Click your way to a fashionable career

A job as a fashion merchandiser, a fashion photographer or a stylist, all sound very tempting. But where does one start? How does one land these jobs? It's precisely these questions that led to the creation of Fashionjobsindia.com, an online portal that lists jobs and internship opportunities in the fashion and style field. Launched this February by Masoom Minawala, the website currently features openings in image consulting, blog management, content writing, fashion photography, visual merchandising, styling and public relations.

Fashion Jobs India can land you an internship and, with a little luck, a job too

The idea to create such a platform came to Minawala after she realised that though there were ample opportunities in the fashion industry, many aspirants were unaware about them. The 20-year-old entrepreneur, who started interning when she was 17, says, "When I wanted to start working, I was desperately looking for placements. Now, after being around for a while, I have realised that the industry often seems inaccessible to youngsters. But that's not really the case. So I decided to launch Fashion Jobs India to bridge the gap between employers and aspirants."

Minawala, who has a fashion blog and e-commerce site, StyleFiesta, started working on the employment portal by spreading the word among her friends. Over time, she began promoting the site on social media such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. "The site gets 10,000 hits every day. The word-of-mouth publicity has helped us immensely. It's heartening to see aspirants, who have landed jobs or internships, thank us and spread the word."

The youngster says the functioning of her site is quite simple. Employers email Fashion Jobs India with their requirements, which Minawala and her three team members put up on their website. She says, "We tell the applicants that they should give our reference while applying for a position. We just help the two parties to connect. We don't scan through the resumes or get involved in the hiring process."

Amazing as it may sound, Minawala doesn't charge a penny from clients, let alone users. "It is a business with minimal investment and this arrangement has worked well for me so far. We haven't spent anything on advertising or marketing. But in the future, we plan to make our site more interactive," she says.

Currently, she is in talks with several city-based colleges to publicise her website among students at festivals and events. "We are hoping to put up banners and our stall at these events as this will help us tap our target audience of college students who look for internships and older graduates who are looking
for jobs."u00a0