Baffled by latest U.S. Labor stats about jobless claims? Two-sided confusion; cautious optimism and wolf-criers. No need to spin your wheels wondering. There’s a no-hassle solution to unemployment news blues. You’ll have to run your search fundamentally different than your pals to find next great career. Don’t do it solo.

Job searching alone is like hitchhiking a scary ride with an unknown stranger on a 180-mile long deserted, no-exit road with hopes you’ll make your destination. When you lack time or expertise to plan career moves carefully, sometimes loss of ground is not apparent until years later. You can get trapped in a black hole and frustrated that your career is not advancing to full potential. Ever feel imprisoned in positions that lacked adequate reward, satisfaction, challenge or a future? There are many reasons for these job jails:

• You’ve become too specialized. • You’ve become too generalized. • You failed to look ahead and plan for future. • You held out too long hoping for “right break.” • You accepted jobs that never made use of your best talents. • You remain too long in positions that offered no challenge or mobility.

Use these seven job search marketing hacks and you’ll get in front of decision makers faster. What’s a “hack?” A “hack” is a clever solution to an interesting problem, so says experts at O’Reilly Media, Inc., a leading-edge book publisher that offers cool technology workarounds on everything from navigating Google and eBay to digital photography and gaming. Hacks are “down and dirty” of getting a task done. Your mission here is to get a great job, high on adventure, low on headache.

Hack #1: Know job market. Locate and identify geographic employment hot spots. Search out emerging industries. Grow up and ditch pabulum of pursuing comfortable industries that are on their way to obsolescence.

You possess personal capital. It is comprised of your time, effort, knowledge and skills. Investing that capital wisely yields a return on your investment. The higher your return on investment (your ROI), more profit you earn. Profit in this context yields discretionary endeavors. And discretionary endeavors tap into most powerful thing you can do to create career results - initiative.

There are hundreds of books filled with an equal number of approaches to managing your tasks and time. Use whatever works for you. But as you do, keep your ROI in mind. Every day you invest your capital. Sometimes you invest it wisely, sometimes foolishly, sometime neutrally. The better investments you make, over time, better your returns will be, over time. Think long-term ROI.

Here are three of my personal ROI strategies: