The social media resume

As many of you know, I am in a new job in 2008. One of the reasons that I was sought out for this role is that I actually do the things that a lot of people just talk about. By that I mean blogging, podcasting, social networking, video, tagging, etc. It's a great feeling to have intimate working knowledge of the tools you need to succeed in the world of new marketing.

Part of the process that I embarked on a while back was putting my résumé together. Now, the normal stance on résumés is a one page, standard template. That leaves little room for your experience and involvement in the industry.

I took a slightly different approach that I would like to share with you. The first page of the résumé is pretty standard issue. My 'About Me' paragraph is a little more relaxed than you may see somewhere else, but that is what I wanted to portray. The other information is really straight forward as you would expect.

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This, however, is where I broke away from the 'best practices' for résumés and looked for the right practices. I wanted to showcase the effort and breadth of my experience, so I added a second page with the heading "Social Media". Here I list this blog, MarketingProfs Daily Fix and the other communities where I am actively involved.

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Each of these links (some I shortened with TinyURLs) paints a larger picture of who I am and what I have a passion for. Want to know what I read? Check out my del.icio.us page. Get a feel for what I am like in person through the videos I do. It's all there and there is nothing to hide. Walking in the door you know what you're going to get.

I highly encourage you to share what you do. Don't limit yourself to the one pager especially if you are going for a job in pr, advertising or digital. When other people are listing that they know Word and Powerpoint (is this really necessary any more people?), you will be listing your participation in the conversation. I hope this inspires you to think outside the one page résumé to showcase your talents in the light they deserve.

Technorati Tags:
marketing, Matt Dickman, Techno//Marketer, social media résumé

Comments

[Len Kendall]

This is really impressive. In this day in age of dime a dozen resumes, this is an amazing tactic and it fits perfectly for the position you are applying to. Best of luck with the new job.

[Doug Meacham]

Matt, Excellent advice that I will personally benefit from. Thanks!

[lisa]

Matt, I love this.
It's clean, to the point, and you've laid it out on the table.
The coolest thing is if they want to know more, you have an abundance of external links to point them to it. It totally refutes those that think a 5 page resume is where it's at.

[David Mead]

I did something similar with my online resume (http://resolio.com/list/DavidMead.html) by adding links to the blogs that I write.

Nice thing with this one is it uses microformats too. You set me thinking. I might see if I could tie that with ClaimID which shows all the places online that I can be found.

@lisa - I think you can run this into a 5, or more, page resume if you listed all the links where you could be found :-)

[Matt Dickman]

Len -- Thanks for the well wishes. I appreciate that a lot.

Doug -- I'm glad to have added a little value.

Lisa -- You're right. I think I would cry if somebody gave me a five page resume. Links do wonders.

David -- That's a great point. This should be online and could be a page on a blog or a hosted HTML page with embedded links.

[Toad]

Brilliant Matt.
Really brilliant.

[Valeria Maltoni]

This is solid advice, and impressive. Kudos, Matt. It fits your unique set of skills and abilities precisely.

I wrote a post a long time ago about using tags and the structure and language for the new attention deficit and time-starved age on your resume. Does the whole document tell a story? Is it your story? I am so unimpressed by canned documents that seem to spit out nearly identical people. When the truth is each person has a different story. It may be time to refresh that post :)

Titles, subtitles and narration from the POV of the customer -- the person who is trying to solve a problem: hiring someone with the right skills.

[Lewis Green]

Matt,

Nice work! Congratulations.

[kenekaplan]

Good stuff! Thank you. I added your post as a comment updating a blog item I wrote on the topic http://tinyurl.com/2oedf7. Best wishes!

[Matt Dickman]

TT -- Thank you!

Valeria -- I love that you see the resume as storytelling. I think that's a great way to envision this as a real marketing tool and not just a piece of paper.

Ken -- Thanks for the link. I highly recommend you check out Ken's post if you have not already.

[SocialButterfly]

This was def. a very helpful post! Thanks for sharing. I recently switched from the one pager to the two-pager...and wanted to make it more creative fitting for the job I was applying for (and now have!).

Thanks!