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Page 1: 125 Twitter Job Search Tips

Copyright 2011 © Position Ignition - 125 Twitter Job Search Tips www.positionignition.com

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125 Twitter Job Search Tips

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Copyright 2011 © Position Ignition - 125 Twitter Job Search Tips www.positionignition.com

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Known as the world’s favourite micro-blogging site, Twitter is a social media platform where users ‘tweet’ status updates of 140 characters or less. With 200 million registered accounts, Twitter is the “go-to” place for early adopters, professionals, sports stars, managers, directors, celebrities and organizations wanting to give out—and get—instant news, views and information. Some people might see Twitter as nothing more than a massive time-waster, but used in the right way, this social media site can be the job seeker’s best friend. Whether you’re finding your first job, aiming to switch jobs, changing careers, or seeking out work experience or voluntary placement, this e-book will show you how to get to where you want to be with Twitter. Read on to find tips on:

• Getting to grips with the basics as a Twitter beginner • Following the right people and attracting the right followers • Knowing how to find jobs of interest • Making sure you aren’t spamming or being spammed • Using Twitter to showcase your talents • Mastering the art of tweeting • Learning the Twitter lingo.

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Twitter Basics Before jumping in, there are a few things any Twitter beginner needs to know, whether they’re looking for a job or not.

1. Use your own name when you sign up so that people who already know you can find you easily and so that you can make new genuine connections.

2. If the username you want i.e. of your name is taken, try to use a variation that includes your name e.g. if @SimonNorth is taken look at

@Simon_North or @AboutSimonNorth or say the name is too long like @PositionIgnition, we have @PosIgnition instead. It might also be interesting to use a name related to the job, industry or career you are looking to get into or specialise in.

3. Fill in your bio. You only have 160 characters for your bio so make them count. Make it clear what you want and what value you are

bringing i.e. “As a senior HR executive with over 25 years experience in HR, I’m currently looking for an interim position in Y type of organisation”.

4. Don’t be shy about including your best qualities in your bio. The Twitter bio is like a first impression you make on people who are seeing

your Twitter page for the first time, so give them a reason to find out more about you.

5. You get to include a link as part of your profile so think about whether you want to link to your CV, blog or LinkedIn page.

6. Use a real photo of yourself. It’s important to upload a photo on your Twitter profile and it’s just as important that it’s a photo of you. As hilarious as putting up a photo of a cat in a bow tie or Simon Cowell is, it doesn’t look very professional in the eyes of potential employers looking at your profile.

7. Choose a photo that shows a lot of your face. The closer up your face is in the photo, the more personal—and therefore trustworthy—it appears.

8. Fill in your location. Not only does it help potential employers to know where you’re based, it’s also important in terms of your listing in Twellow or another Twitter directory.

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9. When putting in your location, think about how people would search for where you live. For example, if you live in Hillingdon, put Greater London.

10. If you already have profiles on other social media sites such as LinkedIn and Facebook, make your Twitter profile consistent with them . For example, use the same profile photo that you use on LinkedIn.

11. Invest in a custom background for your Twitter page. Pay a professional to create a background that reflects who you are and what you

do—or what you want to do. For instance, if you’re a journalist, your background could feature photos of notepads, pens, Dictaphones and newspapers.

12. Before you start tweeting and interacting heavily on twitter, think about what you want your twitter account and presence here to be

about. What are you here for, what are looking to get out of it and what are your priorities, aims and ambitions?

13. Make a plan. To harness your activities on twitter effectively, outline a plan of what you are looking to achieve and do with your twitter account. What types of people do you want to follow, meet and engage with? What do you want to portray through your tweets and profile? How will you go about establishing this?

14. Are you using twitter for personal or professional use? Are you planning on using the same account for both? If so, make sure you keep

this in mind and that you don’t do anything that can harm any aspect of your personal or professional reputation.

15. Don’t lock your Twitter updates. If someone has to request to follow you so they can see your tweets, this will defeat the purpose of using Twitter to make new connections with interesting people and organisations that may be helpful to your job search.

16. Offer your help. This is an important part of connecting with people and being a smart tweeter: You can show both your authenticity and

your ability to fellow users by offering your help to them, be it by answering a question, voting on a poll, or even sending them a book that they’re looking for and that you have. Giving assistance by using your career expertise in particular will of course demonstrate your viability as a job candidate.

17. Get to really know people. Just as in ‘real-life’ face-to-face situations, you’ll get the most out of Twitter if you truly get to know and build connections with people instead of seeing what you can get from them in the shortest amount of time.

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18. Be patient. Don’t expect to meet the employer of your dreams as soon as you sign up. Take the time to explore Twitter and commit to building your Twitter influence over an extended period of time before expecting results.

19. Keep your profile up to date. If you have changed companies, email addresses, location – make sure that your twitter profile reflects this

and is up to date so that potential recruiters and people generally who contact you, have the latest information.

20. Be transparent. Let Twitter followers into your whole life, just as you might expect to be let into the life of a tweeter that you admire or look up to. Tweet (appropriate) photos of yourself—perhaps they could be photos of you trying out a new task or skill in your quest to find the right career. Let people in on your aims—if you’re not currently working and are using your time outside of job hunting to get in shape, update followers on sports or exercise classes you’re trying.

21. Ask for help. If others are asking you for help, you can also ask for help especially if you’re looking for a job. Asking for help doesn’t

necessarily mean coming across as desperate: it can be as simple and understated as asking a journalist who writes about your particular industry if they know of any organisations that are hiring soon.

22. By all means use Twitter to interact with your personal friends, but if you’re also using Twitter to find a job, consciously limit the time

you spend using it for social reasons otherwise before you know it your allocated Twitter time is gone and you haven’t done anything to further your job search!

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Follow and Be Followed Too many people think Twitter is about getting as many followers as possible and that the best way to do this is to follow as many people as possible. They’re wrong on both counts. Like with any type of networking, Twitter is about connecting with a limited number of people relevant to you, your interests, who you are and what you want to do. As a job seeker, you’re not looking to make yourself known to as many people as possible; you’re looking to build relationships with the people who could help you get your target job, either directly or indirectly.

23. As a job seeker there are a few types of people that we’d recommend you follow: • Industry experts or bloggers in your field • Job boards and job sites • News alerts and industry magazines • Career experts, career coaches – people who can give you advice • Head hunters and recruiters • Professional networks, alumni associations • Companies / employers you are targeting • HR personnel – people who are hiring for the position / role you are targeting.

24. By following employers, you stand a chance of learning about a job that won’t be otherwise advertised.

Some employers will quickly tweet out a job vacancy that they need to fill at short notice, instead of formally advertising the vacancy. Keep your eyes open and check companies’ streams regularly.

25. By reading the latest updates from an employer you are interested in working for, you will be able to keep on top of the latest priorities,

activities and focus areas for the business as a whole. This can give you an edge when going in for interviews and applying for roles as it gives you insight into the organisation that others may have missed.

26. If you don’t believe that companies post vacancies via Twitter take a look at: Yahoo, BT and Tesco. These are examples of organisations

that post UK vacancies on their Twitter account.

27. Be clear on the types of people you want to attract and connect with. As a job searcher, to know which people will help you, you need to know what you want. Decide upon which job or career you’re actually targeting and it’ll become a lot clearer who you need to engage with on Twitter.

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28. Use directories of Twitter users to look for people and organizations directly related to your ideal job or career. The most well-known

Twitter directory is Twellow. You can also list yourself on it so people can find you too.

29. To the right of your Twitter homepage, you’ll see a section where Twitter recommends people to follow, based on your profile and who you’re already following. Don’t dismiss these suggestions but look at the recommended profiles to see if they really could be useful to your job search.

30. Don’t forget to follow @PosIgnition for all the latest job search advice and news!

31. Getting your tweets re-tweeted, or RT’d, by existing followers is one way of attracting new followers genuinely interested in what you

have to say. To get re-tweeted, make sure your tweets are content rich, interesting and valuable to the type of people you’re looking to connect with.

32. Another way to get RT’d is to RT others’ tweets yourself. If someone sees you’ve RT’d them, their more likely to look at your tweets and

pick one to RT. Also saying “Please Retweet” believe it or not can work as a way to get retweets.

33. Once you’ve started following people, give them a reason to follow you back—it won’t happen automatically. Each time you start following someone, ‘tweet’ them (by putting their @username in front of your tweet) to explain how you found them and why you’re following. This is a great way of showing people that you’re not just spam-following but are genuinely interested in building a relationship.

34. Even if someone doesn’t follow you back, continue to engage with them by replying to their tweets and RTing them.

35. Be persistent in your RTing. If someone doesn’t notice you when you RT them the first time, don’t dismiss them—some people are RT’d

so much that one-off RTs can get lost in their stream. Instead, RT them a few times and they’ll soon recognise you and will then decide to follow you or not.

36. A creative way of showing someone you follow that you’re interested in them and what they’re about is to click on any link to their blog

post that they tweet and leave a comment on the blog.

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37. Everyone loves flattery. Compliment a user with a blog or website you like by tweeting them with a specific reason why you like their content.

38. You can even try selecting your favourite quotes from someone’s blog post and tweeting them, attributing them to the person by adding

‘by @username’ at the end. This way the person sees what you’re doing and realises that you really are interested in what they’re saying.

39. You don’t have to limit yourself to simply reacting to something a person or organisation you follow tweets. Tweet them with any thoughts on their general activity, interests or with links you think might be of interest to them. Show that you are keyed in to their areas of knowledge and expertise—which are also your areas of knowledge and expertise too.

40. Start a conversation with anyone who @replies you or RTs you, even if they’re not following you yet. It may turn out that you both see

something of value and can help.

41. Create Twitter Lists to organise the people you are following. A Twitter List lets you create you own ‘who to follow’ list by category. So with one click you can view all the tweets from the users/accounts in this particular list. This can be useful if you are following large numbers of people and it can be helpful to categorise different groups into different sets of recruiters, job sites, career advice / news, industry news and so on.

42. If you have found someone of interest to follow why not take a look at their Twitter lists? You can find and follow other people’s Twitter

lists using Listorious.

43. If you don’t want someone to know that you are following them you can ‘shadow’ them by using what is known as Private Lists. This can be helpful if you are still employed and don’t want people to know that you are looking for new roles.

44. Others have already made lists which will be useful for you so make sure that you tap into these. Other Twitter users have probably

created lists for ‘job search experts’ or ‘companies that are hiring’ – so make sure you search for these and follow them as well.

45. Every time someone follows you, check out their profile and click on their link. Leave a comment on their blog / website or on their twitter. Shows you really appreciate the follow.

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Finding Jobs of Interest

46. Twitter has a basic search box that you can use to type in keywords relating to your job search. For example, you might want to type in ‘Director, Marketing, London’, if you are looking for a Marketing Director role somewhere in London.

47. Create a plan before you start using Twitter otherwise you could spend ages on it looking for various roles which are vaguely interesting but not actually suited to you – then waste a lot of time.

48. Use Twitter’s own job search site. Visit the website to search for specific jobs and/or follow it @TwitJobSearch. Use the advanced search

link by filling in relevant keywords and information aligned to your job search goals – and use it to focus your job search.

49. Check the streams of any job sites you’re following regularly, as they’ll often tweet links to vacancies as soon as they come out.

50. Think about what types of roles, organisations, and sectors you want to focus in on. The more targeted and focused you are the better. You will be able to hone in on whom to target, who to follow and which specific roles are the most suited to you. Following anyone and everyone and getting lots of job postings across a wide range of areas won’t help you but instead will be distracting. Be selective in order to focus your job search and to really harness how you use twitter.

51. If you’re looking for a job in a specific location, find people to

follow in that geographical area by using Tweetmondo.

52. If you are clear about the type of job you want, you can target specific key people to connect with, who may be able to help you get closer to this job that you desire. You can make new connections for a number of reasons – to learn about the industry, to find out the details about how a particular company works or what the role is like from the inside, or to find a route to a potential hirer. Think about all of these angles and use Twitter to network your way to your next role if you can.

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53. Use Twitter in tandem with other networking tools such as LinkedIn. Check out our 125 LinkedIn Job Search Tips to learn more about this.

54. Be clear why you are using Twitter to help with your job search and why it is an important part of your job search campaign. Twitter is

fast and instantaneous so by being active on it and keeping up to date with the latest tweets, you may be in a position to catch and access job postings before they go up elsewhere on the web.

55. Posting jobs on Twitter is also free, so if a company can fill a job role without any costs to themselves by advertising on theladders.com,

LinkedIn or other job sites, they will. This makes Twitter a great place for companies to look for candidates, so make sure they can find you as well as you finding them. Make sure your profile is easily searchable in relation to job terms they may use to fill vacancies.

56. Follow companies that you are interested in working for, or that are in the industry you are looking to get into, in relation to specific

alerts and key triggers going on in the business world for them. There are certain triggers or events that can lead to or impact on hiring so it’s good to be aware of them and to monitor/keep track of them. For example, if a company gets new funding, launches a new product, opens up in a new location or territory – it may be actively hiring. Alternatively if it’s closing sites, announcing reductions or redundancies – it is likely to be hiring less. Keep an eye out for these events and if you find it helpful, you can set up alerts so that when keywords that you specific e.g. “funding” or “merger”, trigger an alert and notification of this news directly to you.

57. Bookmark job vacancy tweets you’re interested in by ‘favoriting’ them, so you don’t lose track of the roles you want to look further into.

58. Use Twellow.com or TweepSearch to specifically target specialist recruiters. Think about the roles and area you want to focus in on and

look for recruiters and head hunters who specialise in your specific area.

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Beware of Spam

59. Look out for spam. Avoid wasting precious job search time on following or trying to engage with spammers by learning how to identify them. Spammers on Twitter tend to follow huge amounts of people, whilst only having a few followers themselves.

60. You don’t want to be mistaken for a spammer, so maintain an even balance between the number of followers and the number of people

you follow. If you’re looking to be taken on by a big company, be aware that major businesses get spammed every day. Make sure that your target employer has no reason to think that you’re a spammer.

61. Spam can not only be a general nuisance and time-waster, it can be downright dangerous to the job seeker. Be careful not to click on any

links you don’t trust, as these can often be the main tool of phishing scams. Just as there can be non-existent, questionable, or even illegal jobs disguised as legit positions on listings websites, they can also appear on Twitter and other similar forms of social media.

62. If you need additional help in spotting spammers, use an app such as TrueTwit. 63. Apart from avoiding being seen as a spammer, another reason not to overload on people you follow is that your Twitter stream can get

jammed with too many tweets coming from too many sources and you can get overwhelmed with information. If you’re looking for career opportunities in a sea of irrelevant tweets, your focus could drown, so be discerning in who you follow. Could they really add value to your job search?

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Tweeting Do’s and Don’ts So now you have followers, what are you going to say to them? Sending out a steady, consistent, useful, targeted flow of status updates all 140 characters or less is an art-form in itself, but you will soon get the hang of it.

64. Before you start tweeting think about why you are tweeting. What are you trying to get out of your tweeting and who are you hoping will read them?

65. What do you want people to think about you via your tweets? What impression are you trying to make on them and what do you want to

be known for? These are a few questions to ask yourself before you start on your tweeting journey.

66. Are there specific people that you want to connect with? If so – what is of interest and value to them? What will make them stop, read and take notice of what you have to say? Try to get into the minds of the people you are trying to grab the attention of so that you can maximise your impact on them and usefulness to them.

67. Even the greatest tweeters started with a single tweet. Instead of looking at your

blank, new Twitter profile for days on end, get that first tweet out of the way. Say what you’re on Twitter for, why you decided to join, or, simply, that you’re having an interesting time finding a new job at the moment!

68. If you are job hunting, the bulk of your tweets should be business related. They don’t all have to be job search related but they should be professional – so related to your area of work, area of interest and where you are looking to get into for your next role.

69. Mix up your tweets. Don’t make everything about your job search and how you want help with it. Selling yourself constantly makes you look desperate and boring. Include tweets about other things as well such as industry news, something interesting you read and would like to share or your opinion on something topical in your sector.

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70. Get feedback on your job search tactics by tweeting about them and asking people what they think. This also reminds your followers that you’re actively looking for a job.

71. It’s good to make your tweets more personal as well, and so it can be good to mix up your professional tweets with one or two more

‘human’ ones, which might give people a glimpse into your other areas of interests – hobbies, activities and skills in other areas.

72. If you’re employed and you want to tweet about your current job to give people an idea of what type of work you do, go ahead but check your employer’s privacy policy first.

73. There are some things about your current job that you should not tweet about; such as boasting that you spend all your time at work or

Twitter or criticizing your boss. If your employer catches you, it’ll damage your chances of a good reference and it also doesn’t look too professional in the eyes of potential future employers looking at your tweets.

74. Use direct messages wisely. Just as you shouldn’t spam or only self-promote on your main Twitter stream, don’t make the common

mistake of using Twitter direct messages, or DMs, to send spam or self-serving adverts about yourself to your followers.

75. Be polite. Whatever you tweet, tweet it with civility and manners. Don’t be negative about someone and don’t abuse them. Thank people for their RTs and say ‘you’re welcome’ to people who thank you.

76. In fact, if you’re looking for a job, every aspect of your tweeting activity should be professional. Don’t swear, don’t drunk-tweet and use

correct spelling and grammar. You never which potential employers are reading. 77. If you want to make a particular ‘thank you’ for a RT extra special, say ‘thank you’ via DM. This is a wise use of the DM facility, not a

spammy one.

78. Show an interest. Instead of just tweeting about yourself, tweet questions like, ‘how are you doing?’, ‘what are you up to’ or ‘what are your plans for tomorrow’. Such willingness to reach out and engage with your followers will make them more likely to pay attention to you.

79. Once you start engaging with people in this way, you may find you’re regularly engaged in several conversations at once. You might, for

example, be discussing unadvertised vacancies with an organization’s insider or arranging voluntary work with a charity. Use Tweetdeck

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to keep track of all your conversation and to group your followers into relevant categories such as ‘industry contacts’ and ‘not-for-profits’.

80. You can set up Tweetdeck to automatically search for the terms of your choice. Checking the search results every so often will give you

inspiration for tweets or RTs.

81. Tweet regularly. If you tweet infrequently, you’ll find it harder to build up relationships with your followers and will lose the momentum of Twitter as a job search tool. Tweeting regularly can be easier said than done. So, where can you find the time to tweet on top of your current work and your job research? Remember that Twitter is part of your job search strategy, so you should do what you can to make time to tweet, even if it means getting up a bit earlier each morning, or using your phone to tweet during your lunch break. Look at services like http://dlvr.it to automate tweets from your favorite blogs, but make sure you use this in moderation.

82. If you can only tweet at a specific and limited time each day, but you want to spread your tweets out throughout the day, considering

scheduling your tweets using an app such as HootSuite. If you schedule your tweets you won’t be on hand to reply to any responses to your scheduled tweets right away—but you can still check for replies, messages on RTs on your phone during coffee breaks or during your commute.

83. If you’re at a computer with a Firefox browser, you can quickly check if you have any replies by using TwitterGadget. If you’d prefer

scheduled updates of your followers’ Twitter activity directly to your email throughout the day, try NutShell Mail.

84. If you want to reply straight away to someone who’s taken the time to send you a DM (Direct Message), set up push notifications on your phone so you’re alerted right away whenever someone DMs you.

85. Analyse your tweets. If you’re not sure which of your tweets are working and which aren’t, use an app such as Klout to get a clear

breakdown of your Twitter influence and activity. You can also use Klout to see who the influencers are in your niche of choice. Go ahead and tweet them!

86. Send tweets to find out if certain employers have vacancies. Only 30% of all job vacancies are advertised so you probably have to dig

around to find a vacancy for the job you want at the company you want. One way of uncovering such vacancies is to tweet representatives of your target organisation to ask if they know of any current vacancies.

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87. Tweets from people at events are always interesting. If you’re attending a career or graduate fair, tweet from it about the exhibitors there, the content of the seminars or interesting people you’re networking with. This shows your followers what you’re doing in order to change jobs or careers and gives them some interesting content and colour from the event.

88. Be willing to learn. Don’t just put yourself forward on Twitter for paid opportunities, but demonstrate your commitment to tapping into

your target job role or career by tweeting that you’re also willing to undertake voluntary work or do a short course on your chosen field.

89. If you’ve specifically set out to get voluntary work experience through Twitter, follow voluntary sector experts and tweet them directly to ask for advice and information on opportunities.

90. Be bold in developing promising relationships beyond Twitter. Once you’ve been tweeting with someone for a while and you’re sure you

can trust them, suggest exchanging Skype or MSN Messenger details via DM so that you chat on other platforms and develop your relationship from there.

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Showcasing Yourself How can you showcase your strengths to potential employers and useful contacts in 140 characters or less? Despite the tweet character limit, there are a surprising number of ways

91. The most important thing in any job search whether you are doing it via Twitter, LinkedIn, traditional methods or a combination, is to be clear and focused about what you are going after. Your job search campaign should then be in line with your goals and the specific role that you are aiming for.

92. When you know what type of role you want, at what level, with what company, in what location (for example, i.e. it needs to be as specific as you can make it) – you can focus the showcasing of your talents, experience and skills around that role.

93. Everything that you spend your time doing on Twitter – whether it’s searching for jobs, companies to follow, people to start

conversations with or learn from, or anything that you tweet – make sure that it links back to and stays focused on the role that you have identified you want. Make sure that everything you emphasise relates to this specific role/target.

94. If you have your own blog, it can be a useful tool in your job search. You can demonstrate your expertise and passion for your chosen career area by writing about news, opinions and developments within the field. You might think that the URL link to each of your blog posts is too long to post on Twitter, but you can get round this by using a URL “shortener” such as bit.ly—so link away!

95. With the extra characters that a shorter link frees up, you can include a description of the link in your

tweet, making it more likely that people will want to click on it. The accompanying description can simply be the blog post title, a call to action or a thought-provoking question.

96. Tweeting links with great content isn’t just about tweeting links to your own blog or articles. If you

really know your chosen niche as well as you should, you’ll be up to date with the latest articles and thinking around it. Tweet links to this content to show watching employers, recruiters and influencers just how on top of your field’s developments you are.

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97. Use tweeting to show off your knowledge and expertise if you can. Share your own specific thoughts, ideas, insight and opinions that demonstrate your knowledge and that can build up your reputation as the ‘go to’ person for your field. Think of these tweets as ‘thought leadership tweets’.

98. If someone tweets you a question about your area of expertise don’t just benefit them with the answer but let the depth of your

knowledge be known to all your followers. Do this by RTing the question and putting your answer in front of it.

99. If someone tweets you a question that you don’t know the answer to, recommend a Twitter user that can help by tweeting their username to the asker. This shows awareness of the movers and shakers in your particular niche.

100. If two people you’re following tweet one another, you’ll see their conversation in your stream. Follow these conversations and feel free

to chip in by @replying to both people in your tweet. This shows them you’re interested enough in what they’re talking about to follow and contribute to the conversation and that you also some knowledge of the topic.

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Technical Twitter Terms Once you’ve been on Twitter for a while, you might start noticing that people use certain terms and characters that make you wonder what language they’re speaking in. Once you get to grips with this actually fairly simple Twitter lingo, you can use it to your advantage in your job search. Here are some tips to help you navigate your way around the most common themes: Hashtags

101. A lot of people - be they employers, recruiters, company representatives or job seekers - search Twitter for certain keywords related to their area of business. On Twitter, adding a hashtag symbol (#) to a word makes it easier to find as a keyword. Try hashtagging popular words related to your target profession or industry in order to get found easily by people in that field.

102. Just as you can use keywords related to your industry, search for industry keywords by putting the hashtag before the word or phrase in

the search field.

103. You can also search for useful tweets about the job search process by searching the popular hashtags #jobsearch and #jobhunting

104. Follow the account @Microjobs and track the hashtag #Tweetmyjobs. You can tell them what your target career and job location is and they’ll tweet you whenever a relevant job opening comes up.

105. For extra help in tracking down users of keywords relevant to you, try out a keyword tracker app like Monitter. Another tool that can help

you sift through Twitter’s unique language to find opportunities of interest to you is Twitscoop, which can track trends and events related to your desired job. There are also sites like http://hashtag.org or hootsuite's built-in popular subjects drop down (activated when you click on the search bar) which can be used to find popular hashtags.

106. ‘Follow Friday’, or FF, is a great way of giving back to your Twitter community and finding new and relevant people to follow. FF is a

Friday tradition that sees Tweeters recommend people to follow by tweeting usernames along with the #FF hashtag. Use Follow Friday to ingratiate yourself with people in your career area by recommending them to your followers and to find people or organizations to follow that could be beneficial to your job hunt.

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107. Another popular hashtag is #quotes. People love quotes on Twitter. Attract like-minded people by tweeting quotes about, or from, your target sector or employer and remember to include the hashtag. Go to http://hashtags.org/ to track how popular particular hashtags are on a week-to-week basis.

TweetChats

108. Join in tweetchats relevant to your field. A tweetchat is a Twitter conversation, typically held at a pre-arranged, regular weekly time, between a group of Twitter users, and using a specific hashtag to identify the discussion. For instance, if you’re in PR, or interested in breaking into the sector, give the #pr20chat a go.

109. Find a tweetchat relevant to your career aims by checking out this list. There are even tweetchats specific to finding a new job or career.

They include #JobHuntChat and #careerchat.

110. People often use tweetchats to share links and you can do the same—link to your blog, portfolio, a recent slide presentation you created or something else that says something about your strengths and where you want to be.

111. When someone on the tweetchat that you feel like you want to connect with shares a link, check out the link and then return to the chat to

give them feedback on it.

112. Although tweetchats have specific start times, don’t panic if you’re late to one. Simply say hello and ask what people are talking about. Someone in the chat will soon reply to you.

113. If you’d like the tweetchat to discuss a certain topic, perhaps some aspect of your job search or target career, simply ask to discuss it

during the chat.

114. You might see an employer or recruiter on a tweetchat. Take the opportunity to ask them any questions you have about applying for a job with their company or in their field.

115. Don’t be afraid to follow up their answer with a request for clarification, if you need it. That’s the beauty of tweetchat being real-time—

you can have a whole conversation just as you would in person or on the ‘phone.

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Twitter Lists

116. As mentioned briefly earlier on, you can create ‘Twitter lists’, which are basically lists that you name and then group Twitter users into. If you’re a job seeker it might be useful to make lists of career guides, recruitment agencies, organisations in your industry, people already doing the job you want and so on. Every time you go to one of your lists, you see the latest tweets from everyone on that list.

117. The great thing about Twitter lists is that you don’t have to be following someone to list them. If you think you’re following enough

people but you really want to keep track of a particular person or company, put them in a list instead. 118. You can follow other people’s lists as well as making your own. As long as you’re following people related to your career area, you

should be able to find some relevance in their own lists. Every time someone includes you on one of their lists, thank them for doing so. It’s another way of interacting with and reaching out to the person.

119. If you want to view tweets from your own followers without following or listing them, use the tool research.ly. Research.ly also gives

you the opportunity to search for particular topics by location. Try searching for people in your country that are tweeting about a particular job role, career, profession, sector or industry. Another use for research.ly is that it offers the ability to search a vast array of categorized communities. You can search for CEOs, organizations, managers, and so on. This allows you to connect with people and companies within your chosen niche.

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Tweet-ups

120. Attend tweet-ups. These are meetings and social get-togethers ‘in real life’ arranged on Twitter, by tweeters. If your own personal Twitter network of followers and the followed are related to the your profession of choice, then any tweet-up you organize between all of you will be a valuable experience, as face-to-face networking will help cement your relationships.

121. Follow up on a tweet-up by tweeting anyone you truly connected with at the event, just to say it was nice to talk to them.

122. In the long-term, if someone you engaged with a tweet-up really made an impression on you on someone who could help you, remember

to RT them regularly and visit their blog if they have one. Regularly check their page of tweets for any questions you can answer or any other requests for help you can respond effectively to.

Syncing, Favourites and Modified Tweets

123. Time is precious to all job seekers and to save time managing Twitter along with all your other social media accounts, consider syncing up the accounts with one another. What does that even mean? Some apps, such as Seesmic, allow you to update Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn simultaneously.

124. ‘Favourite’ tweets are tweets that users bookmark by clicking on the small star below them. Users can see one another’s favourite tweets

so it’s useful to bookmark tweets related to your industry, or what you want to do, as visitors to your page will see what you’re interested in.

125. Just as ‘RT’ stands for ‘retweet’, MT stands for ‘modified tweet’. If you see someone else’s tweet and think you can make it better, modify it and then tweet it with MT in front instead of RT. Far from being offended, the original tweeter will notice that you took the time to modify the tweet, showing you both know and care about the topic they were tweeting on.

So what next? Hopefully you will now have a much better overview of what you can do with Twitter and how you can harness it for your job search. The next step for you is to start really getting involved. So target useful people to follow and engage with, read more tweets, publish high quality tweets of your own, build key relationships and start making steps towards landing that key next job for you!

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I hope that you have found this eBook helpful. Let’s stay in touch on Twitter. You can connect with us at @PosIgnition. Good luck in your job search!

More Position Ignition eBooks (Visit our website to download: www.positionignition.com)

• 100 Essential Career Change Tips

• 85 Mid-Life Career Change Tips

• 135 Networking Career Tips

• 125 LinkedIn Job Search Tips

• How to Get the Job You Want

• Getting Started with Interviews: Quick Guide

• How to Ace the Interview

• Up Your Game, Up Your Pay! (85 Tips in Salary Negotiation)

• Moving into Retirement in the 21st Century

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Contact Us Position Ignition Ltd is one of the UK’s leading career consulting and career management companies. Founded towards the end of 2009 by Simon North and Nisa Chitakasem, they have brought together some of the best career guides in the industry, providing much needed high quality career support and guidance to professional working men and women. Position Ignition helps working professionals to identify where they would like to go next, what roles they will find fulfilling and how to go about getting it. Their focus is on helping people to make successful career changes, establish smart job search strategies, find focus and direction in their careers and take control of their own career development. Position Ignition offers support through a variety of ways including one on one career support, programmes, workshops, career courses, seminars, webinars, ebooks and through their popular Career Advice Blog. They regularly offer expert advice in the media, press and in places like the Guardian Careers Clinics. They offer a free initial phone consultation via their website if you’d like to find out more or explore how they can help you. Find out more at: www.positionignition.com or Email: [email protected] Visit the Position Ignition Career Blog: www.positionignition.com/blog Follow Position Ignition on Twitter: http://twitter.com/posignition Like Position Ignition on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/PositionIgnition We hope that you have found this eBook useful! For comments, feedback or suggestions email us at: [email protected]