Eye Contact
In the past month or so, I’ve delivered several seminars on the topic of social media and personal branding to a variety of groups. During the sessions we usually have a healthy discussion about respect, and how we need to pay attention to how we treat each other, both on and offline. I am always impressed when students comment on how we have lost our social skills because of social media. That’s the moment I know there is hope for future generations!
I have heard some say that without face-to-face communication, it’s more difficult to respect someone as there is still a feeling we can “hide” behind our computers. I even ran across this article the other day, “Growing social media influence damaging our generation,” written by a University of Wisconsin, Madison student. This also gives me hope that young adults, as much as they love their phones and tablets, still crave eye contact and recognize the importance of in-person conversations.
Here’s another article from Inc. Magazine talking about The Lost Art of Eye Contact. As much as I am fascinated by all of the possibilities to connect with people online, and from all over the world, I remain convinced that we need to work just as much on our relationships offline and eyeball to eyeball as we do cultivating connections through technology. What are your thoughts?
Social Media & Athletic Recruitment
A big THANK YOU to all of the participants in the February 12th “The Role of Social Media in College Athletic Recruitment” event. I’m pictured here with speaker and Longboard Marketing Partner, Randy Rovegno as well as Terrence Griffin of L.E.A.D. and Lincoln High School Athletes. These student-athletes walked away with a different mindset and approach to social media after hearing from NCSA Recruitment Professional, Carmen Bucci, San Diego Hall of Champion’s Jesse Lovejoy, Sports Illustrated Senior Writer, Jim Trotter, Randy Rovegno and myself.
The coaches, parents and athletes received lots of information about the recruitment process and how to take advantage of social media to boost your image. It was a wonderful evening and I wanted to thank everyone again for all of your insight and expertise and lively discussion. Stay tuned for more social media for student-athlete sessions soon!
2013 – They Year of Social Reputation
“Everything you do online is like a tattoo you get late at night that can never be erased.”
This is a perfect analogy for what is happening in the world of social media. We forget that the drunk photos, snarky comments and threatening tweets remain “out there” forever once we’ve offered them to the internet. NOW is the time to take care of what you say, how you say it and what you post online.
I read a tweet just the other day which said, “Now that I’m getting to the business end of my PhD, I think it’s about time I bulk up my LinkedIn profile.” Why wait? You should worry about your online profile, your social reputation NOW. The hiring managers, recruitment officers and admissions offices do not care that you’ve been too busy to manage your reputation.
You’ll see many more articles about social reputations helping and/or hurting individuals and companies in 2013. My goal is to keep you informed as to how best to use social media to build your personal and professional brands, develop strategic communication and plan your content to stay ahead of the competition. Allow these social sites to work in your favor, not be your demise. Together, let’s make 2013 a late night tattoo-free year.
Just for fun, here’s a link to and MSN article – 30 Bad Tattoos. Warning. These are REALLY bad.
http://now.msn.com/bad-tattoos-30-photos-of-the-worlds-worst-inkings
Facebook 101 at City Club
For those of you who are City Club Members or are a friend of a Member and can score yourself an invitation, please note that I will be providing a social media session on Friday, January 18th from 11:30am – 1:00pm. The first topic of this session is: FACEBOOK 101. Here’s a bit more in the flyer. I hope you’ll join us!
Facebook 101 City Club (You can click here to print the PDF)
Social Media – 2012 in Review
What were the biggest stories in social media and communication this year? Plenty to choose from. We saw theemergence of Pinterest, which in a few short months went from a hobbyist site to a major player and one that individuals and brands now develop strategies around. Facebook bought Instagram for a cool 1 billion dollars. In just the past few days,Instagram’s new privacy policy highlighted just how much we mistrust Facebook. It has truly become the network we love to hate, and the one we are not even close to cutting loose. LinkedIn revamped it’s site and added many user-friendly features. And it’s not surprise that with the popularity of Twitter, that the platform reached 200 million users this year.
But the rise of visual social media is key, in that we saw that more people want to look at video and photos versus reading blog posts. Even tweets, at 140 characters are too long to hold our attention. I suspect we will see visual apps rise in popularity in 2013, based on the significance gained this year.
Social media has also infiltrated the hiring process with 92% of employers using social media to find talent. That’s a staggering number, but what’s even more significant is the number of hiring managers who use social media for candidate background checks. These trends are leading us to believe that our online reputation will grow to act more as our social currency in what some have called The Reputation Economy.
In terms of sports, we’ve seen Major League Baseball establisha fan cave and social media nights in most ball parks. The NFL allowed players to tweet live during the Pro Bowl. The LA Kingscontinue to set standards for sports brands. And athletic programs across the nation struggled to keep their student-athletes in-line, as many teams and players landed in hot water for inappropriate tweets or posts. My work of providing social media and reputation management education, could not have come at a better time!
What was evident this year is that no matter what people may say about Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTube, Instagram, Tumblr, Google+ and more, social media will only continue to evolve. It certainly will not disappear. With more people integrating these networks into their daily lives, it’s no wonder brands and businesses are scrambling to find ways to reach out to customers and even urging their top executives to start tweeting.
Amidst all of this, I find myself working to help people and businesses better communicate with you. My goal is to infuse communication with positivity and purpose. Positivity, because goodness knows we need to receive more uplifting messages against the negativity that seems to be ever-present in the media today. And Purpose, because I want people to really think about what we say to each other. If there is no point in sharing that photo, making that comment or sending that tweet, then why do it? Why? It’s a question we should ask ourselves more often, and one which was not asked enough in 2012.
We learned a lot in 2012 about the limits and boundaries of social networks and what we need to do to encourage more meaningful interaction online…communication that will nurture your reputation and allow you to build a strong network of stellar people. I can only imagine what will happen in 2013. Buckle up!
Update Your Twitter Profile Images
One of my go-to sites, The Next Web, which is a great online and social media resource, posted THIS article about updating Twitter profiles. It’s a clever little tutorial that shows you how to update your background, header and profile images. It seems it was needed, as many celebrities, athletes, brands, teams – you – have yet to take advantage of what I like to call, social “real estate.”
I cannot get over how few high profile individuals and brands have updated their Twitter profiles to include the new header image. There is a lot of room for creativity here!. Two athletes I wish would update their profiles? Hello @TimTebow, and Apolo Anton Ohno! I’m surprised at Apolo who is normally very socially savvy. Here are the few athletes, celebrities and brands I did find who have made great use of the header image. They’re all linked, so click away to view their profiles…
ATHLETES
@FranklinMissy USA Olympic Swimmer
@LarryFitzgerlad NFL, Arizona Cardinals
@karrileewalsh USA Olympic Volleyball 
@Matt Barkley USC Quarterback
@NastiaLiukin USA Olympic Gymnast
ATHLETIC DEPARTMENTS
@HarvardCrimson The background is fan-centric, the header image is seasonal and the profile image is simply their logo. But it all works well together.
@BaylorAthletics Love the use of the header image to point to other social sites.
@UWAthletics Nice motto to go along with that bio and images! Background images features coaches – Sweet!
@TechAthletics Simple but effective. Lots of red!
@Brutus_Bukeye Great use of Mascot as official account and answers the question, “What IS a buckeye, anyway?”
ATHLETIC BRANDS
@BrooklynNets (I’m not sure I love this one, except that it is consistent.)
CELEBRITIES (Hard to find celebs who have updated!)
@RyanSeacrest (Probably the best of all with the most thought put into it.) 
@richardbranson ( i suppose he’s a celeb too!)
@MariahCarey (I don’t love her so much, but her Twitter profile looks cool)
When people find you on Twitter, your background and header image can help you make a good first impression. Here’s some ideas for different individual use of the header image:
Student-Athletes: You can use your header image as a rotating billboard to promote yourself. Try posting your team’s stats or your batting average or that you got an A in chemistry. Post a team photo or one of you in action. You have to be strategic about your photo here.
Students: You might use the header image to highlight what is important in your life. You can put up a photo of your family or beloved pet, maybe your group of friends at the beach or all dressed up at the school dance. College students might post a photo of yourself at a famous spot on campus. Your header image can match your Facebook cover photo so that you present a well thought-out personal brand.
Coaches: Throw up an old photo of you when you were in the pros or in college. Current and prospective players will get a kick out of it, but it also gives a hint of your story. Get the athletic department to help you with a graphic that has your team schedule for the month. Spotlight any of your team members who make Athlete of the Month or achieve other awards. This shows you are focus on your players’ personal achievements, too.
Brands: You have so much opportunity here. Highlight your product. Give some face time to the hard-working employees who make your company a success. Give a shoutout to your favorite customers. Take a pointer from @BaylorAthletics and give your followers reason to click on another social site.
Professionals: Here’s a chance to tell people what you are all about. Are you artistic and creative? Do you love sports? Are you musically inclined? Do you love inspirational messages? Take this opportunity to showcase the best of you so that when that hiring manager or prospective client find you on Twitter, they are WOW-ed the moment they land on your page. (Writing this blog post actually inspired me to do more with my background and header images – even without fancy software, I can create something nice. My current photos are part of my brand design, but the backgrounds are too busy.)
Many social sites, like Twitter, continue to add features to improve the user experience and provide opportunities for visual appeal. It’s easy to understand from first glance who you are and what matters to you when someone sees your Twitter profile. Give them something great to look at and something that will drive their attention to what you are tweeting. If you see a great Twitter header image, leave a note in the comments so we can all see! Now watch this video and then take advantage of the image “real estate” on Twitter – Make it work in your favor!
LinkedIn Updates
LinkedIn has made several upgrades lately. Have you noticed? Not only has LinkedIn changed the total design and function of the website, but they have been adding more features over the past few months in order to make the site more interactive. Here’s a few of the big updates to note:
LinkedIn Today
When you land on the page, you’ll automatically see the news feed. This is similar to your Facebook Timeline or Twitter feed. You’ll see the header above the feed called “LinkedIn Today” which entices you to click on various news pieces and share articles with your connections. This is so that we can enjoy a more interesting feed than Sally Smith is now connected to Joe Jones.
Once you click “LinkedIn Today” you’ll be taken to a magazine layout of news articles for your perusal. World news and business articles await your discovery. It’s a great resource to share on LinkedIn and your other social sites, too.
Follow
You’ll notice that you can now “follow” business and thought leaders who write articles just for the LinkedIn audience. It’s tough to get directly to the list, though. There is no ability to click from the menu. There is no section on the sidebar. I think I discovered this feature because it showed up in my news feed. I went to the LinkedIn Help Page and found this comment:
Visit http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/whoToFollow to see the initial list of thought leaders who can be followed. Currently, only a small, hand-picked set of thought leaders can be followed from their LinkedIn profiles.
Not so user-friendly, but once you do land on this main page, you are treated to a wonderful list of influencers.
Follow the people you want to have show up in your news feed or just browse through the articles on offer. Underneath the header, you can click on the word “Following” to manage who you already follow. I’m not quite sure why LinkedIn would make it so difficult to get to this page. Great feature, but not completely thought out.
Endorsements
One of the features recently added was “Skills.” LinkedIn did this to assist college graduates who perhaps don’t yet have the work experience to fill out a resume. In addition, they now allow you to “Endorse” those skills for any of your connections. Have you noticed that when you view a profile, this box appears to encourage you to endorse specific skills?
This is a nice feature which somewhat replaces “Recommendations.” Previously, you had to ask for people to recommend you, and it was a letter your contact had to write on your behalf. That feature is still available, but now they can go into your profile and just click on the skills they want to endorse. This saves time and is very user-friendly. It also gives greater opportunity for your contacts to endorse you without a request.
Make sure you take the time to add skills to your profile. This will help you get found when hiring managers are doing searches. On top of that, take a moment to go through your contacts and endorse their skills. Perhaps you are working on a project with someone … give them a boost on LinkedIn. If you get off the phone with a business contact, head to LinkedIn and endorse some of their skills. In order to play nice on LinkedIn, it’s a good idea to take a look at who has endorsed some of your skills and then go onto their profile and endorse them right back. Good professional karma.
New Profile
Finally, LinkedIn is rolling out new profile designs. I’ve requested mine, but have not yet received the upgrade. So stay tuned for more information soon.
I would love to hear what features you are enjoying most on the re-vamped LinkedIn. Are these new features making the site easier to use? Are there certain features that are helping you do business better or increasing your contact base? Please share with me. I’m happy to provide updates on my blog or in next month’s newsletter.
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