How to find your first job with Signalsant: a step-by-step guide

This is an illustrative example written by the Signalsant team. It isn't a real customer's story, and the person, companies and results in it are made up to show how the steps work.

Working out how to find your first job is hard when you have no network and no track record. Job boards are crowded, and many smaller employers never post a vacancy at all. So in this example I tried a different route: find the companies I'd like to work for, then write to each of them directly, a few a day, from my own mailbox.

Signalsant is a sales tool, built for finding businesses and emailing them. That's exactly what a job seeker needs to do, just with a different message. Here's how I set it up, step by step.

What I was looking for#

In this example I'd just finished a course in digital marketing and wanted a junior role at a small marketing agency in my city. I had a CV, a short portfolio and a lot of rejections from job boards.

One thing to know up front: Signalsant doesn't know which companies are hiring. It has no vacancy data. What it gives you is a list of real businesses, with their websites, contact details, ratings and reviews. Deciding who to approach, and why, is still your job.

How to find your first job: the plan#

The plan was simple:

1. Find every marketing agency in my city.
2. Keep the ones that publish an email address.
3. Write one short, honest email asking whether they take on juniors.
4. Send it to between 10 and 25 agencies a day, from my own Gmail.
5. Read replies myself and answer each one by hand.

A gentle pace matters. It keeps your mailbox healthy, and it means you can actually reply properly to anyone who writes back.

Step by step with Signalsant#

1. Run a Deep Search for employers#

Signalsant already has many companies on the Companies page, and you can search them in plain words, such as "marketing agencies in my city with an email". When a market is missing or thin, a Deep Search fills the gap by searching Google Maps.

1. I opened Companies → Deep search and clicked New deep search.
2. Query: marketing agency.
3. Country and State: my own, then my City. Picking one city keeps the search small.
4. Max Pages for this city: I left the default of 10.
5. I clicked Start search.

Progress updated live, and I got a "Deep Search complete" notification when it finished. The help guide Run a Deep Search covers each field.

If you're early in your career, try a few different queries rather than one huge one. "Marketing agency", "digital agency" and "web design studio" each turn up slightly different businesses.

2. Let enrichment fill in the details#

There's no button for this. After a company is found, Signalsant visits its website and adds email addresses, phone numbers, social profiles and domain details. This can take a little while after the search finishes, so I came back later in the day.

Each email address gets a status badge, such as Verified, Deliverable or Undeliverable, and addresses are checked before any campaign email goes to them. The How enrichment works article explains the badges.

While I waited, I opened a few company pages. The Overview shows the company's details and its Company Index, a score from 300 to 900 for how established and reachable it looks. The Reviews tab can include reviews from Google Maps and sites such as Glassdoor and Indeed. As a job seeker, those reviews are a useful quick read on what a place might be like to work at.

3. Build a group of employers#

A group is the list a campaign sends to. A group holds up to 1,000 companies.

There are two easy ways to make one:

• On the finished Deep Search, open the ⋯ menu and choose Create group. This adds every company the search has processed so far.
• On Companies, search for what you want, tick the companies and click Add to group.

I used the second way, because I wanted to be picky. I searched "marketing agencies in my city with an email", skimmed the list, and ticked about 80 agencies that looked like a good fit. Then I clicked Add to group → Create a new group instead and called it "Agencies, first round". See Create a company group.

Being selective here pays off. Eighty well-chosen employers beat 800 random ones, and you'll be able to write a better email for them.

4. Connect my own mailbox#

Under Integrations → Add integration, I connected my personal Gmail. You can also use Microsoft 365, Outlook.com or any SMTP mailbox. Emails go out from your own address, so replies land in your normal inbox.

Signalsant asks Gmail only for permission to send email and read your basic profile. It can't read your inbox.

5. Write the email#

I created a template under Templates → New template, which opens the Email Studio with the plain Personal note layout. Plain and short is right for a job email.

I used a few personalisation variables, each with a fallback in case a detail is missing:

Subject: Junior marketing help at {{company.name}}?

Hi {{contact.first_name | "there"}},

I'm a recent digital marketing graduate based in {{company.city | "the area"}},
and I'm looking for my first role at an agency like {{company.name}}.

I can help with social posts, simple reports and website updates, and I'm
keen to learn. Would you be open to a short chat, or to keeping my CV on file
if you take on juniors later?

Thanks for reading,
{{sender.name}}

If you'd rather not hear from me, just reply "no thanks" and I won't email again.

That last line matters. Signalsant doesn't add an unsubscribe link for you, so add your own opt-out line.

You can also draft a template in the Email Studio's AI tab, or choose AI-written in a campaign and give a Brief for the AI. If you do, read every draft carefully. AI can get details about you or the company wrong, and a job email with a wrong claim in it does more harm than good.

On attaching a CV: a campaign can carry Default attachments, but attachments can hurt deliverability. I chose to offer my CV in the email and send it to anyone who replied.

6. Set up the campaign at a gentle pace#

1. Campaigns → New campaign, named "First job, agencies".
2. Audience: I ticked "Agencies, first round".
3. Content: One email, with my template.
4. Sending: my Gmail as the mailbox. Under Companies a day, I chose Custom and entered 15. I switched on Only send during these hours and set 09:00 to 17:00 in my local timezone.
5. Review & launch: I clicked Send me a test, checked the email in my own inbox, fixed a typo, then clicked Launch campaign.

At 15 a day, 80 agencies take about six days; the Review & launch step shows this kind of estimate for you. It's not fast, and that's the point: it gave me time to research each agency that replied and answer properly. When the first group was done, I built a second one from a new search.

Handling replies#

Signalsant doesn't track opens, clicks or replies. It shows whether each email was sent or failed, on the campaign's Schedule tab and in the Outbox. Replies come straight to your own mailbox.

I kept a simple note of who had replied and what they said. When someone wrote back, I answered the same day and attached my CV if they asked for it.

Signalsant doesn't send follow-up sequences. If you'd like to follow up with someone who didn't answer, do it by hand, once, after a week or two. And if someone says no thanks, respect it.

How it turned out (in this example)#

In this illustrative example, most agencies didn't reply, which is normal for any cold approach. A couple wrote back to say they weren't hiring but would keep my details. One agency invited me in for an informal interview, which I prepared for by reading its website and reviews again.

Your results will be different, and nobody can promise any. What this approach does give you is a steady, organised way to reach employers who never posted a job ad.

A few ground rules#

• Be honest about who you are. Use your real name and your own mailbox.
• Keep it relevant. Write only to companies where you'd genuinely like to work.
• Make opting out easy. Include a line such as "reply no thanks and I won't email again".
• Check the local rules. Rules on unsolicited email differ by country, such as CAN-SPAM in the US and GDPR and PECR in the UK and EU. This isn't legal advice; look up what applies where you live and where you're sending.
• Go slowly. Start with 10 to 25 a day, especially with a personal mailbox.

Start your own search#

Signalsant is free during early access, with no credit card. If you're wondering how to find your first job beyond the job boards, run one Deep Search for the kind of employer you'd like, build a small group and write one honest email.

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