Social Recruiting
Is Twitter still relevant for recruiting?
Rachel Hill
HireHive
Rachel Hill
HireHive
Rachel Hill
HireHive
Rachel Hill
HireHive
While LinkedIn seems to be the modern social recruiting platform of choice, does Twitter still hold any relevance in the recruiting world?
A few years back, Twitter was on everyone’s radar. In contrast to LinkedIn or Instagram, Twitter’s unique selling point was its general appeal to all types of people. Recruiters hopped on the Twitter bandwagon, but many found themselves at a loss and quickly abandoned it. As social and as inclusive as Twitter is, it isn’t universally recognised as a recruiting tool and its user experience mirrors this.
However, for all those who say Twitter is ‘dying’, it is still the best platform for real-time interaction, especially during events. Even its key features including mentions and hashtags have been copied by other social media platforms. So can Twitter still yield successful results for recruiters if used correctly? Let’s evaluate:
As a recruiter, it’s important to know where there’s a large audience, but also a targeted audience. With 250 million active users a month (this number is rising) chances are, a good percentage of your talent pool is actively using Twitter. Twitter comes with the added benefit of being free (unlike LinkedIn recruiting!), so you can reach out to active and passive candidates at no extra cost. Plus, you can also be more social on Twitter than other platforms, meaning you can engage and build relationships easily.
If you decide that your talent pool is worth pursuing on Twitter, please ensure you have a complete and professional profile - this means including a profile picture and bio. Without these, people are unlikely to follow you back. Unlike LinkedIn, you can make your profile far more lighthearted, so don’t forget to show your social side in your bio and even profile picture. Also ensure that your profile is open, so your talent pool can easily follow you.
[caption id="attachment_12274" align="aligncenter" width="1310"]
Example of a good recruiter Twitter profile.[/caption]
Now that you have a profile page set up, you may be tempted to start posting jobs. However, before you do this, it is necessary to build up a loyal, steady and sizeable following. The best way to achieve this is by tweeting about a range of professional and personal (but not too personal) issues.
As you cannot rely on relevant people to follow you based on tweets, you need to directly search for your talent pool too. Using the advanced search tool, you can find people based on where they live, their profession, amongst other things. Before you know it, you will have a relevant pool of followers to post your jobs to.
If you received a reciprocal follow from a potential candidate, why not send them a direct message informing them of open roles available? Twitter is very social, so people are often open to receiving these types of messages. On the other hand, auto dms are a big no no.
Twitter is also great for reaching out to local businesses directly and asking them for retweets or referrals. These types of relationships can help increase your social media reach and find candidates unknown to you otherwise. Following and reaching out to industry leaders can also assist with creating inspiring content that your talent pool will relate to.
Not every recruiter will take to using Twitter as it requires long term patience and consistency to yield results. However, if you remember to be social and conversational, to tweet often about a range of topics and to follow relevant people directly - you are likely to succeed over time.
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