Company: HirePerfect, Estero, FL, U.S.A.
Company Description: RezBiz, LLC is a a high-volume writing service that provides clients with optimized resumes, cover letters, LinkedIn makeovers, CVs and more. Our prices are reasonable and our service elite. We succeed for our clients because we are in their corner, no matter what career challenge they are facing.
Nomination Category: Individual Awards Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Female Entrepreneur of the Year – Consumer Services –10 or Less Employees

Nomination Title: J. Melissa Cooper, Executive Vice President of Talent, Inc.

Describe for the judges the activities and accomplishments of the nominated entrepreneur since the beginning of July last year (up to 525 words):

Melissa is the Executive Vice President of Writer Development for Talent, Inc., the largest resume-writing firm in the nation that reaches more than five million people through a system of 10 career-focused websites.

She blazed a unique path in transforming her one-person freelance model to a wholesale and retail resume writing firm (RezBiz, LLC) that captured more than $4 million in gross sales last year before being acquired by Talent, Inc.

Her company remains a strategic asset to two main sectors: Job boards across the country and the job-seekers they are trying to reach.

Job boards benefit from the turnkey integration of RezBiz’s white-label fulfillment feature, which allows companies to seamlessly add RezBiz’s expert resume writing services to their earnings portfolio. Job-seekers receive top-notch service at an affordable price for a product that they struggle in keeping relevant and up-to-date in an ever-changing job market.

The value that RezBIz provides its partners and customers has consistently been validated since Melissa founded the company out of her one-bedroom North Miami apartment in 2009, before scaling it dramatically through relentless business development and marketing.

Melissa in 2013-14 proved that her company’s rapid growth was no fluke. Coming off an impressive 300 percent climb in annual customer orders in 2012-13, RezBiz continued its progressive growth to 51,425 annual orders by July 2014.

The growing market for professionally written resumes and Melissa’s career pedigree in recruiting formed the perfect entrepreneurial storm, as she spearheaded the rapid expansion of RezBiz to more than 250 active employees.

As co-founder and co-CEO of RezBiz, Melissa’s operational functions included overseeing all functions of the business including marketing, contract writer recruitment and management, customer service, product development and new product offering roll-out, order fulfillment, and total quality management. Prior to the Talent, Inc., acquisition, RezBiz served thousands of customers per month, had partnerships with many leaders in the career development space, and fielded a full-service bookkeeping and accounting function, full-time customer support staff, and full-time technical support team.

Now as Executive Vice President of Writer Development for Talent, Inc., Melissa is leveraging past success and lessons learned to grow the company to new heights. Her goal is to make professional resume writing services affordable and the new standard for the general public’s job-searching efforts.

The driving force behind the success at RezBiz and now Talent, Inc., has been an unwavering commitment to providing a cost-effective, quality option to people who need hands-on, constructive help with their resumes.

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Provide a brief biography of the nominated entrepreneur (up to 125 words):

J. Melissa Cooper is the Executive Vice President of Talent, Inc., which acquired her business RezBiz, LLC, in July 2014.

A triple-certified resume writer and dual-certified HR professional, Cooper began her career in agency staffing, where she rapidly become a partner in her first firm, Logix, Inc., before starting her own recruitment agency, Back Bay Search, Inc.

Cooper holds a Master of Science in Human Resource Management at New York University. She is a member of the Women President's Organization and is passionate about mentoring other women entrepreneurs.

Cooper’s additional involvements include non-profit work in Indonesia, India, and Bangladesh. She was named Enterprising Woman of the Year in 2014 by Enterprising Women Magazine. Her first manuscript, Freelance Nation, is set to be released in 2014.