Social media started out as just that: a place to be social with friends and family. But over the years, social media platforms have become a primary recruiting ground for hiring managers. It has also become a valuable search tool when looking for a job, specifically writing jobs.

Google Yourself

Always assume that a potential employer is going to be looking over your social media profiles prior to an interview. In order to mitigate any negative news found, start by Googling yourself in incognito mode. By using incognito mode, your search results won’t be skewed by your browsing history. Once you Google your name, see what pops up in the search results. Here are the results from searching my own name while in incognito mode.

If you notice any inappropriate posts or photos from your social media profiles, remove them and then adjust your privacy settings going forward. Just make sure you don’t lock down your profiles too much. You still want recruiters to be able to find you, so keep your employment history, location, and skills visible on your profile.

Pick One or Two Platforms To Focus On

In a survey conducted by LiveCareer, recruiters and hiring managers say Facebook emerged as a clear winner for the primary platform to use for your professional social media presence. Next was LinkedIn, and then Instagram.

Roughly 68% of those recruiters and hiring managers surveyed say job seekers need to have an established LinkedIn profile. With that said, I would focus on LinkedIn as your primary platform and Facebook as your secondary. Leave Instagram as your personal outlet. Having too many platforms to manage for your career development will make it difficult to maintain.

Confirm that all your contact information is up to date and that your LinkedIn profile matches the information on your resume. Be sure to enable the option to show recruiters that you’re open for work.

writing jobs on LinkedIn

Specify the types of writing jobs you’re interested in along with your preferred location. By doing this, your profile will appear in the search results of recruiters and hiring managers looking to fill those positions. It works very similarly to keywords ranking in Google searches.

Be sure that your profile photos are somewhat professional. The last thing you want recruiters to see as a first impression is a photo of yourself half dressed, pounding a beer, or something else inappropriate.

Use Social Media To Gather Intelligence

Just as recruiters and hiring managers are going to use social media to research candidates, you should be using social media to research organizations you’re interested in. Typically once you find the organization on social media, you can also find the recruiters and hiring managers that work there, so you can do research on them as well.

Open source intelligence gathering will strengthen your job search and give you an edge when developing your cover letter or letter of intent for employment.

writing jobs information gathering

Once you’ve identified the social media profiles of the recruiters and hiring managers, follow them and start to like and comment on their relevant posts. This not only gets your name in front of them, but provides you with a stage to show the value you have to offer.

For the other candidates out there not doing their online research, this gives you an edge in the recruiting process.

Establish Yourself As a Subject Matter Expert

Another great strategy to use while hunting for writing jobs is to portray yourself as a subject matter expert. This is a 2 pronged approach. First, you want to engage with industry leaders by commenting on their posts and contributing to group discussions on LinkedIn and Facebook. These groups can also become an outlet to develop professionally and link up with other people already working at the companies you’re researching.

Second, utilize your own social media channels to post and repost information relevant to your career path. Share relevant articles on your social media and then caption your thoughts on the article. LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter are great places to comment on industry news and establish yourself as a subject matter expert.

writing jobs expert

Ultimately, you want to be consistent across your primary social media channels with the content you post and share. You should be making the focus of your primary and secondary profiles for job searching and building your personal brand.

Send Direct Messages

Sending a direct message, or a cold message, to someone you’d like to network with is great when done right.

When reaching out to a recruiter or hiring manager via social media direct message, you MUST customize the message to the recipient, and be specific. If you can convey your request or thought into one or two sentences, you’re more likely to get a response.

Get to the point when crafting your message. Use the information you found during your research to build an engaging message.

Conclusion

Don’t underestimate the power of using social media to find writing jobs. Social media is a great place to highlight your skills, show who you are, and land a dream job. In the current job market, being able to market yourself on social media will give you an edge over other candidates.

By Published On: March 31, 2021Categories: Career Development, Social Media How-To4.5 min read872 wordsViews: 1196