A few years ago I drove past a billboard that read “Look Better Naked.” The advertisement was for a fitness club. That’s good advertising! Too often businesses advertise their product or service by describing what they are offering. This business cut to the chase – they found my pain point and positioned themselves as the solution.

Too often job seekers approach employers (their prospective customers) by trying to “sell” them with all they have to offer: education, skills, and experience. Whenever I begin working with a job seeker, I always ask this one question: “If I were an employer/company, what problem(s) can you help me solve?”

Are you a trainer that can turn my novice sales staff into rainmakers? Are you a HR manager that can reduce staff anxiety while riding the waves of change? Are you a maintenance mechanic that has a sixth sense about how a machine should sound and can preempt a costly breakdown?

You see, employers hire people because they have problems that need to be solved. It could be a good problem – such as landing a huge commercial account and needing more personnel to help ramp up production; or a bad problem – such as loosing their market lead over the competition and needing a new approach to advertising.

Your job is to figure out the problem and position yourself as the solution. Then develop your job search communication message (elevator pitch, résumé, cover letter and interview responses) around strong examples of how you have solved similar problems for other employers.

As for me, I always thought fitness clubs were overpriced and too upscale for my taste, but this particular club sure did sell me on the idea of looking better naked! Some problems we are willing to pay a premium price to solve and when the “seller” offers the solution, it is easy to forego the competition.