Yeah, the earth will spin off its axis if you tell anyone but there are a couple of decent recruiters out there.

BTW I didn’t take offence – there are a lot (most?) of recruiters that simply don’t have a clue or are primarily motivated by the wrong reasons (e.g. a quick buck). For those of us who might have a vague idea and take a different approach it means:

1. We often get tarnished by the same brush (not so good)
2. It’s very easy for us to differentiate (very good)

I often find people are naturally sceptical about me when I mention I’m a recruiter / headhunter but after chatting with me they realise they’ve been using the wrong brush on me. Perhaps it’s because I was a CIO in a former life? Or because I have ethics? Or something?

Whatever it is, I sincerely hope that there’s not a major bot invasion (from recruiters or otherwise) – I find the Twitter community to be an interesting and enjoyable one. There is a trend towards bot increase and follower pimping although I’m hopeful that those wanting some commercial gain approach the Twitter community with thought and respect.

Or we just block them

Cheers,
MH

What? Impossible! Does this mean there are actually some decent recruiters out there

Hey, I appreciate the comment, and I don’t mean to generalise too much… it’s certainly true that a few bad apples spoil it for the majority. I hope I wasn’t too mean.

And with regards to the bot – I was originally going to post as if I had created the RecruiTwit app (ie an April Fools prank) but changed my mind at the last minute. I hope no one actually builds it…

Cheers,
Craig

Thanks for putting up an interesting post.

Off the bat, you should know that I am a recruiter. Don’t stop reading though – I’m also the founding sponsor of the Sydney Twitter Underground Brigade (http://sydney.twitterusergroup.com/), getting Sydney Twitterers to meet IRL. I’ve been an active co-organiser of these events since July 2007.

Like you, I sincerely hope that Twitter doesn’t get over run by the shot gun approach that is used by most recruiters. We don’t need crude capitalisation attempts whether it be from recruiters or other commercial entities – there is enough noise as it stands.

Sure, there’s no doubt that Twitter can be an effective tool for commerce (recruitment or otherwise). Approaching it from a Business 1.0 perspective, as you have outlined, is bound to fail in the longer term though. As I see it, adding value is essential in today’s world. And yes, believe it or not, some recruiters can do that.

That said, I do think there will be more attempts to use Twitter and other SNS in manners that you’ve described. Then we’ll just move on. Or press block or ignore, like we do with Facebook apps.

In summary, recruiters have been on Twitter for a long time. Some of us are okay – you even started following me before I returned the favour! One thing, please don’t encourage ridiculous bots – we’d like to preserve things for a while!

See you at the next STUB!

Cheers,
MH

http://twitter.com/eskimo_sparky