Success”  (on sale at Amazon and B&N); “Internet Marketing for the 21st Century," which you can get free by clicking the link at WsquaredMediaGroup.com; and his latest, “Working the Web to Win” (on sale at Amazon).  Connect with him on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, and YouTube. 

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