Rather than limit its use or even curtail employee's access to it, one US retail giant has fallen in love with the fledging message tool and is embracing Twitter. But not in the way you'd expect.
Best Buy is one of the biggest electronic retailers in the US. More interesting is how the retailer has turned to social media, not just as a potential marketing tool - but a tool to find suitable employees.
As reported by Networkworld, Best Buy put out a job advertisement recently for a marketing graduate with at least 250 followers; the kind of Twitter experience you would think money couldn't buy.
The position is listed as a marketing role with an 'emerging media' focus, so it's safe to assume that most candidates will know their way around the social media circuit. As part of the basic qualifications for the position, candidates would need at least one year's blogging experience and some understanding of social media.
We're wondering if the job is really just a popularity contest to find the biggest Twitter users. If they want somebody with at least 250 followers, Best Buy may have undersold itself.
Unless Best Buy managers have been living in a social marketing cave, anybody with a brain and a credit card can easily gain Twitter followers for hire - many of which are not entirely honest.
Usocial leads the web as the premier Twitter for hire market. At Usocial, the going price for 1000 followers is $87, meaning a potential Best Buy candidate could turn up for work having only invested $25 to help their chances.
This brings the entire Twitter-as-business-tool concept into doubt. If you can buy your way into the Twitter top 1%, then what does that mean to the legitimacy of the service and its purpose as an emerging media tool? Just as people can now purchase Diggs from Chinese Digg farms, measuring a user based on the number of friends/followers they have lacks true insight into the way social media works.
Twitter has a come a long way since its inception in 2006, when it emerged as the next big thing in social networking. Everyone from Ashton Kutcher to CNN have used it as a marketing tool and its recently being applauded for its role in helping political free speech in the latest Iran crisis. Even Best Buy's CEO Brian Dunn has a Twitter account; one of the few socially motivated CEO's online.
Twitter has long been held up as a useful platform for generating contacts with like minded interests, but as a potential job qualification, this is unchartered waters for the fledging service.
It will be interesting to watch over the next few months how many other employees begin to list Twitter as a potential qualification and whether Australian employers catch on.