Your First Social Media Job Is More in Your Control Than You Think

Once you’ve done something, talk about it like it happened to a human, because it did. The arc. The decisions. The parts that went sideways. People remember stories. They forget bullet points.

This connects to something I care about more than almost anything when I meet someone new. I care more about how you think than whether you land where I’d land.

A student once told me about a brand whose social media they loved. Here’s the thing. I don’t love that brand. I don’t think their social is good. But they walked me through why they rated it. What they noticed. What they thought was working, and why.

The thinking was sharp. They had actually looked, and they had reasons. I disagreed with every conclusion. And I respected all of it. Because I wasn’t grading the answer. I was watching how they got there.

That should take some weight off your shoulders. You don’t need the “right” take. You need a real one you can stand behind.

Here’s a flaw worth fixing early, because it’ll quietly cost you for the rest of your career if you don’t. You’re scared to reach out to people. To follow up. To, in your own head, “bug” them.

Look at the actual math. You message someone and they ignore you. That’s the worst case. But silence is also exactly what you get if you never message them at all. The downside of trying is the same as the downside of doing nothing. The upside is a real person writing back. So send the message.

There’s a line between persistent and pest, and you should know where it is. Here’s mine. Wait about a week before you follow up. Keep it to two, maybe three tries, spaced out. And every time you reach back out, bring something they didn’t already have. A thought on something they posted. An article that’s actually relevant. A real reason you’re back in their inbox.

The rule is simple. If the message only helps you, it’s pestering. If it gives them something, it’s persistence.

The best version of this starts before you need anything. Post your own thinking on LinkedIn. Follow people at companies you admire. Comment with an actual point of view, not “great post.” Do that for a while and you stop being a stranger.

Then a job opens, you apply, and the person reading your name already knows it. That isn’t luck. You built that.

Here’s how hiring actually works now. A machine reads you first, a person reads you second, and you need a plan for both.

For the machine, you optimize. On purpose. This isn’t a dirty word and it isn’t a trick. Pull the real keywords straight from the job posting and put them in, as long as you can back every one of them up.

Keep the file clean so the scanner can actually read it: normal font, bullet points, no columns or text boxes or graphics hiding your best lines. Save it as a .docx. Spell out your acronyms once, like “search engine optimization (SEO).” Tailor it to each posting, because the postings are different and the machine notices. That’s performing for the machine, and you should do it well.

One line of caution, because it’s the only place this goes wrong. Optimize with real stuff. Don’t pad it with keywords you can’t defend. A lot of these systems flag that now, and even when they don’t, the gap shows the moment a human reads you. You’re not trying to fool anyone. You’re trying to get seen.

Then comes the move that actually wins. You use people to get around the machine entirely. A referral can route your resume straight to a human and skip the line. Someone inside who’ll vouch for you beats every formatting tip combined. The relationships you built before you needed them, the comments, the real conversations, that’s the door next to the gate. Walk through it.

When you finally get the interview, a few things matter more than people admit.

And people hire people they want to be around. Skills get you considered. Being someone they’d actually want on the team gets you hired. So be positive. Be confident. Not loud, not fake. Just the version of you that’s good company.

And practice. This is the one almost nobody does. Everyone waits for the interview at the company they want most, then walks in cold and hopes. Don’t.

Take the practice interviews. Take the ones you don’t even want. Use them to sharpen your story, your thinking, your read on the room. Don’t let the rep that counts be your first rep.