With over 500 million tweets sent every day, it is essential to have an understanding of how Twitter’s algorithm works if your recruitment firm is to rise above the noise and attract new candidates and clients on the platform.
Here’s what recruitment marketers need to know about Twitter’s algorithm.
Twitter’s algorithm ranking criteria
Like other social media platform algorithms, Twitter’s algorithm uses a ranking system to determine which tweets from accounts that its users follow are going to be the most relevant or interesting to them.
Here are five key algorithm factors that recruitment marketers need to be aware of.
Recency
With breaking news stories and trending topics a core focus of the platform, timely posts are weighted heavily in Twitter’s algorithm and will more often than not appear towards the top of a user’s timeline fed.
User interests
The algorithm uses platform data to show users more of the content they have an interest in. For example, if one of your followers is currently looking for a new job and engages with tweets sharing CV and interview tips then this type of content will feature more prevalently in their timeline.
Credibility
With Twitter still feeling the effects of ongoing allegations concerning Russian bots using the platform to interfere with political events, it is clamping down on accounts that appear to lack credibility. For recruitment marketers, this means that your firm’s account details, such as bio, location and website should all be completed. You should also ensure that your firm has a healthy following to follower ratio – I recommend having a ratio of no more than 2:1 as this can set off alarm bells for the algorithm.
Engagement
Tweets that have received a lot of engagement with retweets, comments and likes in the first couple of hours of their lifespan will feature prominently in the feeds of users who follow that account.
Media type
The algorithm also looks at past engagement in terms of the type of media (images, videos, GIFs, cards) that users have interacted with. So for example, if someone often engages with videos on Twitter then the algorithm will show them more tweets featuring videos.
What can recruitment marketers do to increase engagement on Twitter?
Maintain an active presence
Too many recruitment firms adopt a stop/start approach with social media channels, such as Twitter, due to busy workloads. However, infrequent tweeting is unlikely to capture the attention of your target audience. As outlined in the section above, when a follower regularly engages with your tweets it increases the likelihood that they will be shown your content in the future. I recommend tweeting 4-5 times each weekday and twice on Saturdays and Sundays.
Conduct a content audit
Recruitment marketers should regularly conduct content audits to evaluate the performance of their tweets and refine their social media strategy where necessary. This will provide you with a wealth of data which you can use to assess which content, topics and media types resonate most with your followers, and which are the best times to tweet.
Repurpose top performing content
Due to the fast-moving nature of Twitter, even if one of your tweets generates engagement it is likely that a large number of your audience won’t have seen it. Therefore, you should ensure that you repurpose this content so that it:
- Doesn’t fall foul of Twitter’s rules on duplicate content
- Presents the information in a different way for users who may have seen the content before
- Extends the overall lifespan of the content
Add hashtags strategically
When used correctly, hashtags are an incredibly powerful tool to get your content in front of relevant audiences who may never have even heard of your recruitment firm before. However, when adding hashtags to your tweets you must make sure they have a purpose and are something that your target audience would be searching for. A study conducted by Agorapulse found that using four hashtags generated the most number of impressions - I recommend using this number and having two broad hashtags related to the industry you are targeting and two content specific hashtags which focus on the key topics the content you are tweeting is about.
Twitter Polls
Have you tried using Twitter Polls? These can be a simple yet effective way of generating engagement from users, and have the added benefit of providing insights that your recruitment firm can then use to produce marketing content for. For example, you could create a poll which asks your audience what the biggest bugbears of their job are and then turn these into a blog and press release.
Author: Dan Stobbs
