6 Ways Social Networking Can Help Your Career

You might think that the adage ‘it is not what you know, but who you know’ is outdated. The problem is that it is not true. There are still plenty of indicators that social mobility has not actually changed and a great part of your social mobility is who you know.

Fortunately, there is a way to very much expand who you have to access to and that, as you probably guessed, is by being on the right social networks and knowing how to use them correctly. That is how you go from finding a job to building a career.

So how to do that? Well, read on and you will find out!

Scrub them

The first thing that you absolutely need to do is go through your social media and scrub it off all negative mention. That means untag yourself in the party shots, not using ridiculous images as your profile pictures and – yes – get rid of any shots where you complained about where you are working or even where you used to work.

This is vital, because when you are active on social media, these pictures will eventually pop up and thereby eliminate any chances you might have had of landing that job you were really hoping for.

Focus your efforts

Some people think that ‘more is better’. That is not the case in social media. The only things you will achieve with that strategy is to make people believe you spent too much time on social media and certainly people will not actually find the most flattering things about you.

So instead, you should focus on the right networks. What are the right networks? Well, if you are trying to get ahead in the business world then you should probably have a LinkedIn account. That is where everybody that is serious about using their social media to find a good job.

Use your actual name

Also, on those networks where you actually want your future employer to find you, you need to make sure that you are actually using your real name. It is not just because that makes it easy for people to find you (though that is a big part) but also because if you are not using your real name, some people will assume that you have got something to hide.

Do not let them think that!

Of course, if there is some network that you do not want them to find, then it is perfectly fine that you use a pseudonym. Just make sure that they definitely can not find it via linking it to your real name on some website, or other. The internet is great at sniffing out those kinds of connections.

Work on your personal branding

Personal branding used to be a phrase for presidential candidates and movie stars. That is not true anymore. Nowadays, we all have digital footprints and it is important that we manage them. That is where personal branding appears.

So what is personal branding? It is where you hone your image with your strong points and create enough noise with those strong points, to push the weak points (or the negative points of view) further down and away from where people might find it.

Don’t know how to do all this? Then check out this list of top writing websites to see where to get the help.

Create a portfolio or curriculum vitae

Another important thing you need to do is to create a place online where people can find out more about you. Generally, the best thing to do is create a website. That is not so hard nowadays.

Then you can point all your social media platforms to this central location, which you can then update and modify as your experience grows and changes.

Why do this? Well, because when people search for you, this is far more likely to pop up than anything else. Also, it means that instead of having to update ten thousand profiles (okay, slight exaggeration) you only have to update only one website that everything points to.

Connect

Of course, none of this will help you if the people who are master can not actually find you. For that reason, make sure that you connect to the people who actually are masters in your industry. Reach out and talk to them, you eventually need to add them to your network.

Why do this and not just get their emails? Because with an email you have only got a connection to that person, while if you connect to them on social media you will also have access to their networks.

Now, realize that the best way to connect is not necessarily straight through social media. In fact, face to face is far more effective in general as it will significantly raise the chance that they remember you. Keep in mind that once you have connected to them in the real life, make sure you add these people to your social media network. In that way, one new connection can potentially give you access to hundreds if not thousands of useful contacts.

Last words

Did you know that spies hate social media? Why?The reason is that makes it far harder for them to build fake personalities. Moreover, social media takes the time to build up and spies often do not have much time to build up a new identity.

Why am I telling you this? Because it takes the time for you to build up a useful social media profile as well. Do not think that just one afternoon is enough. You have got to keep working at it to be effective. The more hours you stick in, the more rewarding each additional hour will be, as it will raise your profile, get you access to more important networks and boost your career.