Blue Helm

In my last post, I focused on the need for college alumni to clean up their Facebook pages, Twitter feeds and blogs. In today’s highly-competitive and unpredictable job environment, you can’t afford to have potential employers come across negative or incriminating information on your social networks (particularly photos). If you haven’t done so already, it’s time to clean house.

This morning I want to write about the next step in evolving your social sites into positive and dynamic networking tools: professionalize.

What does that mean? Well, if you haven’t figured out by now that social networks play a commanding role in 21^st century personal branding, it’s time to take a crash course in reality. Like it or not, Facebook matters in the business world. So do LinkedIn, blogging and a host of other “new media” channels. These are robust, highly compelling tools to use in your networking and job searching endeavors. So you must professionalize your social networks—you must develop them into qualified, focused sites that employers, coworkers, interviewers, former professors and colleagues will respect, value and share with others. However, you don’t have to turn all your social networks into stale, emotionless resumes. You can still use Facebook and Twitter for personal or social reasons…just be aware that employers and business people will see your sites. You want them to look great.

(The following suggestions are for those that already have existing social networks, like Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. If you currently don’t use any social networks, but want to start building your social media presence, go here.)

Upload good profile pictures. Online profile pictures can make significant first impressions on potential employers and others. You definitely don’t want a photo of your recent drunken late-night escapade greeting every visitor to your social networks. Your Facebook profile photo doesn’t have to be uber-professional, but it should be well-cropped and likable. LinkedIn profile shots can have a more professional feel, depending on your industry. Make sure your Twitter profile picture is cropped well and shows your face clearly (unless your Twitter page is based around a product or company). Remember, you’re branding yourself.

Maintain a well-written bio. Most social networks give you the option to include a small biography about yourself. Use this to your advantage! Include work and professional information about yourself on Facebook and especially LinkedIn. Bring some of the strongest parts of your resume over to your social networks. If you’re using Twitter, make your bio short, but full of key words that stand out to people searching about your industry.

Keep your blog focused. Maintaining a consistent, professional blog can be one of the most effective and rewarding online networking tools. If you do have a blog, make sure it caters to a specific industry or niche—and keep it focused! What is your expertise? Your greatest talent? Write about that, and little else. Whether its finance, politics, cooking or PR, keep your blog relevant to one industry. You’ll begin to attract readers from your field that will respect your writing and take notice of your skills. Your status as an opinion leader will grow—and that is a big deal to employers.

Fill out your LinkedIn profile. Build your summary, grow your contacts, ask for recommendations, use LinkedIn’s “Q & A” feature, etc, etc. Go here to learn how to grow and effectively utilize your LinkedIn presence. You really can use it as a great online resume.

Create a custom background on Twitter. This isn’t absolutely necessary, but it’s a nice addition to your Twitter presence, and could really impress potential employers and colleagues. Go here to learn how to get started.

Professionalize! Make your social networks attractive, interesting and, most importantly, impressive to potential employers. Remove all the childish rubbish and consistently update your profiles with genuine and professional content.

My next few posts will focus on specific social networks and how to use each one to build your personal brand. Stay tuned!

It's finally time to clean up your social networks.

Over the last few years, two remarkably surprising and unpredictable phenomena have radically changed the way most Americans spend their time and lives. One is the rise of social media. The other is the Great Recession.

First, social media is quickly altering the way humans communicate and interact with one another. Don’t believe me? 95% of employers polled in a recent business survey say they use LinkedIn to attract job candidates. The United States government just eased sanctions on Iran and Cuba to encourage social media use among their citizens. CNN now sees Facebook as a bigger competitor than FOX News. And on and on it goes.

In the mean time, the economic recession has paralyzed millions of businesses, families and nations. It’s harder now for a recent college graduate to find a good job than it’s been in decades.

So what do these two changes have in common? It’s simple: College graduates must use social media to foster personal branding in order to beat the recession. But how?

I was going to spill out a half-dozen suggestions in this blog post today, but my wise business colleague suggested I create a series of posts that address this important issue, step by step. I gladly took his advice, and I’ll focus this morning on the importance of keeping your social networks clean and appropriate.

Clean up your social networks: A study last year revealed that 45% of employers use social networks like Facebook and MySpace to screen potential job candidates. That number is bound to increase as social media becomes even more widely used. What does that mean for you?

• Learn about privacy features on Facebook. I cannot tell you how many people I come across that have no idea that all their Facebook information, including phone numbers, private notes and embarrassing pictures, are public online. Educate yourself and make invisible sensitive information on Facebook.
• If you’re smart, you’ll simply erase any negative or compromising material on Facebook, especially photos. If your friends occasionally post inappropriate comments or pictures on your Facebook wall, see the link in the point above.
• If you have a blog, that is very good. But, like Facebook, make sure your blog is appropriate for all to see, including potential or current employers.
• Make sure spammers aren’t following you on Twitter. Block them. Oftentimes, spammers will use pornographic images in their profile pictures which are visible to someone looking at your Twitter followers.
• Abandon MySpace. It’s filthy and chaotic and ridden with 13-year-olds. It will do little, if anything, to further your career. Say goodbye and walk away.

In short, remember to make your social networks clean and don’t ever post anything online that could come back to embarrass or hurt you.

Over the next couple years, social media will become even more mainstream and will evolve and grow in ways we can’t yet predict. The recession will (hopefully) wither away into oblivion, like the Wicked Witch of the West slowly melting in a pool of oozy water. Those transformations are good, but it highlights the point that the time to use social media to establish your personal brand is now. The world, as it recovers from the economic downturn, will not wait for you to catch up.