Twitter tools - by special request

Ok so let me first say that I am NOT a Twitter expert! In fact I was reluctant to join at all. I've been quoted saying "I don't care if so and so just had a friggin' piece of pizza!", true fact! This is the main reason why when it first came out I steered clear. After all as a Recruiter you are here to do a job, get it done and make placements. It doesn't matter if you are Corporate or Staffing the story is the same. Also the same is the fact that you have multiple layers of responsibilities and probably have to multitask like crazy while you are eating lunch at your desk trying your damndest to get everything done before the day is over. True fact, in most cases.

So the discussion led by Maren today was about Social Media and the core controversy is whether or not it is useful, as it can be time consuming. If you don't like Social Media and you have no intentions of using it then I say "good for you, do what you want, that's your business" we all have tools we use that are helpful and others that we decide are just not for "me". However depending on the market you are in and the types of skill sets you seek there are multiple Social Media tools at your disposal that CAN give you a competitive edge. To the topic of this post...Twitter.

For one, I have found a number of candidates in development, media, PR, marketing, design, HR and various other skill sets. I will however admit that when I first got in it was overwhelming and there was no way to keep up with all the content. However I did my research and found numerous tools that were helpful in utilizing Twitter and keeping it under control.

First of all my favorites.....Tweetdeck and Digsby.

Digsby: This tool wraps up all your social media applications and gives you real-time updates. Imagine opening up one window and gaining access to LinkedIn, Facebook, Myspace, external email and all IM's. (Now pet peeve here....if you're at work...use it for work. If all you use these tools for is personal then skip it altogether.) On the flip side if you use multiple modes of social media for work related activity then you might just love this Digsby...I do.
www.digsby.com

Tweetdeck: This tool will help you to sort out all the content coming at you on Twitter because no matter how you cut it some will be spam that you could care less about. This tool enables you to sort this content into categories and capture the information you want to see. There are several apps similar to this one so you may want to do some research but I've heard from many that this is their favorite. See the last link in this blog post for a great listing of different tools.
www.tweetdeck.com

Below are numerous other apps that I would recommend checking out that will build upon your Twitter experience and make it a stronger tool for recruiting.

twibs : find businesses on Twitter - biz dev related searches, you know how many companies "tweet" their open jobs...
www.twibs.com/search.php

Twitter Search Operators
www.search.twitter.com/operators

Just Tweet It » THE Directory for Twitter Users
www.justtweetit.com/

Twellow Twitter Search Directory, Twitter Search Engine
www.twellow.com/

TweepSearch Welcome - great search tool for Twitter
www.tweepsearch.com/

TweepSearch recruiting - Recruiters on Twitter
www.tweepsearch.com/search?query=recruiting&commit=Search

TweepSearch HR - HR on Twitter
www.tweepsearch.com/search?query=HR&commit=Search


Last link, is an article that I found while doing my research and it has a slew of other tools to check out. This article is pretty thorough and extremely informative. You will notice Tweetdeck and Digsby are at the top of their list.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/02/19/the-top-20-twitter-applications/