7 Tips for Becoming “Social Media” Smart

Ready to advance your career?
Social media is a remarkable tool that can accelerate your reputation, credibility and personal brand to help you build a name for yourself for the services, knowledge, and value that you have to offer.

But social media can be a double-edged sword. If you're thinking about ways to leverage Facebook, Twitter and the all-important professional tool, LinkedIn for the advancement of your career, you'll need to keep in mind that you must present a professional appearance in line with your intended personal branding persona.

Below are seven super easy tips to help you navigate the confusing social media maze to advance your career.

How do you see yourself? Be sure your public image is in concert with your personal image. Not only will your audience and intended customers or clients appreciate an authentic voice, but it's easier to be genuine when you use your own voice in articles, blogs, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

This does not mean being so informal that you don't sound professional. Strike a balance, always keeping in mind that the world is watching. What do you want the world to see?

2. Personal Branding – Name Your “Product”

What are you selling, offering or providing for your intended audience? In other words, what is your product? Whether you're using social media to offer a skill or talent you have and are looking for clients, or you're seeking a career-oriented position, be relentlessly clear about two things:

a. Your niche or your discipline; and

b. Your experience and expertise in your chosen field.

3. Network, Network, Network!
After mulling things over and deciding how you’d like to position yourself, it's time to begin serious networking. Put up your professional looking and sounding self-named Facebook page, LinkedIn page and Twitter account. Blog on your topic and offer to guest blog on peer blogs and subject related blogs.

Write timely and relevant articles on your subject matter and get them up on the many available ezines. One exciting consideration is that you can take your inspired writing from your blogs and turn it into helpful and interesting articles.
Be sure not to just copy and paste, though, as reputable ezines are looking for original writing and will reject copied text (yes, even if it's your own). Make it unique the first time, and get your presence known.
There are a few great resources online for finding ezines to write for, such as the ezine directories at BestEzine, or FindEzines. These sites are broken up into different topics and niches, so you’re able to find your specific topic within minutes!
5. Upload Your Resume
If you're looking for a career position, you'll want to upload your resume. But even if your intention is to sell your product or a service you provide, there's no reason not to have a resume up on the numerous available resume websites and job boards. It's great free exposure. Narrow your resume to the precise area you are working in to assure that you get the responses you most hope to receive.
There are quite a few sites that are definitely worthwhile to upload your resume to. Try using CareerBuilder or Monster. They’re incredibly easy to use, and are relatively well known, so many prospective employers are likely to stumble across your resume.
6. Linking Up

Be sure to link your various social media and your internet sites to one another. Leave a trail of big, fat bread crumbs that will infallibly lead your potential customer, client or employer to you.
When you consider having “everything about you” transparently available to the world, it becomes clear that your presentation must be consistent. A profile of a fun party girl on Facebook may not jibe with the responsible word smith you present yourself to be on LinkedIn. It's fine to be more casual on Facebook, but don't let the difference seem incongruous.
7. Do Unto Others As You Would Have Them Do Unto You
This last tip may well be the most important – help others get to their destination when you have the opportunity. The miraculous aspect of the internet is that it has put virtually unlimited power in our hands. Use this force for good!
Call it Karma, paying it forward, or simply, the right thing to do. In any case, there are stunning examples of the power of this approach. Take, for example, John Locke, the first self-published author to sell a million eBooks on Amazon. What's relevant to the subject is his social media model, and the wise individual will borrow from it. He is generous in his praise of other authors and tirelessly tells his followers to check out the web pages and the books of other authors.
Generosity returns in kind, and multiplies on its return. 🙂
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Written by James Adams, guest blogger for CareerCoaching360.com. If you ever need to find printer cartridges online, just ask James. He is an employee of a British supplier of printer cartridges and spends most of his time blogging for the website, or keeping it updated. He’s recently been busy with keeping track of all the HP laser cartridges but still finds time to write guest articles.
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