Nowadays, job seekers need to incorporate social media into their job hunt.  The good news is that these tools are free to use (unless you want to upgrade to the premium level on some of them).  Social media refers to connecting with people via the Internet to have a discussion; it’s often referred to as Web 2.0.  It was the latest evolution of the Internet.  The next wave, possibly Web 3.0, is already occurring.  With social media tools, you can share all sorts of information via documents, multimedia, or live chats all at the same time.

Our nonprofit has been part of the social network for employment since 2009.  We use the following social media tools: a Twitter account [1] @Broke4Jobs, Blogging4Broke, Paper.li for e-newspapers, and our Web site, [2] www.brokebutnotforlong.org.   I also use LinkedIn.com and Yahoo Connections to network with other professionals.  We decided not to use Facebook because it requires nonusers to set-up accounts.  Whereas, the twitter feed can be viewed without logging in via a widget (electronic gadget that is embedded into a Web page with HTML code).

First, you should create a Twitter account for the job hunt.  Twitter is called microblogging because you can only “tweet” 174 characters.  Be professional with your tweets because the Library of Congress is documenting them!  Moreover, what you “tweet” will show up in a Google search.  If you set up a Google Alert on your twitter name/handle, you will find that this is true.  Google alerts are part of gmail, Gooogle’s email, which is also free.

Why would you want to use Twitter to find a job? Because many companies have job boards on Twitter.   Visit our twitter account to view our list of US and international job boards.  Currently, there’s a polarized debate going on regarding the future of face-to-face and online job boards.  Matt Adler of Recruiting Futurology stated in his article, “The Job Cloud–Why Twitter is the Future of Job Boards, “Depending on your viewpoint/agenda it seems you should either believe they are going to suffer a painful death and all shut down tomorrow or carry on regardless effortlessly circumventing the massive digital changes that are effecting every other industry so drastically.”

He goes on to say that companies can get several hundred qualified applicants even though they don’t have many followers.  Basically, a “tweet” can go along way!  People retweet important or fun tweets that they find.  I’m always retweeting interesting jobs, internships, and volunteer opportunities in hopes that one of my followers will go after it.  We currently have 573 followers, and I “follow” twice that amount.  If you’d like to learn more about Twitter for the job hunt, read the TweetSheet created by Marci Reynolds at [3] www.marcireynolds.com.

Sandra Annette Rogers

[4] sandra@brokebutnotforlong.org

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