How Important Is Social Media in the Job Search Process?

How important is social media to your job search? In a word … extremely! Your personal and professional social media presences can make or break your chances at finding, applying for, and getting the job you’re after.

Now, you’ve no doubt already read all of the “Do’s and Don’ts” for conducting yourself on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Google+. Don’t post compromising pictures. Stay away from inflammatory comments. Don’t post negative commentary about your current or previous jobs. All of that should be common sense, and it all generally falls under the heading of, “How Not to Ruin Your Reputation on Facebook.”

That’s not the end of social media’s importance in the job search, though. If social media only held the potential to hurt your career, we would recommend staying away from it entirely. However, wise use of social networks can significantly improve your chances of getting the job you want.

While Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ are strong networking tools and can be used to make connections in your field, there’s one social network that really stands out from the rest for your career: LinkedIn.

While LinkedIn was once little more than an online résumé with loose connections to other professionals, it is now an amazingly effective and powerful social networking tool across multiple industries. The platform has expanded so much that you can now follow the employers you’re most interested in. You can see what they are up to and when they have positions available. You can even apply for those positions directly through LinkedIn.

However, finding employers and positions is not the only way to get a job using social media (and specifically LinkedIn). You can actually create a search engine optimized (SEO) profile to allow both employers and recruiters to find you when they have positions that fit your skill set.

Just by looking through employers’ job boards and LinkedIn profiles, you can find the keywords they use most in association with the kinds of jobs you want. Include these in your LinkedIn profile at about a 1% density (one keyword per 100 words – no keyword stuffing!), and your profile will be among the search results when employers and recruiters look for those words and phrases.

LinkedIn’s power is essentially twofold. You can use it to actively search for and network with employers, recruiters, and other professionals in your industry, and you can create a presence for yourself that’s searchable and that will draw them to you, as well.