I’m so tired of media recruiters emailing me about web design jobs.
I’m sure they all have the same CVs from 2001-2003 where PHP, MySQL, HTML, XHTML, CSS were sprinkled across the document. Things change, I’ve changed A LOT over the past 7 years, but yet people are still reaching out for me for jobs that I’m not interested in. Surely recruiters are wasting a lot of time when a couple of simple things using social media could save them a lot of energy and help them find the right person for the right job.
Here are some tips for recruiters that you think could really benefit from using social media better – please feel free to email them, not sure if they’re all up to speed with search/twitter/facebook etc.
Linkedin
If you haven’t updated your profile on Linkedin you’re missing out.
If you’re looking for an employee and you’re not using Linkedin you’re missing out even more. It costs peanuts (relative to agencies and head hunters) to go on Linkedin and be able to access the many many many users who might fit the profile you’re looking for.
Plus you can see how people they work with feel about them. I’ve been lucky enough to work with some really great people over the years and it always makes me feel great when I get a recommendation on Linkedin and I’m always generous about recommending people I really enjoyed working with too. That information can be really valuable to people looking for people to fill in their teams.
The best part is that Linkedin shows you how you’re connected. So instead of going through interviews and interviews, examinations etc and then asking for a reference with turns out to say “Run away” you can get the reference done quickly before even engaging. As well you can get an introduction. An introduction from someone I know means a lot more to me than a cold call email and I’m sure I’m not alone.
Everything else
Linkedin should be the majority of the recruitment time spent on digital media but it’s not the only tool you should use. Engaging with blogs, writing a blog and commenting on thought leadership pieces can be a great use of resources as well. This will help you identify who the leaders are in the market place and who you should get working with you.
Twitter is great for this too, microblogging enables you to engage with potential employees like never before. And here’s the great part you get to build a relationship with people. So a call after a tweet is a lot warmer than before. Looking at follower counts, retweets helps you figure out whether someone’s worth the effort, and once you engage with people the right people for the right jobs will come to you.
I know there’s a lot of concern over the new Facebook privacy stuff, but I honestly think recruiters and employers should take advantage of this, being able to “like” or recommend posts enables companies to find the people who are interested and engage with potential employees in a way that hasn’t been possible before.
That’s just the start, I honestly believe that social media for recruitment is being under utilised and recruiters should do more to engage and build communities to make their lives easier. If for no other reason than I really don’t want another email asking me if I’m available for a PHP developer role!
