Six Ways Social Media Can Help You Land The Job

For the record, I’ve always hated the concept of a "job." A job sounds so blasé, as opposed to finding the work you were meant to do. There have been countless posts around the Web (and even in print) discussing the merits of having a resume in this Web 2.0 and Social Media world. Sure, there’s a part of me that would love for the old-school resume to go the way of HD DVD, but I also understand the current HR crunch, and how trying to change big corporate America is never an easy task.

In a perfect world, I would like to think that anyone hiring anybody would be thinking along the same lines as Seth Godin and his post, Why Bother Having A Resume?, but there’s probably only a handful of companies (and I’d like to think that Twist Image is among them) that think this way.

So, here are a fistful-plus of tactics you could do to get your resume noticed by using Social Media. There is one caveat to all of this: much like networking, everything I’m about to discuss is a million times more powerful if you start doing them a long ways before you begin your job search. I’m constantly dumbfounded by people who call me up and ask me where a good place is to network either after they’ve lost their job or because they want to start looking for a new one. The best time to get involved in Social Media (and networking) is long before you need it for your own personal gain.

That being said, here are six ways (no more, no less) you can integrate your Social Media activity into your resume to land the right gig:

1. Get on LinkedIn. Imagine building your network to the point where you could have a segment of your resume that not only highlights your profile, but shows HR how closely connected you are to others in the organization. Don’t diminish the power of some good "recommendations" on LinkedIn – people do look at them.

2. Use a tool like AideRSS, figure out some of your best Blogs posts and include the title of your posting along with some of the statistical data (how many comments, how many people added it to del.icio.us, StumbleUpon, Digg, etc…).

3. Attend an unconference and include a link to your presentation. If the presentation was not recorded, upload your slides to SlideShare.

4. Put a link to your del.icio.us or your Google Reader Shared Items in your resume. Demonstrate where you get your inspiration and education from.

5. Create a Fan Page or Group in Facebook about the industry you’re interested in serving to demonstrate not only thought-leadership but your passion for the work you would like to do.

6. Connect to people (you could even use something like twitter) and get small (140 characters or less) testimonials.

Bonus: Blog. Nothing will demonstrate your ability to think, add value and get the job done quite like a consistently updated and well-written Blog that has served the community well and sparked new levels of conversations. Plus, the Google Juice and links will add value when HR does a quick online search to see who (and what) you’re all about.

Feel free to get creative and add your own tactics (or comments) below.