Social media is increasily becoming a more vital part of our everyday lives – even in the job search.
I didn’t realize just how important it was to build up and maintain my social media accounts until I went on a job interview and the person interviewing me mentioned he had looked at my Twitter. Luckily, in this scenario, he was complimenting me on the fact that I had a following and was an active user, but that might not be the case for all of you out there.
If you want to pursue a career in public relations, journalism or any type of communications, it’s time to get on the Twitter bandwagon NOW. You’ve got to start building up your network and following so you can work on your personal brand and impress future employers.
Here are some ways I’ve built up my account — hopefully they help you!
Make your account public
This is the first step you need to take if you seriously want to work on your Twitter. If you don’t make your account public, it looks like you’ve got something to hide. The truth is that you shouldn’t put anything out on the Internet that you want to keep private, so you should not have a reason to keep your tweets private. Don’t tweet inappropriate things or give away information that could affect your safety/privacy and it will be OK!
Follow professionals in your field
You’d be amazed by how much you learn from just following a Twitter account. I started following a few journalists here and there and before I knew it, I was looking at a wealth of information about my career of choice every single day. It helped keep me in the know and see what professionals were talking about and how they used Twitter for their jobs. It’s advice I never could have learned from reading in a book!
Interact with people
This may sound silly, but this is a piece of advice that many people often overlook. Yes, you should post your own original content and all, but it does no good if you’re not interacting with other users! Reply and RT to posts that are meaningful to you – even if they don’t follow you back. You’ll find new followers that way and could even make some friends!
Tweet meaningful information
We don’t need to know every single detail about the eggs you ate for breakfast, but we would like to know what you think about current events or an interesting blog that you read. Consider your audience before posting. What is your purpose here? Are you trying to entertain, inform or a combination of both? Figure out what your goal is before you start actively tweeting.
Use correct grammar/punctuation
Seriously, people. I’m not going to take you seriously if you don’t take yourself seriously. I know there’s a 140-character maximum, but that should not get in the way of you posting tweets that can be easily understood. Think of the limit as a challenge for you to use active verbs and put your grammar skills to the test!
