one page summary

06 Aug one page summary

>> Consumers use social media to stay connected with friends and family who are nearby or across the globe and stay up to date on things that interest them at any time of the day.

It’s these aspects of social media, access to relevant, personal news and information, reach targeting and accessibility that make it a powerful tool for everyone, especially brands.

The conversation is happening all over the world all the time.

Social media is the most efficient way for brands to communicate with their consumers.

Using social media, brands have an unprecedented opportunity to connect with their audience, offer help and expertise, judge sentiment, and solicit feedback.

For years, it went like this: A customer comes into your store or office, you treat them well and give them exactly what they need.

You’ve provided a valuable and satisfying experience, and transformed that customer into a word-of-mouth evangelist.

Now he or she recommends your business to a few friends, who have the same great experience and become word-of-mouth evangelists themselves.

That sort of publicity is highly credible and it costs you nothing.

But word-of-mouth can only travel so far before the message stops or gets distorted.

What if that first satisfied customer posts a recommendation on Facebook instead of spreading the word in person? Now it can reach 500 people at a time instead of one, each of whom can share with another 500 people without the message ever breaking down.

This is a testament to social media’s remarkable reach.

Social media enables mass communication on the scale of television and radio, but maintains the intimacy of word-of-mouth.

No matter your business, your customers and potential customers are already sharing information online.

Launching your own social media campaign makes it easier for them to talk about you and for you to talk to them.

Social media has changed the way people feel about your business, whether you know it or not.

Even if your company has no online presence, people have likely already posted about you somewhere on the web.

Word-of-mouth travels faster than ever online, so people’s feelings about you are inevitably spreading.

Studies have shown that Internet users trust recommendations made by people they know over any other source.

Now is the time to take charge of the conversation and create desire for your brand or products.

Connecting with customers on a personal level means they’ll be more receptive to your brand message and less skeptical of your intentions.

Because social media is where your current and potential customers already communicate with friends and family, it makes sense to insert yourself into that conversation and humanize your business.

Dealing with service complaints on a social network can also humanize your business and earn you brownie points with fans.

These kinds of social media interactions don’t feel like marketing, because your business is adding value to conversations, not just acting as a loudspeaker.

Social media’s power to connect businesses and fans makes it essential to modern brand management.

Social media etiquette is a set of unwritten rules you should try to follow when using social networks.

Following these guidelines will help you come across as professional and mature to anyone who finds your name on the Web.

You can always remember the basics of social media etiquette from the three Ps: privacy, promotion and presentation.

Privacy means being mindful of how you’re sharing personal information over the Internet, whether it’s yours or someone else’s.

Remember to think before you post; it’s easier to stop yourself before uploading a photo, sending a tweet or posting to Facebook than trying to erase a message after the fact.

In most cases, the damage is already done once you press “Send.” Be wary of the second P: promotion.

Promoting yourself too much, only promoting your own content and forgetting to cite sources do not help build the trusting relationships you’re looking for online.

Most of the time, too much self-promotion gets you and the content you post written off as spam.

The key is balance.

Make sure to mix posts about your own content with content from other people around the Web, making sure to credit your sources with a link or a mention.

The final P is presentation, or how you appear to others online.

Your online persona shouldn’t embarrass you; you should be just as comfortable showing your social media profile to your boss as you would your friend.

After all, you only have one chance at making a first impression.

When posting, remember that it’s difficult to communicate the tone of a message in text: what might be a sarcastic joke to you might come off as inappropriate or offensive to someone else.

It’s always best to err on the side of professionalism, as a misunderstanding or slip in judgement could cost you your job or worse: your reputation.

Getting the right combination of the three Ps, balancing privacy, promotion and presentation will help you maintain a respectable social media persona.

Social media etiquette is a set of unwritten rules you should try to follow when using social networks.

Following these guidelines will help you come across as professional and mature to anyone who finds your name on the Web.

You can always remember the basics of social media etiquette from the three Ps: privacy, promotion and presentation.

Privacy means being mindful of how you’re sharing personal information over the Internet, whether it’s yours or someone else’s.

Remember to think before you post; it’s easier to stop yourself before uploading a photo, sending a tweet or posting to Facebook than trying to erase a message after the fact.

In most cases, the damage is already done once you press “Send.” Be wary of the second P: promotion.

Promoting yourself too much, only promoting your own content and forgetting to cite sources do not help build the trusting relationships you’re looking for online.

Most of the time, too much self-promotion gets you and the content you post written off as spam.

The key is balance.

Make sure to mix posts about your own content with content from other people around the Web, making sure to credit your sources with a link or a mention.

The final P is presentation, or how you appear to others online.

Your online persona shouldn’t embarrass you; you should be just as comfortable showing your social media profile to your boss as you would your friend.

After all, you only have one chance at making a first impression.

When posting, remember that it’s difficult to communicate the tone of a message in text: what might be a sarcastic joke to you might come off as inappropriate or offensive to someone else.

It’s always best to err on the side of professionalism, as a misunderstanding or slip in judgement could cost you your job or worse: your reputation.

Getting the right combination of the three Ps, balancing privacy, promotion and presentation will help you maintain a respectable social media persona.

There are two ways to distinguish your brand on social media: one is great customer service; another is great content.

Great customer service is simple, though not always easy: be forthright and kind to your fans and followers, and treat them like human beings.

Customer-service oriented brands like airlines and retailers have been able to use social media to respond to customer questions and complaints and salvage relationships quickly.

Creating great content, on the other hand, is trickier.

You need to know who your audience is, what they like, and how to engage them.

However, if you put in the work, the payoff can be tremendous.

The best content for brands is akin to the type of thing your audience would want to consume anyway, such as clever online videos or useful insider tips.

Blendtec, for example, is a blender manufacturer that became famous for their “Will it Blend?” YouTube series, in which the company founder blends unorthodox items from entire cans of soda to iPhones.

The Blendtec videos have tens of millions of views on YouTube, and the campaign has had a huge impact on blender sales.

Great social media content can also simply prompt people to do something they like to do online anyway, like post photos of themselves or take online quizzes.

For example, in 2012, Ben and Jerry’s invited their customers to post pictures on Instagram under the hashtag #captureeuphoria, and some of the photos were used in local and national ads.

70 million people saw the campaign, and the company’s Instagram following grew by almost 25% over the course of a few weeks.

Whether you’re running a single campaign or a long-term social media plan, great content invites people to engage with your brand and share your story.

You could have the best social media content in the world, but it won’t help you one bit if no one sees it.

Most people consume social media through their home feeds on various networks, which generally show the newest content first.

This means that to maximize exposure, you need to post around the time that your audience is using social media.

Among American adults, social media use is most prevalent during the day, while many people are at work in front of a computer.

As such, for most networks, you should post during the workweek in the morning or early afternoon, so that users will see your posts throughout the day.

Pinterest seems to be an exception; more people are active on the photo-sharing site on evenings and weekends, so you may want your posts go up then.

Frequency also plays a big factor in getting your content seen; the more often you post, the more likely you are to be at the top of the newsfeed.

Recommendations vary, but you can follow these general guidelines: Post to Twitter 2-3 times a day, Facebook once a day Google+ 2 times a day LinkedIn 2-3 times per week Pinterest 1-2 times per week and to a blog at least 2-3 times per week.

Keep in mind that these are general guidelines, and you may find that your audience responds better to different posting times and frequencies.

Whatever you settle on, only share valuable content that your audience will like.

Five Tweets per day is not better than one if four of the Tweets are uninteresting or spammy.

And once you get into a groove, stay consistent.

If your fans come to expect content from you a few times a week, several posts in one day can be overwhelming; even worse is an unexpected quiet spell, which will suggest that you are not actively maintaining your social media presence.

Given how much time you spend at your job, it might feel natural to write about what’s happening at work on a blog or on social media.

However, posting about your company can be risky, so you should always be careful about what you say.

It’s okay to be proud of the work you and your colleagues are doing, but there are a few things to look out for.

First off, as with all forms of online media, anything you say can be rapidly copied and shared, so a “private” post you make to a social network can quickly spread to the public web.

Second, it might not always be obvious what is and is not public knowledge about your company.

Just because a big impending deal has been well-known within your company for weeks, it doesn’t mean that it’s public information.

If there’s been a news article or press release about the topic you’d like to discuss, it’s probably fair game.

But tread carefully, since you may accidentally confirm a rumor or speculation without realizing it.

Furthermore, if your company is publicly traded, sharing information that hasn’t already been made public can actually violate disclosure laws, which will get your entire company in hot water.

Only certain people should be making statements about your company in an official capacity.

If this isn’t your role, or you’re posting from a personal account, you should make it clear when writing about your company that you are speaking only for yourself.

Policies vary, but it may be necessary to post a message specifically stating that the opinions you express are solely your own, not your company’s.

Keep in mind that it’s not just text and news stories that you should be careful with.

Don’t post photos taken at work without permission, whether they’re of your coworkers, your office, or what you’re working on.

Not only is it an invasion of privacy, but you may accidentally reveal company secrets.

The consequences to posting something about your company can be incredibly varied.

You might just make your company look bad.

You may violate a contract or agreement that your company has with another business, or accidentally help a competitor.

You could even cause someone to lose their job.

In general, caution is key.

You can always decide to share more later, but it’s hard to undo a post once it’s out there.

Facebook is the world’s most popular social network, and hundreds of millions of people use the site for both personal and professional reasons.

But how your Facebook and your professional life should interact can be a thorny issue.

First and foremost is the matter of friend requests.

Depending on your company’s policy, it may or may not be acceptable for you to connect with your coworkers, bosses, and subordinates at all.

And regardless of company policy, your coworkers may or may not want to connect with you on Facebook.

Facebook is not a place to connect with everyone you’ve ever met; only connect with people whom you are interested in sharing with and think would be interested in you.

If a coworker denies your request, don’t take it personally.

It may be that they use Facebook only for communicating with close family members, or that they wish to keep their personal and professional lives strictly separate.

Second, Facebook offers nuanced privacy tools with more options than most other social networks.

Any post on Facebook can be shared with the “Public,” “Friends Only,” a specific subsection of your friends, or any custom group you’d like.

In general, avoid posting things publicly, since you have no control over who will be able to see them.

Likewise, use the messaging feature rather than publicly posting private messages on a friend’s timeline.

You can further manage your public profile by limiting who can post to your timeline and tag you in posts and photos.

Even if you take excellent care of your Facebook timeline, if a friend shares something inappropriate or offensive to your timeline, you may be held responsible.

You can extend the courtesy to your Facebook friends by asking for permission before tagging them in photos.

Above all, follow good general posting etiquette.

Facebook gives users a lot of freedom to share their thoughts, photos, and more, and the immense popularity of the site means that anything you share may have a lasting impact.

LinkedIn is different than other social networks like Twitter and Facebook because it’s all about your professional life.

People tend to use LinkedIn to make business connections and display their professional accomplishments, not catch up with old friends and post baby pictures.

As such, the actions you are capable of taking, and the rules for what is and is not acceptable, are different as well.

While it’s okay to share major life events such as getting a new job or getting married, you should minimize personal posts about your activities outside of work.

Furthermore, you should think of your posts on LinkedIn as being personally addressed to everyone you’re connected to, from your coworkers to your department head.

Don’t post anything that might be construed as inappropriate for work.

Light-hearted is okay, but risqué content should be avoided.

Rules of decorum are especially crucial on LinkedIn because your profile actively identifies you as an employee of your company: users won’t even have to open a new webpage to see where you work, and whom to contact if you act inappropriately.

LinkedIn is an important tool for networking, and it’s perfectly acceptable to connect with a new acquaintance or business contact.

Resist the temptation, however, to send invitations to everyone you see who looks interesting, even if you’re employed at the same company.

It’s generally okay to connect with someone you’ve met in person.

Otherwise, to connect to someone you haven’t met, it’s best to make use of LinkedIn’s “Introductions” feature.

Finally, make sure to keep your LinkedIn profile complete and up to date.

It serves as a digital résumé, and will often times be the first impression you make if someone looks you up online.

It also provides an easy reference for your coworkers to see what your responsibilities are at work, so everyone is clear on your role.

Hello, my name is Joshua Waldman.

I’m the author of Job Searching with Social Media for Dummies.

And I’m the founder and the main blogger at careerenlightenment.com, which is a blog focused on helping job-seekers regain their sense of control.

There’s so many forces that are pulling us away from our dreams, or the jobs that we — we really want: Unemployment rates, unemployment discrimination, not knowing what to do, not understanding the changes in the hiring world.

And so, with social media, it’s really a tool that can help the job seeker regain that control.

You can control your profile.

You can control the people you meet.

You can’t control how people see you, but you can help to influence that image that you’re projecting through personal branding.

I’ve been syndicated internationally.

I’ve been on ABC Good Morning America; Mashable, with some infographics and some consolidation of some very interesting research.

Personal branding is interesting.

It’s — I think it’s really misunderstood, and it’s a term that’s overused, too, way too much these days.

If you think about it from the point of view of a hiring manager, it — you know, let’s step out of our shoes as a job-seeker, as someone who’s looking to improve our career.

And let’s say, okay, so for a hiring manager to make a decision about you, they need to have three things answered: Do I like you? Are you motivated? And can you do the job? And unfortunately, a lot of people who start their job search are focused on can you do the job.

And this is just a foot in the door.

Right? A resume is really good at answering that question.

But decisions are not made there.

Decisions are made about who you are.

Who you are is not a commodity.

It can’t be competed with.

It’s unique.

You’re the individual, and that’s — that’s what’s going to earn you the job.

There’s a lot of statistics to show that it’s not always the qualified people who end up with the positions.

So, when we move from commodity, from can you do the job, into the realm of personality — such as, you know, who are you, what motivates you, are you motivated, how motivated are you, what makes you the best at what you do — this is the world of personal branding.

And I think that people who are serious about their career, who really focus on this, are going to do a lot better than those who just focus on if they can pull the lever or push the button.

So, personal branding has two spheres.

There’s you, and then there’s them, if you think of it like a Venn diagram, so — and where that overlap is, that’s where your — your sweet spot is.

That’s where your messaging is going to come from.

That makes sense.

So we really have to start personal branding through introspection.

Who are we? What are our values? What are our aspirations? And then, once we figure that out, through value solicitation exercises, personality tests — like the color-code or MAPP testing — M-A-P-P testing — figuring out who you are, then we can begin to align that with the needs of the organization, through research.

And these days, I mean, it — there’s no excuse not to understand, you know, what your — what your target organization’s going through right now.

What are their goals? What are their biggest challenges? In fact, you can even use some of the social media tools to identify exactly who the hiring manager is, and then understand what that hiring manager is going through, so that you can align who you are with their values, their aspirations, and solving their problems.

That’s really the essence of personal branding.

Introspection helps with decision-making.

Right.So for example, let’s say you got a great job offer from an oil company doing some drilling or excavation, but you’ve identified that one of your core values is conservation.

No matter how much money they’re going to offer you, you’re going to say no and you’re not going to worry about it.

It’s very fast.

If you hadn’t done that introspection yet, you’re going to teeter, and it’s going to be a very painful couple of days figuring out whether or not you’re going to take this job offer or not.

So just like a business decides on a strategy and then uses that strategy as a map to make a decision later on, so too as a job seeker or someone serious about advancing our career.

We have to really understand what our strategy is, what we want out of our careers and then use that as a map to decide on what to do.

Everyone’s going to be different, you know, really.

I mean, someone else might test and say that they really love the energy industry and don’t really care that much about conservation but they care more about the technology used in oil excavation; and so that futurism, that passion for newer technology is going to drive a decision to say yes to the oil company.

The most important introspection is going to be values and solicitation.

And there’s not really a test to do that.

There are books that talk about this kind of thing, like the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.

One of the exercises in there is write your eulogy that your best friend is going to say about you, what are they going to remember about you.

Asking yourself who you admire most and why, what value do they represent.

Asking yourself what was a time in my career that I am the most proud of.

Write it down in vivid detail and then figure out exactly why you’re the most proud of it.

Because that’s really going to uncover your core values.

It’s hard to just ask yourself, because you can look at lists and lists of values, right, and say, oh, that one looks good and I like courage and integrity, oh, that’s a good one to have.

Those are superficial.

But when we use our own experiences, that’s a kind of extract.

That, it will be really easy.

You know, one of the exercises to do is to try to figure out what are your top three core values and boil those down into a single statement about who you are.

That’s the best way to get to the essence of your personal brand.

Many people will just start filling out their LinkedIn profile without thinking about their personal brand.

Okay.So part of personal branding is figuring out what your three words are; write your three values.

Also doing some keyword research, using the Google keyword tool or looking at job descriptions and extracting, creating word clouds from these job descriptions to pull out the most used words that companies are actually using to describe what you do and then using those words strategically in your headlines, in your profile summaries.

Once you figured all of that out, it’s very easy to fill out your headline.

Now in LinkedIn, it says, headline, not job title.

A lot of people just say senior software engineer.

This is incorrect.

You have 120 characters here to make a first impression.

This headline is attached to almost every single communication you send via LinkedIn, whether it’s writing on groups page, whether it’s sending an invitation to connect, or whether you’re sending a direct message to another person such as a hiring manager; that headline is going to be the first statement they read about who you are.

In other words, it’s your tagline, if you think about it in the branding context.

So use — having the keywords in there and also having your personal brand relevant in there to get the attention of your audience, and that’s how you approach the headline.

The same with your profile summary.

The way to approach the headline is to think what’s the problem I’m solving.

So if you’re salesperson, you’re trying to grow revenue.

So instead of senior account manager, which is great to have in there, what if it says experienced sales professional, passionate about growing your topline growth or your topline revenue.

It’s a lot more compelling.

Or a quality control engineer could say meticulous engineer concerned about top quality production, quality control engineer.

So that way you have the keyword and you have this passionate statement, the statement of solving a problem.

So you have 120 characters.

Most job titles are only 10 characters.

Right.So you have a lot of room to grow and express who you are.

She called me up to say, look, I had a third-person profile summary.

The other day I changed it to a first-person profile summary.

I do this.

I did this.

You know, this was my experience.

And all of a sudden, she gets 20 percent more leads just like that, you know.

And it’s a testament to the fact that social media is really about showing up, being who you are, being authentic online.

And when you use third person and you’re too formal, you extract your personality and you become a commodity.You become uninteresting.

Right.So the first person, absolutely.

The other thing is that our attention spans online are very short.

So you have probably about 20 to 30 seconds to capture the hiring manager’s attention, so they look at your picture.

They read your name and your headline.

If you pass that, you’re going to — they’re going to come down to your profile summary, and they’re going to give you about 30 seconds.

If you’re rambling on and on, if you’re just bullet pointing brag points about yourself, you’re not going to get very far.

So you know, I think that having a structure with your profile summary is really helpful.

There’s a lot of structures out there.

The one that I think is the easiest to sort of get yourself unstuck is a four-part structure, all right, and that’s answering the question of who are you, what do you do, what makes you the best at what you do and what do you want, what’s the call to action.

Every good marketing needs a call to action.

So for example, I’m an Internet Marketing Specialist.

I am passionate about helping job seekers regain a sense of control over their career.

People who I’ve worked with have gotten interviews within one week of following my advice.

I’d really like you to sign up for my newsletter and watch some of my video trainings.

You know, something as simple as that can really help get you unstuck, figure out how to have a very concise yet compelling profile summary.

It’s all about curiosity.

You want to keep them reading.

You want to keep them engaged.

Second of all, if one of those two books that are appearing on your profile are industry-relevant and easily recognizable by the person viewing your profile, you communicate a lot of your personal brand.

You show them that you’re motivated.

I mean, let’s take the example of an unemployed person.

If you’re unemployed, yet you’re reading industry-specific books, you’re clearly motivated and passionate about the industry.

And that’s exactly what you want to communicate.

Everyone going into job interviews is gonna tell the interviewer, right in the eye, “I really love this job, I’m gonna do great at it, this is something I’m passionate about!” The interviewer knows everyone is going to say this.

So the real question is, “How do I find out, behaviorally, who’s really motivated? Who is who they say they are? After six months, after twelve months, are they still gonna have that level of passion?” If you’re reading a book on the industry while you’re unemployed, you’re keeping your skills relevant, you’re passionate.

>> The fastest way to the maybe pile is to be inconsistent.

The riskiest decision any business makes is hiring the wrong person.

I’ve heard statistics anywhere between a year to a year and a half of the salary is the cost of hiring the wrong person.

So it’s a big deal.

And so they’re looking for reasons to say no to you.

Now if you have a picture here on LinkedIn and then you have, you know, your bonging picture on Facebook.

You’re in the trash.

You’re in the toilet.

Likewise and even more subtly, if you’re messaging is different between your Google profile and your LinkedIn profile.

There’s going to be a yellow flag or a red flag that’s raised.

What’s going on here? They have a resume of you in their hand and something doesn’t quite align with your LinkedIn profile, that’s also a red flag.

So consistency across platforms incredibly important.

One thing I would suggest any professional do is to have the same profile picture across all platforms.

Your profile picture becomes an icon like a desktop icon for an application.

Let’s say you were on your desktop and you were trying to open up Microsoft Word but the icon keeps changing.

Sometimes it’s yellow and blue.

Sometimes it’s a w.Sometimes it’s an m it’s going to be hard to find this application.

Your picture becomes a very fast representation of who you are and this is the primary element of your brand.

The colors and your face.

If you have a common name, it can be a problem because there’s, you know, a thousand other people with your name.

So not you is going to show up on Google results.

A real fast way around it is to use your middle initial.

So you almost rebrand yourself.

It’s basic positioning.

This happens all the time, right? Cisco Systems becomes Cisco.

All these name changes occur.

It’s simple marketing positioning and likewise with personal branding.

We position ourselves.

So if your name isn’t making you unique enough, make it unique.

Add your middle initial.

Add your 3 letter degree at the end of it.

Brand yourself based on your location or your hobby or your profession.

So if you can be consistent across all of your brands, over time you will start to rank.

Right? So your resume will have your middle initial.

And then your LinkedIn profile will have your middle initial and your Facebook will have your middle initial.

And your meet up will have it.

You’ll just use it all the time.

It’ll be on your business card.

So when someone does look you up, that’s the search results that you dominate.

It’s sort of like the long tail for personal branding.

That’s really the only way around it.

There’s a lot of directories available now like ZoomInfo or People or Spokeo whose sole purpose is to find these profiles and construct avatars.

Online versions of people.

So they pull from public records.

They pull from news sources and blog posts and review sites and all kinds of things.

And they think they know who you are.

So in Spokeo it thinks and knows where you live.

And based on your zip code, it’s going to tell you what your income is and what your political party is.

It’s going to extrapolate this kind of information about you.

ZoomInfo is going to find different versions of your name which you can actually start to claim.

Then you can use these tools to see what’s out there.

By claiming your name, informing them that the information they have is inaccurate, you can begin to clean this up.

So rather than you reinventing the wheel.

Piggyback on some of the services out there that are already trying to aggregate profiles.

Nobody wins a beauty pageant for having the nicest-looking LinkedIn profile, or having the cleanest Facebook profile with the least amount of trashy pictures on it [laughs].

It’s not about your profile.

It’s about who you know, you know.

There’s a screen shot I can share with you from a few years ago, when I had 880 connections on LinkedIn.

You can see how quickly it moves from 880 to, you know, several million, to tens of millions, in third degree, you know.

That’s the power of this stuff.

It’s who you know they know.

You know, it’s a third — third-degree connection that’s really going to help you.

Right? Because job searching has always been about relationship-building.

Most jobs come from people we already know, and when they remember us, when we’re memorable.

Okay? So, even though social media’s really pretty and attractive and it’s trendy right now, they’re just tools.

They’re just tools that help augment our relationship-building for networking.

So instead of having to go to networking events every day — which we had to do — now we can go to networking events a couple of times a week, and then go and network on LinkedIn for half the amount of time and no money for drinks [laughs].

And we can ask those people to coffee, because that’s — that’s where the relationship is built, with a one-on-one conversation, eyeball-to-eyeball.

Asking questions, listening, the good personality skills.

One of the dangers — and we’re seeing this happen — is that, you know, as — as kids are growing up not interacting as much, we’re losing some of our social skills.

You know, there’s all kinds of articles of bosses firing employees over Facebook, you know; boyfriends dumping girlfriends on text message.

It’s like we’re almost shying away from that — that intimate connection.

And this is a huge mistake, because in the professional world, it’s all about that connection, right, and staying up-to-date with that.

So, when you find that hiring manager on LinkedIn who you think is going to be influential, get introduced to them, and then offer to buy them a cup of coffee.

And just ask them questions and listen.

That’s the best thing you can do for your career.

Absolutely.

Size matters. Size matters a lot.

So does quality, but the larger your network, the easier it’s going to be to find a second or third-degree connection, and therefore, you can get introductions.

You don’t really have to pay for a LinkedIn account unless you totally run out of direct messages and introductions.

Once you hit your head on the brick wall, you know, yeah, pay for the account.

But if your network is big enough, and you’re connected to the right people, it’s very likely — or you’re in the right groups, it’s very likely you’re already going to be able to communicate with the right people via LinkedIn.

Size also matters because degree of separation will play a pivotal role in where you rank in search results.

Okay? So as recruiters are using LinkedIn more and more like an applicant tracking system, and this is going to start to happen more as LinkedIn focuses on the recruiter market.

Recruiters are going to rely on their degree of connection to find talent to fill open requisitions.

So the more recruiters you have in your network, a better chance you have of actually showing up on somebody’s search.

So in that sense, size absolutely matters and is going to help you be able to get access to the right people in your job search.

I received an e-mail from someone who — who was at an agency, a marketing agency.

And they wanted to move to the other side of the house.

They wanted to run marketing for a startup company that I was with.

And so, one of my sister’s friends from art school photographed his wedding.

Right? So when he e-mailed me, via LinkedIn, you know, he found the company that he was trying to target, saw that I was in a role there, saw the degree of connection that we were separated, saw who separated us, and then made that off-line connection.

Said, oh, your friends photographed my wedding, and I wanted to ask you about this company.

There’s immediate — there’s immediate rapport, you know, when that occurs.

And so this is — this is a fantastic way to bridge, both off-line and online.

You know, another habit I have is if I go to a networking event, I’ll have a stack of business cards.

Well, instead of taking those business cards and throwing them away, putting them in a box, or sending e-mails to thank — thank them for, you know, for meeting them, why not look them up on LinkedIn and invite them.

Right? That way, when they accept your invitation, you’ll have access to the people they know.

And then you’ll have access to the people who they know.

All right.

And then — but also, they’ll have access to the people you know.

So there’s a mutual exchange of contacts.

And in this way, your network can — can really grow.

So, if you’re moving from silicon chip manufacturing to chair-making, and you went to a chair-making conference, and you have a lot of chair-making business cards, and you add those to your network, all of a sudden your network is going to grow in an exponential way, all right, in this new direction, you know, in chair-making.

You know, another — another interesting setting in LinkedIn is location.

Some people — when the President spoke on LinkedIn’s campus and asked, so, what is the main reason why are — jobs aren’t being created, his answer was mobility.

Meaning that there are jobs, but people aren’t able to move to them.

They’re stuck in homes.

So mobility becomes a big issue.

Now, if mobility is not an issue for you and you’re willing to move, there’s a huge amount of opportunity for you, if you go to the right place, or if you move to the right industry.

You can change your LinkedIn location setting to be in the location where you want to go.

So you’ve done your research.

You know that New York City has a lot of job openings in this — in a particular sector, but you live in Virginia.

Change your location setting to New York City.

And all of a sudden, you’ll start showing up in recruiter search results for talent in New York City in that industry.

So presuppose you already made the change.

You already made the change to an industry you’re not in yet.

You already made a move to a city you haven’t moved to yet.

This is a powerful technique to open up a lot of opportunity.

When you ask for an introduction on LinkedIn, you’re withdrawing from your account [laughs], so you have to make sure you have some credit there.

In other words, have you earned the right to ask for a favor, is really the first question to ask.

If the answer is no, you probably want to get on the phone.

You don’t want to jump on someone and say, Hey, introduce me to Bob, because Bob’s going to hire me for my new job.

Haven’t talked to you in three years, like, you know, how are you? It — it’s — it comes across as, you know, insincere.

So the most important part of the introduction is the person making the introduction.

I would say be professionally assertive.

And make sure you have credit in the bank to do that.

I would probably suggest calling that person first, because if that’s an important enough introduction, you want that to go through smoothly and quickly.

When you’re writing the part of that introduction to the target person, always start with something in common.

It can be your mutual friend, or it could be a school or a mutual interest.

But starting with something in common is going to make it a lot easier for that person to say yes.

Right? Oh, they also went to Boston College.

So, let me look at their profile for a second.

Oh, what a nice profile picture and a compelling headline.

[Laughs] Right? So before you reach out, you have the foundation of looking good.

And then the decision is made, okay, I’ll give this guy 15 minutes of my time.

And that’s your — the thing is to ask for a time, to limit the amount of time, and to make sure it’s not a job solicitation.

Even to quite frankly say it, you know.

Hey, you know, I saw that you’re working at this company that I’m also interested in.

This is not a job solicitation.

I’m just curious about what it’s like to work there.

Can I ask you a few questions? I only need 15 minutes of your time.

I can buy you a cup of coffee next week, you know.

Short, simple, nonthreatening.

Not all groups are good, a lot of them are, quite frankly, spammy or so small that there’s not a lot of vitality in the group.

Some groups are really amazing and there’s a lot of discussion.

Tactically, groups joining the same group as your target person makes it possible for you to connect to them paying.

You can reply privately to comments to other group members.

You can add other group members to your network without knowing their email address and I believe you can send direct messages to them.

So joining an industry relevant group that’s big and active opens up your possibilities, that’s the tactical use of groups.

The more relationship building use of groups are immense.

I’ve seen job seekers ask a group for advice and then get 50 responses, right? One, one woman asked advice from the social media group that I’m involved with, I want to start my career as a social media community manager, can you give some guidelines as to what skills I need to have to really excel in the interview.

She got 50 people to reply.

I mean how great is that? It’s free, very professional advice for the job seeker.

So there’s a lot of value in being part of a community and providing value to that community as well, ’cause this, this girl is sharing articles, commenting on other people’s posts.

It can be overwhelming, I know that.

Pick three and just post once a week to each of them and that’s probably enough to start building some, some credit in the bank to ask for help later.

So the top seven mistakes job seekers make online prefaced by the fact that 80 to 90 percent of hiring managers are going to use social media as part of the hiring process.

So these mistakes, you really do want to avoid.

The first mistake is not having a well-defined personal brand.

A lot of people just jump on LinkedIn.

They just jump on Facebook or Twitter and they fill out the forms without really thinking about consistency and messaging and what value they’re providing to their target organizations.

The second mistake is not using your professional headliner appropriately.

People just think it’s a resume and dropping their job title.

Actually, LinkedIn doesn’t call it a job title.

They call it a headline, and you have 120 characters to really get across your personal brand.

This is, in a lot of cases, the first marketing message that anyone is going to read about you.

So by just using your job title, you’re missing out on a great opportunity to expand your personal brand and make a lasting impression.

Number Three, rambling on and on in your profile summary.

Yeah, you have a whole lot of space to fill out in your professional summary but a recruiter is only going to give you about 30 seconds of their time; so make those 30 seconds count.

Use some kind of framework such as who are you, what do you do, why are you the best and what action do you want them to take as a framework to fill out your professional summary.

Number Four, not using LinkedIn’s applications, in particular, not using the Amazon reading list, because, the reading list is going to add color to your profile, and it’s going to demonstrate to the hiring manager what motivates you, and it will show that you really are interested in the industry that you’re focused on.

Number Five, not having 100 percent complete LinkedIn profile.

Okay.Imagine walking into a job interview stark naked.

That’s exactly what it looks like to a lot of recruiters when they look at LinkedIn profiles that are not seriously complete.

It just communicates that you’re not that committed to your career.

Number Six, looking like an ax murderer online.

We are a visual animal.

So the picture we have on our profile really does matter.

If you’re worried about discrimination, they’re going to see you eventually anyways.

And if it’s a company that does discriminate based on race, gender or anything else, it’s probably not a place you want to work anyways.

So get a nice picture done and put it up there online.

It’s really going to help accelerate your job search.

Number Seven, leaving your online relationships online.

Networking works.

It will continue to work.

It will always work in building your professional career.

Don’t get shiny object syndrome with social media.

Find people you want to meet on LinkedIn or on Twitter or on Facebook and then invite them to coffee for an informational interview.

That’s the way to advance your career.

No matter your business, your goal in using social media should be to open new lines of communication with current and potential customers.

Those lines vary because different conversations call for different ways of communicating, and picking the right mix of networks for your image and your ideal audience is essential to consistently and effectively spreading your message.

When choosing your mix, keep in mind that Facebook and Twitter are the most popular social networks in the world, and with accounts on each, you can bet that the majority of people who are searching for your brand will be able to find it.

If you’re based outside of the US or want to reach an international audience, it may also help to research the top social media channels in your target country.

Next, carefully choose a few more specialized networks that are appropriate for your brand or business.

Location-based networks like Yelp and Foursquare are good candidates for brick and mortar stores, while photo-sharing services like Instagram and Pinterest are great for lifestyle brands.

No matter what mix of social channels you choose, it’s important to not spread yourself too thinly.

Only create as many channels as you can reliably post on and supervise.

Otherwise you’ll wear yourself out for too little gain; or worse yet, your pages will lie fallow and appear abandoned.

Likewise, resist the urge to create a brand account on every new social network that crops up.

It may be tempting to jump on the hype of a brand-new network, but unless you can consistently engage users on that platform over a long period of time, it’s not worth it.

A common technique that can make it easier to manage multiple networks is to cross-post the same message across several channels simultaneously.

This can ease the burden of creating different content for each network, and more of your fans will see your message.

However, the varying tone and style of posts written for different networks can make your content seem out of place, and fans who follow you in more than one location may suffer from message overload.

So, it’s best to cross-post sparingly, and only for important messages with universal appeal.

Even then, it’s best to tweak each message so that it reflects the nature of the place it’s posted on.

The most effective way to increase the reach of your social media content is for your audience to share it with others.

Though it’s not always easy to get people to to share your content, there are techniques you can try to give people the right incentive.

The most straightforward technique to encourage sharing is simply to suggest it to them.

Doing so is as simple as ending a YouTube video with a request to share or subscribe to your channel, or including a “share” link at the bottom of a blog post.

Another tactic to encourage sharing is to create a material reward for doing so.

For example, you can run a contest where each person who likes, shares, or comments on a post is entered to win a prize, like a free month of a subscription service.

A way to super-charge that technique is to give someone a higher chance at winning or a bigger prize for sharing multiple times.

Many brands also appeal to their fans’ spirit of generosity by pledging to donate a certain amount of money to a charity or nonprofit organization in exchange for a Like, Retweet, or Share.

This not only expands the brand’s following, but builds goodwill as well.

The bottom line is, you want to make the person sharing your content feel good about having shared it.

Whether they stand to gain something material, or just feel like they are showing a worthwhile link to their friends, your followers should feel like their lives are improved for having sent your message to others.

No matter your target market or preferred social network, there are a few general posting techniques that can help you attract and keep your audience’s attention.

First and foremost, if you’re writing text, make your posts as short as you can without sacrificing your message.

It may seem like you need a lot of text to get your idea across, but in most cases you’ll lose your readers well before they’ve gotten to the good parts.

Keep things short, and where possible use pictures instead of text to convey information.

Posts with images stand out on your readers’ home feeds and have been proven to increase reader engagement across all types of social media channels.

Conversely, if you’re posting an image or a video on its own, a text caption helps to contextualize the content for your followers.

On many social networks, you can use hashtags to succinctly tie your posts to a larger conversation or encourage your fans to start a new conversation entirely.

In addition, you can tag or @ mention other users or brands in your posts to encourage more interaction.

If you want to include a link in your post, you can make it more reader-friendly by using a link shortener like bit.ly/ or ow.ly/ to minimize the space the URL occupies.

Some networks, such as Facebook, Google+, and LinkedIn, allow you to post a link and an image preview without having to include the actual URL in the text of your post.

The easier you make it for your readers to get all the information you want out of your social media content, the more likely they are to engage with it, follow you, and become a devoted fan.

If you’re using social media to promote your brand, it’s important to know how well your efforts are contributing to your progress, and what to change if it’s not working.

The data that makes the most sense to pay attention to will depend on your business and specific goals on social media, but in general, you can track the demographics of who is seeing and interacting with each of your posts, and the ways in which they interact, from favoriting or commenting to making a purchase on your site.

That may not sound like a lot of data, but it’s enough to reach conclusions about the success of your social media content, and how to improve it in the future.

For example, if your posts generally do well during weekdays, and women tend to interact with your posts in the mornings, a weekday morning is a good time to share a post about a sale on women’s clothing.

When you’re starting to track the progress of a social media endeavor, the easiest places to get information are the built-in tools that each network provides for tracking your page, such as Facebook Insights or the Google+ Page dashboard.

How robust the tools are vary by network, but they all give you the basics.

The best part is that there’s no additional setup; the tools are built-in when you create your account.

You’ll need more advanced tools if you want to want to monitor and compare success on multiple social networks, or track more advanced stats.

Google Analytics can help you track how your social media and other growth efforts are contributing to your overall success, while tools such as Unmetric can provide targeted, detailed insights into how well your posts are doing.

But no matter how advanced your analytics tools, they won’t do you any good if you’re not learning from every post you make.

Experiment with the time, style, language, and type of posts you’re making, and try new things constantly.

But as any business that has ever paid to spread their message will tell you, not everyone’s attention is equally valuable.

Individuals using social media, however, are perfectly suited for targeting.

They maintain digital, self-curated profiles to share who they are, what they like, and how they feel.

Businesses can use this information via both free and paid channels.

With no budget, a brand or business can seek out or create discussions and community-based blogs focused on a particular product, industry, or topic.

Active participants in these conversations will often be the agents that you are hoping to attract.

Through paid channels, businesses can direct ads to users based on the information contained within their individual profiles.

The criteria for these social ads can be so specific that an otherwise elusive target market becomes suddenly within reach.

Personal social media profiles have armed marketers with the ammunition needed to reach the perfect customer at the lowest possible price.

Now you just have to use it to your benefit.

Making your ideas known to the world has never been easier.

Posts you make on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, or LinkedIn could be seen by millions of people, and anything you post online will be in the cloud somewhere forever.

This means that if you post something you shouldn’t have, even if there aren’t any consequences now, it could come back to haunt you in the future.

When posting anything online, the most important thing is to use common sense; remember that social media posts are highly visible, and can quickly blow up into a media frenzy.

If something you’re about to publish might reflect poorly on you later, even if it’s seemingly anonymous or just a joke, it’s probably best to hold off, or rephrase what you’re about to say.

Respecting your audience will go a long way.

Profanity, insults, or inappropriate material are most likely to become a lightning rod for criticism.

Be thoughtful and considerate.

Be especially cautious when discussing potentially controversial topics like religion, politics, or current events.

If someone responds negatively to your post, always be respectful and sincere in your response, even if they disagree with you.

If you are feeling emotional about a topic, give yourself a cooling-off period; posting in haste might make you say something you regret later.

Like it or not, things you post online will reflect on any group you associate yourself with, whether that’s your employer, your school, or even your family.

Consider the consequences your post will have on the people and organizations you’re connected to.

And remember that just because you haven’t identified yourself as an employee of your company on Twitter, it doesn’t mean someone can’t do a quick search to find your LinkedIn page or company profile.

Lastly, be mindful of the privacy implications= your post will have.

Publishing any type of personal information, whether it’s about you or someone else, can easily come back to bite you in the form of things like identity theft or personal attacks.

While it’s often tempting to post for posting’s sake, remember that the repercussions could far outweigh the benefits, and you should always use caution when posting online.

One of the most effective ways to develop your brand’s presence on social media is to ask people who believe in you to publicly advocate for your brand; they’re commonly called brand influencers, ambassadors, or advocates.

If you find that you have a particularly active or notable customer, courting them to become an influencer can be a huge boost to your brand.

Influencers are effective because of the faith consumers have in them.

If an expert, public figure, or someone they trust vouches for a product, a consumer is far more likely to buy it, and the best influencers achieve this on a massive scale.

Finding influencers can be as simple as checking internally to find your most active users.

You can also use external tools to track mentions to locate potential influencers, or just ask existing fans; for example, in a social media campaign called The Fiesta Movement, Ford actively recruited everyday people to borrow and vlog about their Fiesta line of cars, to great effect.

It may seem like all that matters is the number of people an influencer is able to reach, but that’s actually less important than how convincing they are to their audience.

A celebrity tweeting once about your brand may garner attention briefly, but several posts from someone who is less notable but has relevant expertise or is truly passionate about your brand will be more effective over time.

Once you’ve found a potential influencer, reach out with a specific plan for what you’d like them to do, and how they’ll be compensated.

They could guest post on your blog in exchange for a link to their site, post a video review in exchange for a product sample, or something else entirely; just make sure it’s a channel that makes sense for your influencer.

The best influencer relationships are ongoing, with your influencer continuing to do outreach on your behalf; so, if the relationship clicks, try to work out a long-term deal.

And remember that influencers are people, too: periodically check in to see how they’re doing, share something they’re interested in, or ask if there’s anything they need.

A/B or split testing should be an integral part of any social media strategy because it’s one of the most reliable methods of identifying what works and what doesn’t in a campaign.

As with split testing a marketing email or website page layout, optimizing social media content involves publishing two different variations of a post to see which one performs best.

Split testing can help a brand conclude the best time to post, type of multimedia content to use, post length, and call to action, among others.

Note that the most important variables to test and results to monitor are those that are relevant to the brand’s overall social media strategy.

For example, testing a call-to-action that invites comments is best to drive engagement, while one that compels people to click a link is better to increase site visits.

To evaluate the results of tests, brands use tools built into social networks, like Facebook Insights, to quickly gather data about how posts performed.

Additionally, external social media management tools can provide more specialized information, such as how well particular messages or strategies work on different platforms.

One danger with split testing on social media is that repeated exposure to a post or type of post can create fatigue among an audience, so that engagement decreases for later variants of the same message.

To solve this problem, platforms like LinkedIn and Facebook can segment audiences so that each audience member only sees one version of a post.

Facebook’s Dark Posts feature is particularly powerful; since dark posts appear only on the targeted audience’s home feed and not on a brand’s Page, brands are able to test posts until they are perfect before widely sharing.

A hashtag is a word or phrase preceded by a pound sign; hashtags allow social media users to link their posts to a popular topic or to provide additional context.

Though hashtags can now be used on most popular social networks, including Facebook, Google+, Instagram, Vine, and YouTube, they originated on Twitter in 2007.

Like many early Twitter developments including replies and @mentions, hashtags were first adopted and used by Twitter members before they became officially supported by Twitter itself.

Now, all supported networks automatically turn hashtags in a post into clickable links that show all posts containing that hashtag, so users can quickly see what others are saying.

Twitter and other networks allows brands to track the most popular hashtags right now, so that they can participate in the discussion about a current event or topic like the #Oscars or #throwbackthursday.

Before participating in a trending topic, brands should make sure to understand the context behind the hashtag: Kenneth Cole got in trouble in 2011 for using Egypt in a promotional tweet, which was trending because of the ongoing civil unrest there.

A common and effective way for brands to start conversations is to create their own hashtag that pertains to their product or advertising campaign, and thereby encourage users to either directly or indirectly discuss the brand: Edge Shave Gel got people talking in 2010 with the hashtag #soirritating, while a 2014 Super Bowl commercial by Esurance encouraged people to enter a $1.5 million dollar giveaway by using the hashtag #esurancesave30.

Overall, 57% of commercials that aired during the Super Bowl in 2014 contained hashtags, and the most popular ones were thematically related to the commercial topic, rather than simply the name of the brand.

Be careful when creating your hashtag, though; they sometimes take on a life that their creators can’t control, as with McDonald’s #McDstories in 2012.

There are a variety of third-party tools that can make your experience running a social media campaign easier and more effective.

Some social networks allow you to schedule posts in advance, but third-party clients like Hootsuite and Sprout Social come with more sophisticated options, like uploading multiple posts in bulk or auto-posting at times when your audience is most active.

Scheduling posts in advance is convenient, and can help you test when posts on social media get the most views or highest engagement.

Other third-party tools can enhance the appearance of your posts so they attract as much attention as possible from your audience.

Brands use photo editing tools like PicJointer to modify images in ways beyond the capabilities of regular social media apps, such creating a collage or adding a frame.

Some apps, like PicPlayPost, do the same for video as well.

Infographics are another popular tool to convey data and spread brand awareness, and tools such as info.gram and Easel.ly make creating them a snap.

In addition to maximizing individual post performance, tracking how your brand pages are doing over time will help you determine whether your social media plan is working, or if changes in strategy are necessary.

Twitter and other networks provide in-house analytics that can give you an idea of who your followers are, but Hootsuite’s tools provide a more detailed analysis, such as how individual posts influence your account’s popularity.

Alternatively, dedicated analytics apps like Moz can provide powerful analytics for all your marketing efforts, not just those on social media.

Many organizations have made their reputations by contributing valuable, honest, and consistent content to their social feeds.

But many others have damaged their brand in the eyes of customers and prospects by posting insensitive or inaccurate comments that fail to meet the organization’s ideals.

To protect your reputation, your first step should be to create social media guidelines for yourself and your employees.

This will ensure that all messaging is in line with the company’s brand and mission.

First, your policy should clearly outline what social media is, why it’s important to the organization, and the risks involved in using it.

It should be clear that posting questionable content on social channels can have serious consequences including termination and lawsuits.

Second, the policy should seek to protect the company itself because the employees are agents of the company.

This typically includes a social media code of conduct to make sure the brand is upheld.

Next, depending on the organization’s social media presence, the policy can include more specific guidelines pertaining to the moderation and response work flow of comments left on company blogs and other feeds, such as Twitter.

Your policy should also encourage honest, well-written and error-free copy.

A single typo or inaccurate statement can become fodder for trolls to ridicule your organization.

Finally, policies also typically include information on disclosure and citations ensuring that credit is always given where appropriate.

If it applies to your organization, the policy should make clear whether there are any distinctions between the two primary communication sources.

The first are the accounts managed and linked directly to the brand itself, and the second are employee accounts which, when used for work, typically include the brand name as well.

Taking these precautions will help your reap the benefits of social media without sacrificing your organization’s hard-fought reputation.

Consistency is an overlooked virtue when establishing your business’ social media presence.

Customers and prospects should feel that they are interacting with one brand, not many different departments.

A huge part of this consistency is creating a design strategy that applies across multiple feeds and profiles.

Whenever possible, your social media pages should reflect the design of your website.

The easiest way to achieve consistency is to use the same avatar and color palette across every channel that you choose to engage.

The design of a social media page also needs to reflect its function.

Otherwise, you create a disconnect between the message you want to transmit and the one the customer is receiving.

For example, If you want to capture someone’s information, be sure to have an e-mail capture form or a Facebook Connect button somewhere on the page.

Setting one or two main goals for each of your feeds will help you avoid cluttering them with features, and instead keep your design clean and functional.

It’s easier than it ever has been to share and distribute files online.

However, what is and is not legal or acceptable when sharing a news article, website, song, or video can be murky, and you can get in a lot of hot water if you share inappropriately.

When dealing with copyrighted materials online, there are a few best practices to consider.

First, when you’re representing your company online, you should always err on the side of caution, because the consequences for a publicly-known company are likely to be far worse than for a private individual.

Anything marked “all rights reserved” is definitely off limits, whereas you should be OK sharing content that the creator has given you permission to reproduce, that is in the public domain, or that has a “Creative Commons” license.

“Creative Commons” is a license that many content creators choose in lieu of traditional copyright to make it easier to share their work.

And there are several good websites to help you find content that you can share freely and even modify.

Whenever you post a piece of text, an image, or anything else you did not create yourself on social media, make sure to give credit to the person who made it.

If you’re linking directly to a piece of content, most social media sites will include the link and additional context for you.

In other cases, like when writing a blog post, you may have to add a caption to indicate where you found something you’re sharing.

It’s polite to give credit to the person who showed you the content by tagging them, but always make sure to also give credit to the original creator.

If you’re not sure of the original source, do your best to find it, and, at the very least, note that you don’t know the item’s origin.

Infringing copyrights can have big consequences, especially if you’re posting in an official capacity, like your company blog.

Even if you have noble intentions, not properly citing things you post online may get you accused of plagiarism, which can call the integrity of other things you’ve posted into question, get you fired, or even result in legal action.

Besides keeping you on the right side of the law, crediting your source also allows the people with whom you are sharing to see the context and draw their own conclusions so that everyone involved can have a more valuable discussion.