[yann2]

First of all its not about standing out. In the vast majority of orgs, no one experienced expects some one fresh out of college to be a MASTER at anything. Most of them arent masters of anything either.

So dont worry about that.

Worry about location. If you AND all your friends in town arent getting responses - move. If you are sitting in the boondocks move closer to larger cities. Best case would be to move to the most buzzing active cities where you have friends who have access to school job boards and/or have landed jobs/know the process enough to help.

I spent 6 months in a smaller town getting no calls. Moved to NYC and the whole story changed. This ofcourse was because I had friends going to multiple schools there. Thanks to which I would keep getting info on which company was on campus, which team within the company, what they were looking for, what type ot questions etc. So even if I missed them on campus I would apply via the site knowing which positions to target.

Also keep brushing up every single day on a list of fundamentals, known interview questions etc. Dont let the activity over time rot the brain away. So when a call does come certains basics are on your finger tips.

[baron816]

Moving now probably doesn’t make that much sense. Everyone is still remote, and interviewing remotely. Just tell the recruiter you’d be willing to move anywhere they want you to.

[R0b0t1]

There's a definite bias against people who are outside of a company's area. It might just be that they look at and hire from the local candidate pool first, or it might be something else.

If you live in the middle of nowhere it is very hard to get a job.

Per a (now very old) HN thread there also seems to be a bias against rural candidates.

[MattGaiser]

Just remove any location information from your resume. Mine has none. No address, no office locations. All sorts of recruiters have called, assuming that I live in SFO or Seattle.

[usr1106]

I don't agree. Not me personally, but company policy strongly prefers local candidates that can come to the office every day. Well, some day at least, for the last 1.5 years nobody has been required to do so. So when I read an application with no mentioning of location or somewhat convincing willingness to relocate that's automatically a no go. Well, in case of an exceptional applicant we would ask. But exceptional candidates are ahem... exceptional. The question was about normal mortals just having graduated.

[seasily]

Name, email, and a local number procured through Skype or Google Voice is the way to go.

[extr]

True, but I think you can use this bias to your advantage in some ways in the remote world. On a resume what catches your eye first, the name/locations of the HQs of prior employers? Or home address of candidate? The former is much more striking to me personally. If I've seen someone has ever worked in my city, I mentally frame them local even if I later see their address is remote.

Point being, if you can break into the market and rack up a bit of experience, you get that some of that local bias for yourself.

[bregma]

Summary: It's now what you know that gets you the job. It's who knows you.