Your social media footprint

Social Media now has a bigger impact than ever on people both getting and losing jobs. Although this should be a personal space, more employers are looking to social media to get a feel of their employees and applicants. The amount off accountability has increased significantly and even things you post within your personal capacity can be negatively held against you.

Your social media footprint is any information that can be found about you online. It is the trail that is left behind every time you get tagged in a Flickr photo, upload a photo on Instagram, check in on Foursquare, tweet on Twitter, share anything on Facebook, pin on Pinterest, publish videos on YouTube, add jobs and education info on LinkedIn.

This phenomenon is not just about what happens on the internet. It allows you to present an image of how you would like the world to perceive you at first glance. Google yourself. Do you like what you see?

Being the mobile generation, there is no place cheaper and easier to build a brand for yourself than a social platform. Get connected and increase your networking. Stay active on the net, it increases your reachability.

Your profile picture is a first impression. Make sure that it is presentable. Chose a platform that is suited for you so that it can be easily maintained. The last thing you need is to build an audience and then leave them wondering. Engage with your audience and be consistent with your updates. Keep your content interesting and add a touch of personal. The more content you create the more likely it is to fall into the right hands.

I personally love the twitter platform. It is available on any smartphone and is quite cost effective on data. It feels great to tweet and get feedback from the biggest names in the industry and see that there are people who agree with your opinions. There is also a vast range of available information to me that I would otherwise not be able to get and many of the issues are often summarized so that I can get the core of it. A quick tip I can give is be careful not to be too personal and never respond when you’re emotional.

It is important that you take interest in your field of study and gather as much information about the industry before you get in it. Not only does this make you more knowledgeable but the evidence of you doing so makes you marketable to potential employers.

Don’t wait until it is too late to start your connections in the industry. The brand you build for yourself could be the one factor that uniquely identifies from the rest. Get social!