How to use Twitter for recruitment

Finding good people is tough. Really tough. With the help of Twitter, you can make your life a little easier. At least, you can if your target is on Twitter. If you’re looking for a lumberjack, maybe Twitter isn’t the ideal channel to use. But if you’re trying to fill a job that requires any level web savviness, odds are you’ll find a lot of the most qualified people are experienced tweeters. And that’s a great opportunity as Twitter allows instant access to them, letting you start to build initial relationships quickly and with little effort. Here are five strategies for finding brilliant new recruits through Twitter.

Announce job openings in hashtags
There are lots of hashtags on Twitter devoted to posting open positions, and a lot of tech savvy job seekers are monitoring them daily. Don’t forget to ask for retweets when you post, people will usually oblige you if they have people in their network they think would be interested in the job. Some of the most popular hashtags are  #jobs, #job, #jobseeker, #career and #careers. You can find more refined hashtags that focus on your industry and location by searching through hashtags.org.

Work with job search Twitter accounts
There are lots of Twitter accounts devoted to helping people find jobs. One such is @JobAngels, where people write in their experience, send a link to their LinkedIn profile and Job Angels promotes them to their followers. Other accounts take your job opening and tweet it to their followers, like @craigslistjobs and @thejobsguy. There are local incarnations of such accounts (like @losangelesEdjob and @JobChicago), so do a little searching to see if there’s one focused on your city. 

Get recommendations
As a social community, Twitter is perfect for getting recommendations. Using your network, your employees’ networks and relevant hashtags, circulate tweets asking for recommendations and open a dialogue with those who respond. There’s even a site devoted to professional referrals on Twitter called endorse.se. Users sign up so they can endorse (get it?) people they respect. It’s pretty web/designer focused, so it’s a good place to start looking if that’s the kind of position you need to fill.

Run a competition through Twitter 
If you’re looking for someone to fill a creative position, putting out a mock assignment through Twitter can be a great way to see who’s truly motivated to fill the position and how they approach problems. 

Be your own head hunter
The best people tend to already be employed, and Twitter gives you a way to find them and open a conversation. You can find relevant candidates through Twitter search sites like wefollow.com or by following industry related Twitter lists. Then you just follow them to get to know what they can do, and engage them if they strike you as a good fit for your company. 

Of course, Twitter can’t replace your current recruitment process. But it can serve as that vital first step in getting in touch with your new star employees. 

Jason Ross is a copywriter for The Duffy Agency. He loves working on both traditional and social media projects and speculating on the future of the ad industry.

Comments

[Maria Payroll]

With all the advancement nowadays, I don't see anything wrong with online recruitment. We just have to be cautious of personal information that we post online as they can be viewed publicly.