by Wendy Jo Moyer - Dec 8, 2009
Social media allows you to broaden your pool of contacts with people you may or may not know. The status updates offer a forum to update your contacts about your job search and skill set, while company searches allow you to seek out and connect with organizations that interest you most.Job postings are frequently listed by both employers and employees. With Twitter you have a chance to network and connect with those who share your interests, work in the same field, and brand yourself as an expert.
What is Twitter?
A real-time short messaging service that allows users to read and share messages of 140 characters or less with their contacts. It's not just another passing trend.
Unlike LinkedIn and Facebook, where requesting connections with someone you don't know is discouraged, with Twitter this is acceptable behavior.
Reasons to use Twitter include...
- Networking
- Company Information
- Personal Branding
- Industry Knowledge
- New Ideas
Before you use Twitter you will first need to create an account. Open up a web browser and go to twitter.com. Try to create a professional name, typically your first and last name, or some combination there of since it may have already been taken by another user. User names are limited to 15 or less characters, with no spaces or special characters.
Other recommended settings include...
- Time Zone - Select the correct time zone, so that your tweets will reflect the correct time.
- More Info URL - Enter your LinkedIn, blog or personal web page address if you have one.
- One Line Bio - Type what you want others to see describing you when you tweet (160 character limit).
- Your Location - The city and state where you live, or are planning to re-locate to.
- Protect my tweets - Leave this unchecked. Checking this tends to discourage people from following you.
The Tweet
The tweet is nothing more than a brief message you send to the people following your account.
You can have some personal tweets, but it's best to tweet about your professional interests. For example a Food Service Worker would probably tweet...
- Meals that were made.
- Links to articles about the profession.
- Links to food service expert blogs or web pages.
- Occasionally about their work experience.
- Reposting other person's tweets about the industry (re-tweets).
You can also search by terms other than names utilizing the Search box shown on the home page.
Some other useful Twitter Search sites on the web include...
Typically most people just follow their friends or work contacts. 75% of these will follow you back.
Participate
Once you begin following several contacts, participate in the conversation. Reply to questions, give feedback and introduce yourself. Try to give a glimpse into your personal life, but keep it clean.
If employed, do not mention your search on a social networking site.
Never bad-mouth a previous or current employer, or include a company's confidential information.
Update your profile regularly, even if you're currently not looking for a job.
Re-tweet
It is customary on Twitter to "re-tweet" others messages. When you do this, you send someone else's message that you think is valuable to all of your followers.
By re-tweeting, messages spread throughout the Twitter network and help you to build a relationship with the sender.
Twitter Codes
Twitter used to require codes to do certain functions. These are no longer necessary, but still work. Twitter has been updated to provide these options within the Application.
- @username - Standard way to refer to a person on Twitter. If you want to send a message to a person, simply using the "@" sign before their user name. Remember that whatever you send will also be seen by all of your followers.
- RT @username - Re-tweet a message. Place this at the beginning of your message.
- D @username - Send a direct message to one person only. Place this at the beginning of your message.
Try not to follow every job resource on Twitter. You won't be able to keep up. Focus only on those types of organizations and people that are most likely to tweet about your desired career.
Twitter Job Resources
Here's a list of some job resources to check out...
- @WCFHotJobs
- @OrlandoJobTweet
If you want to follow Twitter jobs accounts specific to your area, consider following...
- Accounting - @AccountantsORL
- Admin Assistant - @OfficeJobsORL
- Bio - @JobOrlando
- Banking - @tmj_orl_banking
- Clerical - @tmj_orl_cler
- Design - @DesignJobsORL
- Education - @ORL_education
- Enginering/Architecture - @tmj_orl_eng
- Executive - @ExecJobsORL
- Finance - @tmj_orl_finance
- Government - tmj_orl_govern
- Healthcare - @tmj_orl_health
- Human Resource - @tmj_orl_hr
- IT - @ITJobsORL
- Hospitality - @tmj_orl_hrta
- Law - @LawyerJobsORL
- Nursing - @tmj_orl_nursing
- Pharmacy - @PharmaJobsORL
- Physician - PhysiciansORL
- Public Relations - @FFPRAOrlando
- Retail - @tmj_orl_retail, @ORLRetail
- Sales - @tmj_orl_sales
- Teaching - @TeacherJobsORL
- Transportation - @tmj_orl_transp
- Writing - @tmj_orl_writing, @WriterJobsORL
Some general job Twitter accounts to consider following include...
- @FindInternships
- @freelance_jobs
- @JobAngels
- @JobHuntOrg
- @thejobsguy
- @jobshouts
This can easily become overwhelming. Don't let it scare you.
The more you use the Twitter, the more it will make sense and help you on your way to building your network.
As you provide valuable information through your tweets, your network will grow.
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