Link Love

One of my favorite sayings of all time is:

“The Plan is Stick to the Plan”

When it comes to social recruiting, and social media in general, planning is usually referred to as strategy. This makes it sound way more professional and impressive, but, unfortunately, doesn’t make it any easier to do. Luckily for us, the internet exists! I have not broken it yet, although I have shaken my fist at it quite a bit.

Here are some links to help you with your plans for world domination… and by world domination I, obviously, mean social recruiting. They’re pretty much the same thing, right?

Links!

This article is awesome. It gives you a solid plan to help you define and implement your social media goals, then track your return on investment (ROI). Seriously, these steps could be applied to any part of your work or life. It is sooo worth the click.

This one  has pictures! A great article that lays out social media strategy in 8 easy steps. These steps are also presented with a well-designed graphic that you could print out and post above your desk in between the motivational posters and pictures of your cat.

Some strategic ways to develop your business with social media. Screenshots (love screenshots!), smart tips and great app suggestions.

The 5 Best Social Recruiting Apps!  Behind every great social recruiting strategy, there’s a great app… or two… or three. Another fantastic piece by The Undercover Recruiter. Not to brag or anything, but they think Jobcast is the best bang for your buck. Okay, so that was totally a brag 🙂

You know I can’t post anything without including an Infographic. I just gotta be me, and that means all infographics all the time.

A huge part of any social recruiting strategy is a Facebook Career Page. Jobcast is an amazing tool for creating a branded Career Page on Facebook. Oh, and by ‘great’, I mean BEST ever! True, completely unbiased, fact 😛

We’re officially on a Facebook kick!

I think writing these Link Loves is the best part of my job. Wait… I take that back, researching them is the best part of my job!

I would never have found the Bit Rebels blog if not attempting to stay abreast of awesome links to love. If I had not found this blog I would never have read this line:

“The Internet is not bad, it’s the way we use it sometimes that can be harmful to us”

So wise.

Though addressing a pretty serious topic (internet addiction) it got me thinking about a pretty non-serious one: super powers and the great responsibility that accompanies them. This, obviously, lead me to re-watch X-Men 3 whilst munching fancy chocolate. Pretty great Tuesday night, if I do say so myself. Thank you Bit Rebels.

These links are all about the Cyclops of social networking sites: Facebook! Who’s using it, how to use it better, why research done about it is often flawed and woefully incorrect, and Facebook-related fashion. General awesomeness!

Links!

Essential Facebook Apps to Improve Fan Engagement. As mentioned multiple times in the comments section, this post is EPIC! So thorough. So many screenshots. As far as my over-extended X-Men metaphor goes, this author is definitely smarty-pants Jean Grey.

The LikeBelt. An interesting new way to update your Likes on Facebook and possibly get a date or slapped while your at it. Sounds like Gambit to me!

Three Reasons Why Facebook Advertising Seems so Damned Impossible. Don’t worry, the author goes on to give some great advice on how to address these problems. I’m going with Wolverine for this one, solely based on the title having the word “damned” in it.

Six Easy Ways to Increase Likes on Your Page. An awesome article by Ryan the beloved Doctor Xavier of Jobcast.

Why a New Study on the Effectiveness of Facebook Totally Misses the Boat. I am officially dropping this metaphor thing — I’m starting to annoy myself! Though not as much as a recent study on Facebook ads annoyed the author of this blog post!

Happy reading!

What a productive week so far. We unveiled our new website, cast a trillion jobs (hyperbole is a well respected literary device!) and I invented a new word. Actually several, but only “Pincruiting” is work-related. The rest were invented at the gym when I tried to do too many pull-ups and fell on my posterior chain.

I hope all of your weeks are shaping up to be equally fruitful and far less painful than ours.

Here are some links to inspire even greater productivity:

Wunderlist! Where would I be without this awesome app? I have experimented with more list-making apps than I can count, but I just keep coming back to Wunderlist. It’s simple, intuitive and gorgeously designed. I can’t wait to see more from Wunderkinder.

20 Unconventional Tips to Improve Productivity. This girl’s entire website is devoted to improving efficiency and has lots of solid tips about becoming more productive at work.

Gamification For Better Results. Gamification can increase both engagement and productivity at work. Nerds all over the world rejoice! Leveling up is a pretty great feeling, so what if the goals can be a bit silly. You won’t mock me when I’m officially an inbox zero ninja-wizard level 82!

The Happy Secret to Better Work. An amazing Ted Talk about how a simple shift in thinking can improve success and productivity at work and in life. I’m pretty sure just watching this has made me a better person. And it’s funny. And maybe I cried a little.

Speaking of happiness… Happy Halloween! I’m going as John McClane— my poor husband got stuck being shards of glass, as he is only a level 80 ninja-wizard.

It's that time again! Thanks to Google Currents, I had a really hard time choosing which links to post this week. There is just so much happening on the internet. I want to post all of it, but if I did then this blog feature would just be the internet! If content is king, then curation is queen, so I have whittled it down to five fantastic links for your viewing pleasure.

Social Media Music Television: What Music Parodies Can Teach Us About Social Media Strategy. Who knew there was so much to be learned from comedy? Me, obviously! Oh and also the person who put this together. Quick Tips to Optimize your Linkedin profile. Because tips are better when they are quick. 10 Incredible Pinterest T-shirts! I want all of these. I can layer them to keep warm — very practical. The Social Media 90/9/1 Rule. I did not know about this rule and was very happy to find out about it through such a charming source. Mobile Apps for Social Media. Two words, Google Currents! Flipboard is also amazing. As is Buffer... just download all of them, you'll be so happy. Speaking of apps, Fitocracy is my new obsession because I am a sucker for gamification. I pretty much love anything that lets me level up. If anyone has any suggestions for apps that gamify blogging, I will reward you with eternal love and possible cookies (but only if you live in Holland — otherwise they will be too stale by the time they reach you) See you all next week!

We have some good ones this week!

Standing desks, using Instagram for business, 3 fundamentals of Facebook recruiting, new roles in HR and…

Remember how we recently wrote about why we think Job Boards matter? Well, the Job Board Doctor one-upped us with some great advice on how NOT to run a Job Board. All of his tips are relevant to anyone working in HR and recruiting, but I’m especially fond of this one:

“(Don’t) Fail to change: Ever visit a job board and think, ‘Man, that looks like the 1990s!’? I see sites like this every week!”

Links!

• How to Not Make Money With a Job Board

• Are You Using a Standing Desk?

• 10 Creative Ways to Use Instagram for Business.

• The 3 Fundamentals of Recruiting on Facebook.

• These Might be the Next HR Roles You Need to Fill or Perform.

• This looked too delicious not to share.

Okay, I’ll admit it, I use a standing desk. Well… a very makeshift version of a standing desk!

New feature alert!

At Jobcast, we read a lot of blogs. Although you may not believe me, they are not all to do with kittens, delicious foods and Jiu-Jitsu. Most of them are about recruitment, HR and social media. Many are also about running a small business, being more organized and other generally useful things.

I do still read a disproportionate number of blogs about kittens though.

We thought it might be nice to pay homage to the blogs that inspire and delight us, and share them with our lovely readers. So, starting with this post, we will be doing some serious Link Love every Wednesday.

Here we go!

• Facebook May Ditch Its Boring Logged Out Homepage. Oh Facebook, always so very cutting edge.

• HR Examiner Weekly Edition v 3.40 October 5, 2012. Dear John Sumser, you are great at blogging. Thank you HR Examiner Weekly!

• Completing the Social Business Transformation: A Manifesto. I felt smarter after reading this.

• How to be the Most Organized Person in the World. You can never be too organized. Also, this is an infographic, and you can NEVER have enough infographics.

• Looking at Pictures of Cute, Cuddly Animals May Boost Work Productivity. Yeah… that’s why Cute Overload is always up on my browser.