Standing out at a Career Fair can make a difference in your search. Job Faires are starting to pick up, and a major job search company is running some nice ones, called Targeted Job Fairs. At a San Jose Area Job Fair in January, 10 companies as showing up, and a major job search company has 82 career fairs scheduled for this year across the US.

How do you rise above the crowd at a Job Faire? The competition can be sizeable, but you can help yourself leap out from the gang with advance preparation. At AA-Careers, we have a simple step-by-step process to prepare. Planning to go? Here’s how to prepare:

First, research the organizations that are going and pick your objectives. Use the internet to check out the organizations that are there ahead of time. Go to their internet sites and see if they have their jobs listed. Pick a tenable number to target, and get ready to spend about an hour researching each one. It’s hard to do more than ten in a day, and 3-5 is a much more reasonable target. For each hiring organization, you want to know: executive names, recent news, and key product lines. Try to see if you know anyone at the target companies. You should end up with a page or two of research for each company/job.

Second, if there are job postings on the web, read them to see what the hiring department is looking for. Create a mapping of your achievements and skills to the requirements of the job. Make the nomenclature match. If the hiring company calls customers "clients", your resume should do the same thing. The accomplishments should be written in the style of the hiring organization.

Third, create a ‘thumbnail sales pitch’ for each likely company/job combination. Write down a sixty second ‘thumbnail’ that you can repeat out loud depicting why you are a fantastic prospect for that job. You’ll use this in your resume and when you meet the company at the job kiosk.

Fourth, modify your resume for each opportunity. The objective on your resume should exactly match the position you’re targeting. The executive summary should be a written form of your “mini sales pitch” for the job. Then choose the achievements and skills that most clearly match the job prerequisites. Especially at a Job Faire, the purpose of your resume is a sales tool for you – to get you on-site job interviews. It should be very easy to see that you’re a match based on your resume.

Fifth, dress and prepare as if you’re doing on-site interviews. Dress nicely and be fittingly groomed. Don’t over do-it (this isn’t a date!) and don’t underdress (no jeans or t-shirts, no matter how much you paid for them). Avoid strong cologne or perfume.

Finally, practice your ‘mini-sales-pitch’. Collect your research and the resume for each position - bring a couple of copies for each – and put each in a distinctly tagged folder. Keep them in a light briefcase or folio.

Remember to smile, and good hunting!