KomodoPR PR london agency

Are you being professional, if you’re connecting with business colleagues on a ‘social’ networking site? Is it appropriate to be sociable on a ‘professional’ networking site? The lines are getting blurry, as we increasingly live out our personal and professional lives through online communities.

There seem to be three types of networkers: 1) The ‘dabblers’ who belong to several networks, but only engage with one or two – if any; 2) the ‘loyals’ who usually belong to, and leverage, only one network; and 3) the SMS (Social Media Socialites) who constantly update and sync all of their networking sites’ status updates, so everyone knows what they are doing at all times – and they use applications, such as LinkedIn’s Tripit.

The question to ask yourself is ‘what do you want to gain from your networking?’ If you’re only interested in keeping up with your friends and showing off your cute kids and pets, then the likes of LinkedIn are probably not for you. Having said that, many businesses, organisations and political parties have made ‘social’ networking sites work to their advantage. The Obama campaigners were pros at this, which even won them Advertising Age’s marketer of the year award.  

Professional networking, if approached strategically, can help you achieve your career/business goals and net you serious gains. Make it work for you.

Some useful tips:

Engage with the site and with your connections. Recommend people, ask to be recommended and ask to be introduced, if one of your connections knows someone you’d like to know.

Complete your full profile and keep it updated and user-friendly. It’s amazing how many people just fill out name, title and email address.

Consider your Profile Pic. You should definitely have one. However, if you are trying to sell your professional self, it’s probably not wise to post a photo of yourself on the beach, clearly having had too many beers or umbrella drinks.

Think about how many sites you belong to, how often you are updating and what your updates say. Most of the people you need to/want to connect with are on one site you are on. Also, if you’re syncing them all, do you think that your professional connections care whether you are taking out your recycling? They also may wonder when you ever get any work done, if you are updating every hour.

Remember who’s in your network. We’ve probably all seen the articles about the woman who wrote an inflammatory status update on Facebook, regarding her boss, forgetting that said boss was in her network of ‘friends’. Not surprisingly, she was publicly fired and humiliated on Facebook by her boss.

Be secure. Check your security and privacy settings, and ensure that only those you want to engage with you, can.

Finally: Unless you’re a ‘loyal’, there will always be crossover with connections on your professional and social networking sites, so never post anything on any of your networking sites that you wouldn’t show your parents, your boss or your client…and that you’re not prepared to have live forever in cyberspace.

Happy Networking!

Zena Martin, Senior Advisor, Komodo PR