When Riley Prescott was laid off after 10 years at Greenshades, he knew one thing for sure: he did not want to go back to software development. With a tough market, shrinking severance, and a family to support, he worried he might have to take the faster, safer route back into dev. Instead, he decided to test, learn, and then double down - and ended up exactly where he wanted to be, with a pay bump to match.
The Decision: Don't Choose One Lane - Test Both
For seven years, Riley had been a .NET developer. In the last three, he'd moved into operations and HRIS work - and that's where his energy really was. His goal was to land a technical business analyst or data and operations role that leveraged his payroll and HR tech experience. But he wasn't sure the market would agree.
Rather than betting everything on one direction, Riley decided to treat his first App Booster run as a 25-day experiment.
"I used my first 25 days with Applica to test. Titles, keywords, how I was presenting myself."
As Applica applied on his behalf and he watched which roles were responding, patterns emerged quickly:
- Senior Product roles were often too far above his experience
- Operations, HRIS, and business analyst roles felt like a much closer match
- The market responded better when he leaned into his data, HRIS, and payroll background
Along the way, he refined his resume to be more ATS-friendly, tuned his titles, and rethought his positioning entirely.
"After that first round of refining, I realized what I'd actually been doing was operations and business analyst work. I just hadn't labeled it correctly."
Step Two: Running Two Profiles in Parallel
By the end of the first 25 days, Riley had clarity - he knew which lane he wanted. But with a family to support, he didn't want to abandon the safety net entirely. So when he re-upped with Applica, he used the multiple profile feature to run both paths simultaneously:
- Profile 1 - Technical Business Analyst / HRIS / Operations: the dream lane
- Profile 2 - Software Developer (.NET): the fallback, where 7 years of experience made him a strong fit on paper
"Applica allowed me to diversify my job search. I had one profile for the work I really wanted to do, and another that leaned on the rest of my skill set."
The Offer - In Exactly the Right Lane
In the end, it wasn't software development that won. Riley landed a Technology Business Analyst – Data Solutions role that matched almost exactly what he'd been targeting.
"I was on the interview call and they were like, 'This is the guy.' I only had one call with them. They were so excited to have me."
The numbers worked out too. His new role came with a $15K increase in base salary, benefits costs cut roughly in half (worth another ~$8K per year), and a net compensation improvement of around $20K over his previous job.
"I don't have nicer words for Applica. The amount of money I spent on you guys was completely worth the job that I landed."
What Made the Difference
Looking back, Riley points to three things that changed the outcome:
- Treating the first run as a test. Instead of assuming he knew exactly what to target, he used 25 days to let the market give him feedback. "I pinpointed my market worth and where I actually fit pretty quickly."
- Running two profiles instead of guessing. He didn't have to choose between passion and safety - Applica let him pursue both intelligently and simultaneously.
- Staying in control of the pipeline. App Booster applied in both lanes while Riley kept applying manually to targeted roles. Applica centralized everything with application history and the Interview Tracker.
"Applica did exactly what I would be doing, just faster. I still felt in control, but I was way more productive."
