credit: St. Mary's University

It used to be the classifieds and career section were at the core of any job hunt, possibly with support by resume writing and interview services.

Then came Working.com, Monster.ca and Workopolis.com and things started to change. You could job hunt with e-mail alerts and key words. You could put yourself in front of recruiters simply by opening a free account and building a digital resume.

Now career hunting is going social, in a big way.

Why? Because social media adds referrals and transparency to the equation. The hidden job market is opened up to you, whether you’re actively looking or not, and the hidden talent pool is opened up to recruiters. Not only that, but everyone can see more details about everyone else, so there is a sort of pre-screening involved. As someone who has recruited and hired a lot of people over the years, screening resumes is a grueling task. But if I know “Credible Bob” on LinkedIn referred you, and you have 25 recommendations in your profile, your resume automatically rises toward the top of the virtual pile.

The two most active social sites for career opportunities are Twitter and LinkedIn.com.

Twitter is less obvious than LinkedIn, but masses of recruiters are coming on Twitter every day. If you are engaged in a job search, a good Twitter profile, bio, link to your LinkedIn profile, and some sharp search skills can land you a gig in no time. Influential Twitter personality @PRsarahevans has a great article on Twitter job search at http://mashable.com/ 2009/03/13/twitter-jobs/, well worth a read.

LinkedIn.com is the real Mecca of professional networking and career tracking. Part Rolodex, part resume, and all social, LinkedIn is a must have for professionals. A client of mine, a recruitment firm, told me recently neither they nor their competitors buy print ads to find candidates any more. It’s all digital, and in their world, LinkedIn is the point of entry.

We set out to optimize their use of LinkedIn for recruiting purposes. The same techniques used in that workshop apply to you, the candidate. Here they are:

• Check your profile is complete – LinkedIn offers a gas gauge and percentage rating. Follow its advice to get up to 100%
• Spend a few bucks and get a professional photo. Your vacation photo from Mexico is not necessarily what recruiters are looking for. Don’t use a logo or icon – people seek out people not faceless brands
• Diligently fill out complete details of all your past employment, education, and volunteer work, using proper company or organization names so people can successfully find you in searches
• Make sure your summary and Specialties sections are rich in key words others might use to find “someone like you”
• Add your website, blog and/or Twitter account to your profile and avoid the generic “My Website” tag in LinkedIn by using the “other” name setting to customize it.
• Open up your public profile as much as you are comfortable with – preferably all the way. The more Google “sees” the more you can be found and hired.
• Edit your public profile address to get a so called “vanity URL” (like linkedin.com/in/ douglacombe) and promote that URL in your email signature and elsewhere
• Get some recommendations – most searchers will skip over those not recommended by at least four or five people.
• Update your status frequently – this keeps your name front and center in people’s activity update lists, but be aware these must be useful, professional, or educational comments to have the desired effect.

Put a little polish on your social media resume, and networking, and you’ll up your chances of career success considerably.

Doug Lacombe is president of communicatto, a social media agency in Calgary.

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