How to lose a job on Twitter

Follow

While I’m on my perch about the benefits of Twitter, you do need to be smart about how you use it.

If you muck up, you can muck up publicly, damage your online brand and ping people off when you use it. I’ve since un-followed a person because of what I’m about to describe and I suspect many other people will as well. Here’s what happened.

I check my @box on Twitter a few times a day to see who’s been trying to speak with me. (An @box is like your email inbox) A few weeks ago I received the message below. For those of you who don’t use Twitter, “@” is where people leave you a message. It appears on their profile, and you can respond by doing the same on your profile. This is the public conversation you may want to have on Twitter.

This is the offending tweet.

“@interviewIQ Scientist needs job now, find my profile on LinkedIn.”

I thought that it was interesting that she sent me this, so I checked her profile. She had dozens of people she was spamming like this. Her first page of tweets had the same message to 10 random people, not many of them recruiters.

The reason she did this was to get people like me to look at her profile, and not just rely on her being at the top of my rapidly descending list of tweets. But it is plain silly on so many levels. Firstly she looks desperate which is a job searching no no. Secondly she shows that she hadn’t taken the time to work out what I did or what any other person did. She was just spamming everyone. Thirdly she’s showing both poor communication skills and poor networking skills.

I know this sounds harsh, and it makes me wonder if I’ve annoyed people in the same way. While Twitter seems easy to use, it does take a while for people to understand what Twitter is really about when you first start out. But I do think good networking rules apply, if you want to make the most out of it.

Online relationships are fragile. You are summed up pretty quickly on Twitter. Be warned.

K B

Karalyn is the Founder of InterviewIQ and chief champion for all her clients. Get personal coaching to make 2023 your most successful year yet. Check out our job search booster services here>>Give me smarter ways to find a job .

Tagged as: Find a job on twitter, Hidden job market, online personal branding, secrets from recruitment consultants, Twitter