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Discoblog
« The “Piece of Paper” That Can Detect E. Coli
Doctors Remove Implanted Heart After Original Heart Heals »

Want a Job at Best Buy? Better Have 250 Twitter Followers

twitterJob hunters, maybe you should be building your Twitter network instead of your resume—at least if you’re interested in the position of Senior Manager-Emerging Media Marketing at Best Buy. The electronics giant reportedly listed “at least 250 Twitter followers” among the requirements for the position.

The Telegraph reports:

According to the advertisement, the chosen candidate would be “the primary lead for the Best Buy’s mobile, social, and video marketing & media efforts to drive in-store and online sales, create sustainable word of mouth evangelists, and brand loyalists.”

Basic requirements for the job included a Bachelors degree, two years of mobile or social media marketing experience, four years [of] people or resource leadership experience and one year of active blogging experience.

The job opening, which was at the company’s Minnesota headquarters, appears to have been filled. But because companies increasingly look for candidates with good social networking skills, it’s a good bet that job-seekers will see similar specifications in the future from other employers.

Just don’t tweet about how you hate your job, because your boss is probably on Twitter, too.

Related Content:
DISCOVER: Twitter’s Greatest Hits–and Greatest Misses
Discoblog: Twitter to Replace World History in England Schools
Cosmic Variance: Karl Rove is Following Me on Twitter

Image: Courtesy of Twitter

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July 14th, 2009 12:14 PM Tags: employment, jobs, Twitter
by Allison Bond in Technology Attacks! | 17 comments | RSS feed | Trackback >

  • Julian

    AGH I HATE TWITTER

  • http://twitter.com/michaelejahn Michael Jahn

    http://twitter.com/michaelejahn

    Please follow me, I only have 200 followers and I need 50 more so I can get a job at Best Buy.

  • wjv

    I always wonder when companies depend on ‘brand loyalty’ and not on offering sound products. Has anyone performed a rigorous survey on when, where (I’d assume the US) and why the marketing department became more important than the research and development department? And more importantly is anyone in these companies asking the question of how sustainable is a company that depends on exposure and marketing (reading duping/coercing into consumptive behavior) more than innovation and new products/solutions?

  • http://bigbadbobby.blogspot.com bobroth

    Posted my job description yesterday; a humorous slant on the mores of job descriptions themselves, especially one in the emergent, dynamic world of social media… can there really be an expert in an ever-changing environment?

    I urge you to have a look at my post, laugh and, if entertained, give me your vote:
    http://bestbuyideax.com/ideas/653

    My post is currently in the lead by 5 votes!

  • Alex O’Neal

    One of the ways I manage my Twitter is to block followers I don’t like the nature of – such as advertisers and “dating” service Twitterers. I would say I’ve blocked as much as 50% as many twitterers as actually follow me. I’m probably more rigorous than most about this, but I perform UX/SNA for a major social network, so I’m more aware than most of social presentation.

    My question is, what recruiter or hiring manager has time to go through a person’s followers and see the worth of them? Are they relevant to the job? Does the person even tweet about their field, or is this a non-work aspect of their online social life? And how many of their tweets are forwards of other people’s posts, or simply links to other people’s sites?

    If they managed social networking for their company, I can see something as simple as # of followers being a measure – but branding yourself is something requiring a much deeper dive than simply counting followers.

    Good luck to them in their hiring!

  • David

    This is funny. Its not like this is something weird or out of the norm.

    You do see that the job is called “Senior Manager-Emerging Media Marketing”.

    Sounds to me like the job will include handling a Best Buy Twitter project. Which obviously means the person will have to know the ins and outs of twitter. How do you determine that? Well obviously that person would have followers on twitter.

  • http://bhc3.wordpress.com/2009/08/04/how-user-reputation-scores-will-change-twitter/ How User Reputation Scores Will Change Twitter « I’m Not Actually a Geek

    [...] improve your Twitter Reputation. Companies filling social media positions will go beyond requiring a certain number of Twitter followers. They’ll look for minimum Twitter Reputation [...]

  • http://siliconangle.com/ver2/2009/08/04/how-user-authority-and-reputation-will-change-twitter-for-the-better/ How User Authority and Reputation Will Change Twitter (For the Better)- The SiliconANGLE

    [...] improve your Twitter Reputation. Companies filling social media positions will go beyond requiring a certain number of Twitter followers. They’ll look for minimum Twitter Reputation [...]

  • http://www.personalbrandingblog.com/schawbel-report-the-current-state-of-personal-branding-worldwide-august-2009/ Schawbel Report: The Current State of Personal Branding Worldwide [August 2009] | Personal Branding Blog – Dan Schawbel

    [...] of 2008 and now we’re starting to see companies adopt this ideology, such as Best Buy.  Best Buy is hiring a new employee and the job description says “Must have at least 250 Twitter [...]

  • http://huguesrey.wordpress.com/2009/08/24/the-size-of-your-network-is-now-a-job-qualification/ The size of your network is now a job qualification « I am a Bridge (Hugues Rey Blog)

    [...] of 2008 and now we’re starting to see companies adopt this ideology, such as Best Buy.  Best Buy is hiring a new employee and the job description says “Must have at least 250 Twitter followers.”  [...]

  • David

    After a little checking I found a site called tweetlarge.com and you can get followers on demand and look like a bigshot for the best buy brass.

  • http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/discoblog/2009/10/27/does-twitter-really-cost-british-companies-2-2-billion-a-year/ Does Twitter Really Cost British Companies $2.2 Billion a Year? | Discoblog | Discover Magazine

    [...] Related Content: DISCOVER: 3 Great Uses of Twitter, According to Cofounder Jack Dorsey Discoblog: Want a Job at Best Buy? Better Have 250 Twitter Followers [...]

  • http://www.unripe.com/?p=203 unripe – Cartoon 146 – more Twitter followers

    [...] one mega bragging rights.  Large numbers of followers can even get you your next job.  (A certain position at Best Buy requires that you have at least 250 [...]

  • http://tweetaddercrack.com/ Joy Mangine

    HAha, this is So funny. I guess we will all have to have followers and fb accounts – Seems handy for the companies to do some covert job application research on new-hires. But these days it’s very easy to get twitter followers between family, friends, and coworkers. Or if you run a company it’s easy to get highly targeted twitter followers. ;-)

    Thanks for the article – interesting!

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    [...]we strongly recommend the websites below this line that will help[...]……

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    b2b data…

    [...]will always help you get the right prospects for your b2b mailing lists so[...]……

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    seo…

    [...]Do check out these internet sites below for great offers and informations[...]……





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      Discoblog also includes the daily feature NCBI ROFL, in which two prone-to-distraction grad students post real scientific articles with funny subjects. Email your tips to ncbirofl [at] gmail.com. Follow the ROFL feed here.

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