IT Recruiters Are Terrible at Twitter and it Makes Me Sad

Anyone who regularly uses twitter can probably attest to the fact that, generally speaking, most people on twitter are terrible. Like, 95% of the population is terrible at twitter and that's probably being kind.

Amongst technical and non-technical recruiters, I'd argue that it's more like 98% of Recruiter Twitter is awful. What makes most recruiter twitter accounts awful? Well, in general, I think it's because recruiters on twitter usually fall into one of two categories:

1) The serial job tweeter 
Every tweet from this person is a link to a job ad. "I'm hiring for a Front-End developer! (long link)." Garbage. Pretty self-explanatory. NEXT:

 2) The external-links-to-numbered-lists-of-things tweeter
You know what I'm referring to, right? You'll see tweets like "20 resume tips that will attract employers! (long link)." Or "16 reasons why you should definitely use recruiting agencies so we that we don't all lose our jobs and have to go back to grad school (long link)"

 Basically, people are trying to be buzzfeed, linking to long, numbered lists of things. Why are both of these things terrible? #1 should be plainly obvious, but just put yourself in a candidate's shoes. Is some software engineer going to magically stumble upon your account (a longshot in itself for most recruiters) and, through some miracle, see your link to your job posting and think, "OMG, I WANT THAT JOB NOW!!"? Of course not.

35 Times @MattMcGorry Was The Most Lovable Person On Instagram http://t.co/d7sNFCO15w via @caitlinjinks pic.twitter.com/ICPcLwzDaz

— BuzzFeedEntmnt (@BuzzFeedEnt) July 9, 2015

         STOP TRYING TO BE LIKE BUZZFEED YOU GUYS

Nobody who's in demand wants to follow the serial job tweeter, folks. Remember, you're just another recruiter to these guys, and they're already skeptical of you.

 The problem with #2, and it's actually almost more offensive than #1, is that the "clink on my link!" recruiter is violating the basic premise of twitter, which is to fit in an informed opinion in 140 characters or less. That's it. That's what twitter is. It's a platform where people can post quick opinions and not think too much. That's what makes it so great. And when everyone tries to post links with every single tweet, it violates that subconscious agreement that the twitter user has agreed to by following you.

 I'm not saying you can't post links to your content - after all that's what I'm doing with this blog and the irony is not lost on me - I'm just saying that it can't be every one of your tweets. It should be like, one in every five or ten or even twenty of your tweets.

 Want to make money off twitter? Want to use it to better your career? Then you PROBABLY shouldn't be on twitter. If your primary goal is to commoditize your social media platforms then you're doing it wrong. You may get lucky once with a fluke candidate view or even placement (though I've never heard of it) but more likely, you'll lose credibility amongst potential candidates.

Be a real person. Come from a genuine place. Post links now and then, but not every freaking time, and maybe, just maybe, you'll start to slowly build a following. If you're a recruiter and using twitter for professional purposes, my suggestion would be to use it to humanize you - people want to work with a real person, not a recruiting tweet-bot. Cause tweet-bots are the worst and most people also don't love recruiters to begin with, so don't be BOTH OF THOSE THINGS!

Technical recruiters especially should know better. Don't be THAT recruiter, please. It's killing me. And making me sad.