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Whenever an aspiring entrepreneur decides to start a business, the first concern that comes in his mind is how to keep the cost to a minimum. Launching an online business isn’t all about just getting a website built and taking it online. There are several other procedures & unavoidable costs such as registering the domain, getting a server, business name registration, etc. However, there are other operational costs that can be minimized with the help of technology to keep the budget within the limit.There are many tools& resources for startups that not only help in minimizing the cost, but also save time & make your business look & operate smartly. From recruiting to project management, CRM to email marketing, and every other critical element involved in running& growing a startup, today, there’s a tool for everything.The only problem is your unawareness of these tools that can help you accomplish the same tedious, mundane tasks in no time and with minimal effort. So, let’s explore some of the best tools & resources for startups.1. The Name AppTo have a unique and easy to remember business name is important for brand recall.This particular tool saves you the struggle of finding the right domain name for your startup. What’s more, it also helps you in checking the availability of the username and in deciding social media profile names that resonate with your business. Simply login to The Name App’s official website or download it on your Apple device’s App Store (Sorry, Android Users, you’ll need to make do with the website for now).2. GrowthHackerGrowth Hacker TV is a place where you can watch interviews of successful growth hackers and entrepreneurs who have made a mark in the digital world. The interview videos keep on playing on the website in a loop, which is accessible to visitors for free. But if you want to access a past video recording, then you would need to signup, which is paid. But wait, that’s not all. If you are visiting the website for the first time, you might get a promo code to access site’s content as a premium member for a week.3. Amazon Web ServicesAmazon Web Services, commonly known as AWS, is a web hosting service offered by the ecommerce mogul Amazon. Probably, one of the most dependable web hosting service available presently, AWS is scalable, flexible and currently offers over 90 services including database storage, content delivery, and other features & functionalities.4. MailChimpTo run a successful email marketing campaign and to keep your audience updated about offers, you need an efficient newsletter service. This is where MailChimp comes into the picture. MailChimp is a name that probably needs no introduction to the tech world. The good news, MailChimp offers a free startup package with all the basics features. Paid services begin from $10 per month. Alternatively, you can also take a look at ActiveCampaign and see which one of these suits you prefer.5. AytmThere are plenty of survey tools available in the market today. What sets Aytm apart from all those tools is the fact that it not only helps you in creating a survey form, but also helps you in reaching out to the right audience that will be interested in taking these surveys. A Quick tip: keep your questions open ended to get better insights.6. GlasshatGlasshat comes across as a super-efficient SEO tool that helps startup owners in planning their SEO and other digital marketing activities. This tool prepares a list of activities and also educates new entrepreneurs why a particular activity is important for their startup. While using Glasshat, it would be a good idea to add the Yoast SEO Plugin to your WordPress website so that you can mend your web content as per SEO guidelines.7. AsanaAsana is a web & mobile based project management tool that was built for improving workflow at Facebook. Eventually, and inevitably, the efficiency of Asana made it a prominent name among almost all startup owners across the world. This project management software allows users to assign tasks as per their status, add assignees & get activity feed, view log reports, and a lot more. If you want explore further, we recommend Trello, an equally efficient project management system8. StockSnapA picture is worth a thousand words, and this is why all businesses know the importance of using high quality images to create better engagement. StockSnap, as the name suggests, is a website from where you can get high resolution stock images. The website offers all these images absolutely free of cost. However, if you are looking for more options to get stock images and don’t mind paying a reasonable amount for the same, ShutterStock is the name you can always trust.9. WaveWave is a free online accounting tool for startups and small businesses. The website helps you track all your expenses and incomes, and also helps you with your taxes when the time comes – thus, can help you save a lot of time & effort, usually involved in these procedures. As the screenshot above depicts, this resource is quite reliable for having received media coverage from prominent players such as Forbes, CNBC, Bloomberg, Technology Product Reviews, News, Prices & Tips and Inc.10. RecruiterflowWhether you designate people for human resources, or you decide to handle it on your own, you want the whole process to be easily manageable, and hence, Recruiterflow. Recruiterflow is efficient recruiting software to help startups manage all their activities and planning revolving around the human resource department. It helps you automate your outreach and coordinate with your candidates, as well as streamlines your appointments to keep things running seamlessly.11. FreshdeskFreshdesk is the answer to all your questions pertaining to customer support. From ticketing to tracking to FAQs, Freshdesk can help you sail through the ocean of customer support without breaking a sweat. Freshdesk offers startups a 30-day free trial, without having to enter the credit details. It’s other top features include multichannel helpdesk, automation, reports & analytics and a bunch of team specific products, such as for sales, admin, etc.12. HootsuiteThis list wouldn’t be complete without Hootsuite, the most popular social media marketing management tool among startups. This nifty tool can help you manage over 35 most popular social media networks from just one dashboard. With Hootsuite included in your social media marketing mix, there’s no more clutter and missed out opportunities from social networks. Hootsuite saves the day, everyday13. OptimizelyConversion Rate is one aspect that each and every business depends on. We all know how important A/B testing is to ensure your ecommerce startup (or any business for that matter) is able to covert efficiently, and hence, Optimizely. The name is synonymous to A/B testing in the business world and helps you in fine tuning your webpages to ensure high conversion rate.14. BetaListBeta List is a prelaunch traction system that lets you list your startup before launching it, absolutely free of cost. Free submission entails a waiting period of two months after submission, while getting listed within a couple of days simply needs a nominal fee of $99. The prime benefit of this platform is that you get to showcase your startup idea in the community of business enthusiasts and get valuable feedback from them.15. SemRushSemRush is an all in one marketing toolkit that helps startup owners in carrying out their competitor research easily and effectively. SemRush’s other prominent services include technical SEO audit of your website, semantic core collection, ideas for generating organic traffic, and so on. From ecommerce moguls like Amazon to the Entertainment Conglomerates like Disney, many prominent names have trust in SemRush.16. AngelListAngelList is a platform that every startup must know about. Not only does it help startups connecting with potential investors, but also helps them find experienced professionals who would be interested in working for them. Unlike other job portals, on AngelList, professionals & startups require no middle man to connect. On the other end, it is also a good platform for investors to explore potential startups they would be interested back financially.17. Google Docs/Sheets/Slides/FormsA Free alternative to the MS Office suite, the office tools offered by Google help startup owners to create and share word documents, excel sheets, presentations and forms, and share them with their team members without having to send the edited files again and again. Its accessibility options further ensure only selected people can view the files, and you can also see who made what change to the file, as well as the entire edit history.18. HemingwayHemingway is an online word editor that lets you analyze the readability of your content. It also tells you the changes you should make to your content to make it more readable by telling you which sentence needs what kind of fix. Grammarly also does the same with its paid version. The added advantage of Grammarly’s paid version is that it also verifies the originality of the content with its plagiarism checker.19. CanvaCanva is an online graphic design tool used for generating social posts, blog graphics, Twitter headers, Facebook ads and the likes. The website holds a library of around a million fonts, photos, as well as icons. Users can select a design template or opt to create one from scratch using drag-and-drop features. Uploading, adding and creating images is quite an easy task with Canva. The basic account is free of cost. Additional graphics and photos uploaded by freelance designers can be used for just $1 each.Brief is a team collaboration tool enabling team members to prioritize and focus on important tasks while minimizing distractions.Brief helps you to:1. Seamlessly manage your team progress and spend more time on higher impact tasks.2. Organize daily tasks to remove unnecessary complexity and ambiguity while establishing clear processes.3. Highlight task priority and minimize miscommunications.4. Enable your team’s performance with better and faster communication, clearer process, and well-defined goals.How does Brief workBrief consolidates the most effective features you love about most highly rated messengers and task trackers.Group and private chats, file sharing of any size, desktop and browser accessibility, superior speed, and guaranteed safety.Improved task management: Turn any message into a task with one click. Don’t waste time copy-pasting. Set a task instantly and share it with your team.Helicopter view: Create “hubs” centralize, sort, and prioritize tasks depending on your needs and goals. This helps teams focus on critical tasks first and allows stakeholders to minimize time spent assessing progress.Ultimate ease: Eliminate the learning curve required by most project management tools. Brief features intuitive design that makes using it just about as simple as your basic messenger.How can you get helped from brief:Seamlessly manage your team progress and spend more time on higher impact tasks.Organize daily tasks to remove unnecessary complexity and ambiguity while establishing clear processes.Highlight task priority and minimize miscommunications.Enable your team’s performance with better and faster communication, clearer process, and well-defined goals.Brief’s powerful productivity app gives users simple tools that bring personal and team focus. By combining chat, task dashboards, team hubs, file sharing and storage, teams have a simple menu of productivity tools that help execute around priorities, to make every action count.Diversity, geographic distribution, time zones, cultural differences and varied reporting lines mean that teams are needing to embrace new ways of collaborating in order to drive productivity in today’s era of work. The connected, mobile and social workforce is all about real-time sharing of work, ideas and opinions. Brief’s entrepreneurial collaboration dashboard combines video, organization and communications tools into an elegant user dashboard that allows you to easily connect to anyone in the world, in real time either face-to-face or through chat/team hubs. When used effectively, Brief can eradicate the need to use email, making communication quicker and more focused. Research shows that 73 percent of all emails received by employees are no even relevant to their roles. More focused personal decision making and execution means a more focused you, and a more focused team that achieves more together.Brief is a productivity app that helps you focus your day to achieve more professionally and personally. Its clean, minimalist dashboard combines team chat, video, hubs, to-do lists, file sharing, and storage helping you action priorities that drive the most impact.During our team work we used BRIEF for our team collaboration and found a great service from here. Brief is a productivity app that helps you focus your day to achieve more professionally and personally. Its clean, minimalist dashboard combines team chat, video, hubs, to do lists, file sharing and storage helping you action priorities that drive the most impact.Hope you will have a great team experience from there.Good Luck.

Do you want to refine your writing skills? Are you an aspiring content writer? Maybe you just wish to start your blog? If your answer to the above is a yes, read on for the top 5 paid content writing courses online.WHAT IS CONTENT WRITING?Content writing is a skill-based career. It does not require any extraordinary degree or qualification. But at least a short-term course is imperative to understand the nuances of digital writing.People, who have a way with words, can express thoughts into words adequately, usually do well in this field. Stronghold on grammar, sentence structure, etc., is something that can you can learn. Even the rules of digital writing are something that can you can learn. Hence, the content writing field does not require high-level specialization as such.WHAT ARE THE CAREER OPPORTUNITIES WITH CONTENT WRITING?The content domain is vast with various niches, and hence career opportunities are also diverse. Some of the careers under content writing are:Website content writer: They compose content for websites. They create content in line with business goals and SEO guidelines to attract more visitors and get more conversions.Creative content writer: Creative writing includes writing journals, statement of purpose, motivation letters/recommendation letters, etc. Creative content is on platforms like blogs, magazines, novels, handbooks, newspaper, etc.Editor: An editor is someone who determines the final content of a newspaper/magazine, etc. He/she is responsible for the accuracy and quality of the written materials in a company.Bloggers: They are responsible for conceptualizing, writing, editing, and then promoting content on their websites or company websites.Script Writers: They scripts for audio, video, multimedia, and training modules. They write scripts for the mass media like television, plays, films, video games, etc.Fiction/non-fiction writer: These are novelists or authors, writing in various genres.Technical writers: They analyze functional and technical specifications of products and gadgets and create documentation such as instruction manuals, journal articles, and user manuals.Academic writers: Simply put, it is all writing that has to do with academics like a dissertation, thesis, essays, books, reports, and more.Press release writers: Such writers write short and compelling news story or official statement delivered to members of media.Business writers: They write proposals and plans, reports on the stock market, financing, and the likes, for publication.Ghostwriters: They are mostly writers who write without taking any credit for their work. The credit goes to the client/company/person who hires the ghostwriter.For each of the above specializations, there are content writing courses online.HOW TO PURSUE A CAREER IN CONTENT WRITING?Whether you wish to write blogs, articles, web content, or books, the World Wide Web has courses for all. We have compiled a list of the top five paid content writing courses online.Joining an institute/program is the first step towards fulfilling your goal. The program, of course, depends on what your goal is.Is your goal to start content writing as a side hustle/freelancing?Do you want a full-time job in content writing?Are you looking at just improving your existing skills and maybe polish them and understand current trends and rules of online writing?No matter what your goal, there are content writing courses online to cater to it.With the goal in place, your next point of determination would be course features that best suit your purpose. Following that, are considerations about the course fee, the mode of delivery, the course duration, and so on.This article about content writing courses online provides all the required information.Rank #1. IIM SKILLS Content Writing Master Course.When it comes to content writing courses online, IIM SKILLS tops the list. It is an institute with an outstanding reputation in the online skills prep industry. With headquarters at New Delhi, it has centers across India and in Dubai. In an attempt to cater to more number of aspirants across the globe, all of its courses are exclusively online. It is an opportunity for people from anywhere to access the high-quality training program at any time on any device.In just five years, the institute has come up with job-ready courses that meet global standards in the field of:Content Writing.Digital Marketing.CAT Coaching.It aims to provide top-of-the-line yet affordable courses. The institute has plans to come up with more in-demand skills training in the segments of finance, artificial intelligence, etc. IIM SKILLS has delivered more than 1000+ training across 35+ countries.IIM SKILLS is a premium institute with a global footprint in the content writing domain. The flagship course, Content Writing Master Course, is the best of all content writing courses online. It is a comprehensive course. It covers possibly every aspect of content writing and combines content marketing aspects, thus making it a truly holistic program.The mentors at IIM SKILLS are not just industry experts who robotically teach through the instructor-led sessions. They are passionate about sharing knowledge and provide personal attention to every participant, ensuring they each learn and grasp all concepts. They give a handholding through the technical aspects. The way of teaching is what makes the course so enjoyable and engaging and enriching experience.Salient Features of the content writing course at IIM SKILLS:Requirements/Eligibility: No specific qualification but preferably a graduate.Mode of Course Delivery: Exclusively online via Zoom.Duration of the Course: It is a four-week/one month course with 16 hours of live sessions and 60 hours of practical assignments.Curriculum: The syllabus has 12 modules:Web development.UI/UX interface (blog creation).Introduction to content writing.Content keyword research.Start writing content.Content writing tools.Duplicate content detector.Content distribution using email.Google local page set up.Content marketing using social media.Exploring social media tools.Freelance content writing module.Types of content: Candidates will learn different types of content, such as:Articles.Blogs.E-books.Commercial http://pages.Ad copy.Business listing.Academic writing.Product description.Press release.Web pages.Brochures.Social media posts.Digital infographics.Virtual classroom experience.The course material by industry-experts is up-to-date and relevant.Course Fee: INR 11,900/- + GST.Benefits:Practical experience. The trainer emphasizes learning by doing.Lifetime support. All participants get lifetime access to the learning management system (LMS), which is a knowledge bank of all the course material and session recordings.Students learn about various standard tools of content writing, such as:BufferTweet DeckWordPress theme and pluginsGrammarlyPlagiarism checkerWord Counter, etc.Alumni Network, mentors for life. The institute provides post-course support in the form of an alumni network and even guidance after the course.Placement Assistance. The institute provides candidates with interview assistance as well as assistance with relevant job openings.Certification: All participants get a master certification from IIM SKILLS and a content marketing certification from HubSpot.UDEMYA prominent player in the online teaching and learning marketplace, Udemy has over 150,000 courses and 50 million-plus students. Primarily an American online learning platform, it has a global reach and presence. It has opened doors not just to learning but also teaching.As of January 2020, it has around 57,000 instructors teaching in over 65 languages and 295 million course enrolments.The statistics speak for themselves regarding Udemy’s popularity. The platform has free resources as well as paid resources. Improving the lives of millions of people globally, Udemy has a very user-friendly website.Learners from around the world have easy access to industry experts in the form of instructors. With this ease of access to online learning resources, anyone anywhere can transform their lives.In the content writing domain, they have content writing courses online from A-Z for fiction, non-fiction, creative, business writing, SEO, blogging, and more.Some of the current bestseller courses:Content Marketing Masterclass: Create Content that SellsRating: 4.5 stars.Number of ratings: 1802Students enrolled: 9802Price: 420.Created by: Brad Merrill and last updated in December 2019.Some of the essential topics covered in this course include:Classic marketing fundamentals.Content marketing essentials.Web design.Generating content ideas.Copywriting.Types of content.Content formats and repurposing.Search engine optimization.Content promotion.Email marketing.External marketing channels.Measuring your results.The course curriculum is extensive enough and covers all vital aspects of content writing, plus it comes with Udemy’s 30-day money-back guarantee if you are not satisfied. This course has 3.5 hours of video content, 12 articles, lifetime access, and a course completion certificate.Ultimate Web Content Writing Masterclass with the Power words eBook.Rating: 4.4 stars.Number of ratings: 856Students enrolled: 4836Price: 426.Created by: Sivakumar Kannan and last updated in May 2020.This course enlightens candidates about copywriting, content writing, and content marketing. Editing, blogging, keyword research, SEO, are some of the crucial aspects of content writing and are well-covered in this course. As a freebie, candidates get an eBook of power words that create an impact on writing. This course has 4.5 hours of video, ten downloadable resources, lifetime access, and a course completion certification.THOUGHTFUL MINDSWith a humble beginning in 2006, Thoughtful Minds Web Services Pvt Ltd has grown immensely along its epic journey thus far. It is a pioneer of digital content marketing and SEO outsourcing. What sets Thoughtful Minds apart is its global footprint, thanks to its founder. It is a pioneer in the outsourcing of:Quality content creation.Digital marketing.Website development.Search engine optimization.Social media optimization.Reputation management, etc.Another factor that makes Thoughtful Minds different from the rest is its sense of social responsibility. Some facts that vouch for it being a socially responsible company are:Employment to senior citizens, academically sound students, and lecturers.Work from home options for females.Building eco-friendly offices.Working with animal welfare and environmental welfare organizations.Support NGOs.Apart from providing content creation services, Thoughtful Minds now offers content writing courses online. Learning content writing from a content writing agency sure has excellent benefits.Salient Features of the content writing course at Thoughtful Minds:Requirements/Eligibility: Basic requirements include:English medium schooling.Internet knowledge.Good research skills.Interested in work from home options.Candidate devotes time to social media.Mode of Course Delivery: Online platform, virtual classes via Skype, or Google Hangouts.Duration of the Course: 45 minutes every day from Monday through Saturday, for 45 days (one and a half months). The timings are flexible, though with morning, afternoon, and evening classes.Curriculum: The syllabus includes the following 14 modules:What is content writing?Types of content writing.Keywords.Optimum keyword density.Articles.Types of article writing.How to increase content writing speed?How to avoid plagiarism?Difference between web content and article writing.Writing user-friendly content.Writing SEO-friendly content.How to check plagiarism online?Sources for content writing work.Content writing market rates to expect.Course Fee: INR 5,000/-Benefits: Students can expect to get placed soon after course completion. They get a course completion certificate valid for any content writing work. Also, students learn about freelance content writing and can make use of the same.ONLINE IDEA LAB:A next-gen institute aiming at building a digitally competent society, Online Idea Lab offers quality content writing courses online. It has an extensive line-up of specialized training products.The institute provides its training and services across India, USA, and Canada. It offers courses in:Digital MarketingAmazon Web ServicesContent Creation.Python Programming.Online Idea Lab also caters to training corporates and has an array of courses for higher education. Under the content creation training domain, too, there is something for everyone. The courses on offer are:Content writing foundation course.Advanced content writing course.Copywriting course.Creative writing course.Technical writing course.Instructional design course.We will explore the features of the content writing foundation course online.Salient Features of the content writing course at Online Idea Lab:Requirements/Eligibility:Basic communication skills.A personal laptop.Basic computer http://skills.An eagerness to learn.Time for classes and assignments.Mode of Course Delivery: Online platform, virtual classes.Duration of the Course: Twelve sessions of two hours each spread over a month for the weekday batches. Eight sessions of three hours each spread over a month for the weekend batches.Curriculum: The content writing framework relies on three aspects; content research, content writing, and content promotion. The modules include:Digital marketing fundamentals.Basic competitor analysis.Reading and analyzing content.Fundamentals of visual content.Common grammatical errors.Content writing and ethics.Proofreading and editing.Content writing tools.Writing viral content.Freelancing as a content writer.Course Fee: INR 8,900/-Benefits:With training at Online Idea Lab, candidates engage in activities and assignments, pushing them to learn concepts through practical application.Career guidance and support for a lifetime.Candidates learn to use over 20 tools for research, writing, and promotion of content.Access to become a part of the Online Idea Lab alumni network.Placement assistance from the in-house team to help candidates find a relevant job.A certificate of completion.CONTENT WRITING COURSES-DMTIA division of the Digital Marketing Training Institute in Mumbai, Content Writing Courses, has been in the training industry for nine years now.Poonam Mashru, the co-founder of DMTI and DMTI Softpro, is an online marketing consultant, speaker, and author. Being active for over 26 years with various workshops and online courses, the content writing courses by Poonam Mashru are one of the best.The author/trainer even has her blog page with useful resources like articles and blogs on content writing, digital marketing, SEO, social media, and self-improvement. There are also free motivational e-books. Let us take a look at their content writing courses online.Salient Features of the content writing course at Content Writing Courses:Requirements/Eligibility: Basics of writing the English language.Mode of Course Delivery: Online platform, virtual classes.Duration of the Course:Online Certificate Course in Content Writing. The weekday batch is a fast track for one week, while the weekend batch is on Saturdays for five weeks.Online Advanced Course in Content Writing. The weekday batch will last for two weeks, while the Saturday only weekend batch will take three months.Course Curriculum:The certificate course includes ten modules. It is inclusive of nine worksheets, notes, and three e-books and a certificate.The advanced course is more in-depth and includes 25 modules. It contains eighteen worksheets, ten e-books, notes, and two certificates. The advanced course as a bonus also gives candidates a gold subscription and access to the digital library with over 200+ videos on digital marketing form top trainers in the world.The modules of content writing are:Kickstart content writing, principles, and processes.Crucial content writing steps, how to focus on the buyer persona.Blogging.Content writing strategies for online sales, headline strategies, CTAs.Writing emails that will convert.Keyword research.SEO copywriting.Learn and create graphic content.Create video content.Creating a blog on WordPress.com: Create a Free Website or Blog.Create engaging content for social media.Writing high-converting product descriptions.White paper and case studies.Content marketing.Viral content.Influencer marketing (full Instagram training).Using Linkedin marketing for self or company promotion.Email marketing system, learn to design, collect, and deliver bulk emails.Freelancing portals and methods.Write for landing pages.Caption writing.Using extra tools for content writing and marketing.Course Fee:The online certificate course is for INR 5,550/- (inclusive of GST).The online advanced course is for INR 11,550/- (inclusive of GST).The limited early bird offer for the courses is INR 4,550 and INR 8,550/- respectively.Benefits:Candidates get weekly assignments.Students learn WordPress, blogging, and even build their blog.Students learn various tools for research, writing, and promotion of content.Candidates benefit from the small batch size and individual attention.All participants get a certificate of completion.CONCLUDING THOUGHTSWhile most institutes offering content writing courses online concentrate more on content writing only, IIM SKILLS takes a radically and practically different approach. It enlightens students on some digital marketing fundamentals which hold immense importance in the content writing field.As digital marketing and content writing are inter-related, and one cannot exist without the other, candidates need to have some basic understanding of the rules of the digital game. Content writing today is nothing but digital writing, as it is content for online platforms. Hence, the Content Writing Master Course is an ideal choice with more practical knowledge about digital platforms.Platforms like Udemy, no doubt provide excellent content writing courses online, but the lacking factor is interactive learning. It is without human interaction, mostly learning through recorded videos. Yes, there are post your query sections, but nothing to beat the satisfaction of face-to-face query resolution.With technology advancement, there are various platforms like Skype, Hangouts, Zoom, etc., to aide institutes in holding content writing courses online. These interactive sessions are akin to classroom sessions but come with the advantage of learning from the comfort of your home.Also, they are convenient in terms of time management. Imagine rushing through your chores at the office/home so that you can reach your classes on time. The thought itself is tiring, isn’t it?Learning online obliterates the need to go through the commute, which in most cases, is draining and tiring. You are left with more energy and a fresher and calmer mind to go through the course.Another perspective of online learning is that you get to interact with people, not just from your city/locality but with a diverse segment. Cross-cultural understanding and teamwork on a virtual platform are some benefits.

The advantages of attending a prestigious name-brand university:How much of a difference does it make for your career if you attended a prestigious name-brand university like MIT, Stanford, or Harvard?I will use the adjective 'name-brand' to refer to prestigious well-known universities (e.g., Ivy League schools, MIT, Stanford, Caltech, etc.), and the adjective 'normal' to refer to all other universities (e.g., most state schools and lesser-known private schools).This article only describes the impact of college reputation on knowledge workers in the high-tech industry. For many types of jobs, where you attended college doesn't matter as much (as long as you have the proper degree), so this article might not be as relevant for aspiring accountants, beauticians, doctors, dentists, electricians, high school teachers, etc. However, I believe that these observations generalize well to many fields outside of my own.The reason I focus on high-tech engineering careers is because my friends and I are most familiar with this sector. I graduated from MIT with bachelor's and master's degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, and I'm currently pursuing my Ph.D. in Computer Science at Stanford University. During my summers, I've interned at several well-known companies (Google and Microsoft), as well as a few lesser-known ones.I've talked with many friends both at MIT and Stanford about this topic. Some of the most interesting insights came from my friends who went to a normal (non-name-brand) undergraduate college but then to a name-brand university for their Ph.D. program. They saw first-hand the stark contrast between being an engineering major at a lesser-known college and at a name-brand institution like MIT or Stanford.SUMMARY OF ADVANTAGESAttending a name-brand university will give you the following professional advantages over those who attended normal universities:It will be easier for you to get interviews and job offers at prestigious big companies.Big companies will offer you more favorable starting positions and higher salaries.People at big companies will have a better initial impression of you even if they haven't yet seen your work.It will be easier for you to get involved in a more promising start-up company.It will be easier for you to get admitted into name-brand graduate schools.Carrying a name-brand diploma gives you the largest boost in credibility right when you graduate, the proverbial "helping to get your foot into the door." Most recent college grads have little to no real job experience, so potential employers often use college reputation as a metric of intelligence, work ethic, and technical skill. They might be thinking that since it's tough to get into and graduate from MIT, even a mediocre MIT student might do the job as well as an exceptional student at a normal (lesser-known) university.As you progress in your career and move onto successive jobs, then carrying a name-brand college diploma matters less: Intermediate and senior job candidates are evaluated mainly based on their prior work experience, so if you've done a great job and received positive recommendations, then that could more than make up for your lack of a name-brand diploma.That said, though, the impact of an initial boost upon graduation can be tremendous. If you land a more prestigious job straight out of college, then you will get better opportunities to work on more challenging projects, command more respect, and also get better-connected with other people in equally-prestigious jobs, which will all help you land your next even more prestigious job, and so on and so forth. There is a natural positive feedback "snowball" effect where prestige begets more prestige.The rest of this article discusses each of the advantages I just listed in detail.1. IT WILL BE EASIER FOR YOU TO GET INTERVIEWS AND JOB OFFERS AT PRESTIGIOUS BIG COMPANIESPrestigious universities feed students into prestigious big companies. When I was an undergrad at MIT, representatives from prestigious 'name-brand' big companies like Google and Microsoft would come to our school career fair several times a year and do on-campus interviews to fill summer internship and full-time job openings. Most of my friends who wanted summer internships at such companies were able to get offers after their sophomore and junior years (most freshman were too inexperienced to qualify). My friends' internships paid more than most people's regular jobs did and often resulted in full-time offers (one main purpose of a technical internship program is to recruit potential full-time employees). I had other friends who never interned at these big companies and were still able to get a dozen or more full-time offers upon graduation, at which time they could start negotiating by pitting companies' offer letters against one another.In fact, students from name-brand universities like MIT often expect to receive several high-profile big company job offers upon graduation. Of course, I don't mean to say that these jobs were simply handed to us because we attended MIT. My friends definitely took the job hunt process very seriously, diligently polishing their resumes and preparing for possible technical questions that interviewers might ask. And they are some of the smartest and most hardworking people I know, so they are more than deserving of these numerous job offers.Even more extreme, my friends and I from name-brand Ph.D. programs regularly receive unsolicited mail from recruiters at Fortune 500 companies. My friend who went to a normal university for undergrad and is now at MIT for grad school was shocked by the fact that people were scouring the Internet for MIT graduate students and spamming them with offers for job interviews. In fact, to receive less of these sorts of recruiter emails, some of us took our resumes and academic information offline so that web crawlers wouldn't find them. If Ph.D. students at name-brand universities want a particular summer research internship, we just have to ask: Either our advisors or other research collaborators have personal connections at those corporate or government labs, and we can get an offer immediately after a quick referral and brief formality phone 'interview'.Contrast this experience with what my friends at normal universities faced upon graduation: They had to take much more of an initiative to find the jobs that they wanted, and also had to face much more rejection and disappointment in the process. Few big companies even bothered to seriously recruit from normal universities, because they preferred to divert more of their on-campus recruiting resources to name-brand schools like the "Big 4" of Computer Science: MIT, Stanford, UC Berkeley, and Carnegie Mellon. My friends who went to normal universities rarely knew anyone who got a job at, say, Google (the hottest high-tech company while I was an undergrad), whereas it was commonplace for my MIT and Stanford friends to get job offers there.Of course, anyone can apply for a job at a place like Google, right?You just submit your resume and cover letter online! But submitting an online application is like throwing it into a black hole. Big companies can more than fill up all job openings from personal referrals and college recruiting from name-brand universities; they often won't even bother to look at unsolicited online applications. I've rarely heard of my friends or my parents' friends getting even first-round phone interviews after submitting their resume online—even my friends from name-brand graduate schools rarely heard back when they stubbornly tried to cold-call rather than relying on their lab's connections!Even when you do receive an interview, your interviewer might be tougher on you if you didn't come from a name-brand university. I heard from my friend at a lesser-known university that when some of her friends got on-campus interviews from famous Big Company X (I don't want to name names when I'm maligning companies), the interviewers were downright antagonistic! Perhaps these recruiters were not planning to hire many candidates from lesser-known universities, so they told their interviewers to be more harsh and less forgiving. Sure, you could still land an offer if you performed impeccably, but there is no margin for error. Even worse, you might actually perform below your actual skill level, since you feel the antagonism and arrogance of the interviewers breathing down your neck. In contrast, Big Company X always has plenty of internship and full-time positions available for MIT kids, so the interviewers can afford to be more laid-back and pleasant. As an MIT student, you can get nervous and slip up a bit in your interview, and still get the benefit of the doubt and an eventual job offer.Still, though, MIT students don't simply get a free ride to lucrative job offers, right? Sure, most of the time, they still need to compete with other MIT students for offers, spending lots of time and effort preparing for interviews. Fortunately, your preparation time has a direct effect on your likelihood of success, whereas a person attending a normal university could prepare day in and day out but never even receive an interview.As a thought experiment, if you take identical twins who are equally intelligent and technically proficient, and place one at MIT and the other at a normal university, then the twin at MIT will have astronomically better odds of landing a job at a prestigious big company than the one at the normal university. Despite the fact that both twins would do identically well on the job, the twin at the normal university will probably never even get the opportunity to interview for that job, because most recruiters will focus on finding recent college grads from MIT and other name-brand schools.So why don't big companies do more outreach to students from normal (lesser-known) universities, perhaps enacting a form of Affirmative Action where the 'underrepresented minorities' are people who did not come from name-brand schools? Why are companies so snobbish and gung-ho on hiring mostly from name-brand schools? Aren't they passing up lots of great candidates by not paying much attention to the vast majority of universities? Yes, they are probably passing up lots of great candidates, but they don't care because they can still get more than enough great candidates from name-brand universities. Companies are not social charities dedicated to fair representation; they are out to maximize profits! If it's most cost-effective to recruit at a name-brand school because they get a higher 'hit rate' of good employees, then so be it! They will ignore lesser-known schools while fully knowing that they are passing up some great people. For example, if IBM can find 35 great candidates for every 50 they interview at MIT, but they can only find 5 great candidates for every 50 they interview at a normal school, then it makes financial sense to direct much more recruiting efforts to schools like MIT.I want to conclude this section with the topic of "free rides". Is it possible for MIT students to simply get job offers without even putting in any effort? Most of the time, of course not! Students at name-brand universities still have to put on their "A-game" and compete with their peers to win offers. However, I do remember one time where this sort of "free ride" was a reality. A few years ago, Big Company Y (an extremely lucrative well-known Fortune 500 firm) found that it was starting to have a harder time attracting new hires from name-brand schools, because students perceived other big companies as being more 'hip' and 'sexy' employers. In an attempt to woo MIT students, Big Company Y handed out internship offers at the career fair, and practically gave out full-time offers with minimal interviewing (interviews were simply a formality to make sure you weren't a joke). No kidding! This is one of the most profitable companies in the world, with market dominance in their field, and they were giving out job offers left and right on the MIT campus. To further sweeten the deal, they even offered free summer housing for interns, something that none of their competitors did. Big Company Y had plenty of money to throw around, but not a hip-enough image, so they simply tossed out free job offers with the hope of attracting some MIT students and boosting their reputation. I can't imagine how this would ever happen at a non-name-brand university.2. BIG COMPANIES WILL OFFER YOU MORE FAVORABLE STARTING POSITIONS AND HIGHER SALARIESBack to our identical twins, one who attended MIT and the other who attended a normal university: Even if they both get job offers at the same prestigious big company upon graduation, the MIT twin will likely get a more favorable starting position and a higher starting salary. Let me illustrate with a few stories I've heard from my friends.First, big companies will often reserve more prestigious starting positions for graduates of name-brand universities; they simply won't give those offers to people from lesser-known schools. Here are three examples I've heard from friends:My first example comes from the software industry. Software companies typically hire Computer Science graduates for 3 types of entry-level jobs: Program manager, software developer, and software tester. The program manager coordinates between sales, management, and technical staff, the software developer writes the code to implement new functionality, and the software tester writes code to find bugs in the developers' code. These 3 jobs are supposed to be at the same level in the corporate hierarchy—in other words, program managers are not the bosses of developers or testers on their teams; they are all colleagues. However, there is often an unspoken status differential: Program manager is seen as the most prestigious job, followed by software developer, then software tester. I've heard from my friend at Big Company Z (again, a huge company and market leader) that they only offerprogram manager jobs to recent graduates of name-brand universities. In contrast, they mostly offer tester jobs to recent graduates of lesser-known universities. So, in effect, the level of your college prestige directly translates to your starting level of workplace prestige: In this case, lots of program managers come from schools like MIT, and lots of testers come from normal universities.Another example comes from electrical engineering firms in Silicon Valley. The more prestigious design engineer desk jobs are mostly offered to graduates of name-brand universities like Stanford and UC Berkeley, whereas lower-reputation lab technician jobs are offered to people from normal universities or technical trade schools. Almost everyone who applies to these companies hold a bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering; the caste that you end up joining is determined in large part by where you received your degree. I've heard that there are parallel tracks for career advancement of design engineers and lab technicians; it's virtually impossible to get into the company as a lab technician and then 'jump ladders' onto the design engineer track. You're stuck in your caste, which was long ago determined by your college reputation.My final example comes from finance jobs on Wall Street. The most prestigious and super-high-paying front-office jobs (e.g., investment bankers, traders, quantitative analysts) are only offered to graduates of name-brand universities like Harvard and MIT, whereas the less prominent support jobs (middle-office and back-office) are open to graduates from normal schools. In fact, I don't think any of my friends who didn't go to name-brand schools personally know people who work on Wall Street making several times as much money each year as most Americans can ever hope to make. My friends on Wall Street admit that their firms are extremely snobbish in hiring; there's no possible way to even get an interview unless you have a name-brand diploma. But there are more than enough people from the Ivy League to fill up their applicant pools.How about variations in starting salaries? I don't have any actual numbers for comparison, but I definitely know that people from name-brand universities are offered higher starting salaries for the exact same job position as people from lesser-known universities. Why? Simple: Because people from name-brand universities are more likely to have several high-profile, high-paying offers from other big companies.It's much more rare for people from normal universities to have several high-paying offers, so big companies know this fact and can give them lower-priced offers. Company recruiters might think that if you went to a normal university and managed to get a prestigious offer from Microsoft or Google, then you'd take it in a heartbeat since that's the best you can hope for (arrogant attitude, I know, but such is reality).In contrast, plenty of MIT students have standing offers from Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, Apple, Amazon, IBM, and other well-known high-tech companies, so each one needs to sweeten the deal with better offers and bigger starting bonuses in an attempt to get students to choose them over their rivals. Simply put, when you have more offers in hand, you have more bargaining power and the ability to drive up all of your offers as companies compete to woo you. In the most extreme case of job candidate wooing, the head of Big Company Z (someone who everyone reading this article will recognize) made private phone calls to several of my MIT friends to try to personally encourage them to come work for his company rather than one of its competitors.3. PEOPLE AT BIG COMPANIES WILL HAVE A BETTER INITIAL IMPRESSION OF YOU EVEN IF THEY HAVEN'T YET SEEN YOUR WORKOnce you start a job at a big company, you might recognize a clique of young people who came from name-brand universities as well as an assortment of others who went to normal schools. You will find that some managers might be biased towards those from name-brand schools, even if they aren't necessarily more skilled or experienced than their peers from other schools.The impact of a favorable initial impression can be tremendous. If you are initially trusted as being more intelligent, responsible, and hardworking, then your self-esteem and motivation rise, which will encourage you to actually do a better job to make sure that this initial respect is well-earned. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy—your managers think that you are valuable, and in response you actually make yourself worthy of their praise.In contrast, if you went to a normal university, even if you were able to land a prestigious job, your peers and managers might harbor a subconscious bias against you (especially if they went to name-brand schools). My friend who is a trader on Wall Street says that whenever his colleagues find out that a new hire didn't go to a name-brand school, they immediately think that he simply got in due to nepotism ("his uncle probably works here!") and is actually incompetent. That initial stigma might give you performance anxiety, drop your self-esteem, and result in a negative self-fulfilling prophecy coming true—people perceive employees from lesser-known universities as not being as sharp or responsible, which makes you discouraged, not live up to your potential, and thus reinforce their initial prejudices.In general, people who end up attending name-brand universities have grown up accustomed to hearing themselves praised by their elders, whereas most people didn't grow up with such privileges. This same unequal treatment persists far into adult working life.(Of course, the flip-side is that managers who went to normal colleges might harbor a negative bias against subordinates who went to name-brand colleges, perceiving them as snobbish elitists!)4. IT WILL BE EASIER FOR YOU TO GET INVOLVED IN A MORE PROMISING START-UP COMPANYMy focus thus far in this article has been on big established companies like Microsoft: i.e., attending a name-brand university greatly increases your chances of getting a well-regarded Fortune 500 corporate job.But what about those of you who don't want to work for The Man? If you want to get rich starting your own business, doesn't it not matter at all where you went to school? Isn't the whole basis of the American entrepreneurship spirit one of rugged individualism, untarnished by the reputations of elitist establishment institutions like name-brand universities? Can't anyone pull themselves up by their own bootstraps and make a solid living based on the quality of the product or service they provide? Surely your customers don't care whether you have a Harvard degree or one from a university they've never heard of! Well, in an ideal world, where you went to college (or if you even went to college) should have no bearing on your success as an entrepreneur. But in this world, it can have a huge effect.Huge effect number one is social networking. If you went to a name-brand university, chances are that you personally know friends or classmates who have gone on to found start-up companies that are now doing quite well. They will be able to introduce you to mutual friends who might be able to help you launch your business or at least provide useful advice. You don't even have to go out of your way to schmooze or network—these people are your classmates, acquaintances, and friends!Of course, most of their companies will never grow as large as Google, but many are flush with venture capital funding and will at least have a fighting chance of becoming profitable. Venture capitalists and other investors flock around places with prestigious Computer Science programs, most notably Silicon Valley (home to Stanford and UC Berkeley) and Boston (home to MIT and Harvard). It's no surprise that some of the most successful start-ups that have gone on to become Fortune 500 companies were founded by students from name-brand universities, most famously Google and Yahoo out of Stanford and Microsoft and Facebook out of Harvard.If you are 'in the know' with regards to start-up culture, then you will have better luck with joining an already-formed company or finding partners for your own venture. If you are an outsider, then it's tremendously difficult to get your foot into the door.Huge effect number two is, again, reputation. Even though venture capitalists and other funding sources are supposed tojudge your start-up pitches based solely on the merit of your ideas and execution, they are still human and biased towards people carrying name-brand diplomas. It's a great confidence booster to come into a pitch meeting with a team of MIT graduate students who are spinning off a cutting-edge research project into a new consumer product. Compare that with a quaint storyline of two small-town farm boys from the Midwest who invented some kooky contraption in their garage. The latter makes for a more heartwarming movie, but the former will be more appealing for most funders (who are wealthy men and women who probably went to name-brand universities).5. IT WILL BE EASIER FOR YOU TO GET ADMITTED INTO NAME-BRAND GRADUATE SCHOOLSLastly, if you want to pursue graduate education beyond your bachelor's degree, then you will have an easier time getting into a name-brand graduate program if you have a name-brand undergrad pedigree.I can only speak for the Ph.D. graduate program, but what professors look for in an applicant is the ability to do graduate-level research. One surefire indication of such potential is an applicant's successful efforts working on well-established, well-known research projects supervised by famous researchers. It's no surprise that such well-regarded projects and researchers are often located at name-brand universities! So if you started out as an undergrad at MIT and worked on projects under Professors X, Y, and Z, all of whom are well-known in your field, then their recommendation letters carry far more weight than letters from three relatively-obscure professors from other universities.Thus, it's no surprise that many Ph.D. students at name-brand universities also did their undergraduate work at other name-brand universities. High reputation begets more high reputation. In Computer Science, MIT undergrads continue onto grad school at Stanford, UC Berkeley undergrads attend grad school at MIT, Harvard undergrads also go to grad school at MIT, Stanford to Berkeley, MIT to Carnegie Mellon, and so on.Of course, it's definitely possible to jump from a lesser-known undergraduate school to a name-brand graduate school (several of my close friends have done so), especially if the professors who write your recommendation letters have ties to name-brand schools (e.g., they graduated from a name-brand school where you want to go for your Ph.D. or have friends who are professors there). But again, luck plays a much bigger role when you're not already coming from a name-brand school. With a name-brand diploma, the deck is already stacked in your favor; you just need to live up to already-favorable impressions and not disappoint.If it was of some help to you then kindly Upvote!