Let me tell you where I stand – I am very reluctant to connect with someone who does not include a picture. I am active on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Friendfeed, YouTube, Plaxo and a number of other sites. You will find my mug on every site that asks for it. My feeling is the more information one provides, the better.

Although I have not read every comment in the photo debate – who has the time – those taking the time to write something seem to be split 50-50 on the question. What amazes me is that people are writing fairly long posts on the issue. Of course, like most of these discussions, it wanders off course and ends up being filled with invective.

As an aside, I am continually amazed how people are willing to say things on the ‘Net that they would never say to a person’s face. Someone needs to write an “Emily Post” for the web.

Getting back to my main point, providing as much information about yourself and company is extremely important. Let me count the ways:

• A company that would like to do business is going to do its homework. That means they are going to gather as much information as possible about your business. Make it easy for them. It is human nature to favor the easiest path. If you make them search too much, they are going to look at some other company.
• The same goes for those of you looking for a job. The last statistic I saw showed that 85 percent of human resources people go to LinkedIn first. Besides making it easier, the more information you provide, the better. When things are missing, those make hiring tend to get suspicious.
  • A note about running pictures for those job seekers who, like me, are aging. I have heard the argument that we have a better chance with hiring managers if they don’t see our picture. So what are you going to do when you go to the interview? From your resume alone they are going to figure out how old you are. To me, it is a form of lying not to include a picture.
• The more information provided, the higher your company’s search ranking. That is, of course, if you provide the information with SEO in mind. Of course, you want that higher ranking so more people can find your business.

Now I know many people argue that won’t provide some information because of the fear of identity theft. Well, unfortunately, an identity thief doesn’t need your online profile. There is so much information floating around out there about all of us that it is impossible to keep much things secret anymore.

Of course, no one should post such things as their birthday. That’s just common sense. But one of the things you give up when you go on the Web is a lot of your privacy. It is just world we live in.

So lean into it and post that picture and all the other information. It is going to help much more than it will hurt.

Granted, it would be better if those residents of the C-Suite had a guide who knew how to lead them throw the social media jungle. Obviously I think social media is the best marketing tool to come along since traveling medicine shows. Both relied on word-of-mouth to sell their products. One was and one is highly effective.

While those executives should do a better job of searching, I also fault we social media marketers. We are part of the problem. We need to make a better case for what we do. We need to show the skeptical executives that the social media sphere is the best place to be. These are people who are used to “fire and forget” marketing. In their world they tell their marketing people to hire an agency and produce a campaign. The only time an executive sees the campaign is in the final approval process. You have to show them how social media is replacing all of that.

What those executives want is a demonstrated method that is going to drive sales and profits. They want to know what the return-on-investment for the money, time and effort they are going to have to put into social media. They don’t feel any need to tell their friends where they are eating or whether they are leading in some kind of faux friend race.

So what do you do to convince them there they should be parking some of their marketing dollars in social media?

First, let me tell you what I don’t do first. I never show anyone Facebook as a marketing tool in the first meeting. To the average 50ish executive, Facebook is where their children post pictures of their dogs and friends. Plus, they have had their personal people tell them a seemingly good job candidate was rejected because of those pictures from that fraternity party. At best they see no need for Facebook, at worst they see it has a huge waste of time. As I once had an executive tell me: “there is a reason why I do not want to connect with people I knew in high school.”

What I do show them are the facts and figures showing how effective certain kinds of social meeting marketing can be. I also show them examples of companies such as Ford, Zappos, and others that used social media to expand their footprint in their marketplace.

When it comes to specific sites, I usually start off talking about what Linkedin can do for their company. Why Linkedin? Well in the business world it is viewed as the adult Facebook. Most likely the executives you are talking to have a Linkedin profile. They understand how it works and its effectiveness. They know their company has found good candidates for open positions.

In short, they understand how effective Linkedin can be when used properly. It is an easier sell. Not easy, but easier.

The second thing I talk about is blogging. It is a little tougher to sell than Linkedin. Executives usually balk at first when I tell a blog is not a sales document. But when I show how potential clients are drawn to the company’s website by a well-written blog that demonstrates the company’s expertise, the light bulb usually goes on.

From there I move onto YouTube. Watching a video campaign – such as “Will It Blend” shows the effectiveness of using sites such as YouTube. After that comes Twitter, which I describe as a billboard for their company. It is a term they understand.

I also make it clear that it usually takes six months to a year to see the results of a social media campaign. By then, having seen the results of successful campaigns, they get it and are willing to make the investment.

What I just gave you was view from 35,000 feet of my process. Trust me works, but only if you are careful to separate the substantive from the nonsense.

It is no secret right now there are more people looking for jobs than there are jobs to be filled. Job-hunting has become a survival of those able to stand out. These might not have the best qualifications, but they know to market themselves.

Most job hunters also know that LinkedIn is now the place recruiters look first when trying to fill a position. So, people do everything they can to punch up their profiles to make themselves stand out. Job hunters want to be unique, knowing unique is what gets one hired. They also want to use those words and phrases that will make a recruiter jump at the chance to hire them.

However, for a lot of people, they are not as unique as they think they might be.  LinkedIn recently compiled a list of the 10 most overused terms and phrases within the profiles of its 85 million members. Here they are:

1. Extensive experience

2. Innovative

3. Motivated

4. Results-oriented

5. Dynamic

6. Proven track record

7. Team player

8. Fast-paced

9. Problem solver

10. Entrepreneurial

“We wanted to reveal insights that help professionals make better choices about how to position themselves online,” DJ Patil, LinkedIn’s lead data analyst, said in a statement to CNN.

Look, selling yourself is no different than selling a product. Just as potential customers respond better to a unique message, potential employers respond better to a unique profile. Using any of those phrases listed above is the equivalent of saying “this product is the best.”

As we all know, phrases like that accomplish nothing. The same is true of saying you have extensive experience. It just doesn’t work.

Let me put it another way. As many of you may or may not know, I am writing a novel. Because I was news writer for over two decades, I knew I had to change my writing style. So I went to classes at a wonderful place in Milwaukee called Redbird Studios. There I took a course called “Shut Up and Write” taught by Judy Bridges, one of the finest writers I ever worked with.

One of Judy’s most important rules about writing was “show it, don’t say it.”  Basically that means be descriptive. Don’t say your character was breathing hard. Say something such as the character was so winded his lungs couldn’t handle his body’s demands for oxygen.

The same holds true for a profile, a resume or a business pitch. Don’t say you are innovative. Give examples of how you were innovative in your last job. Showing it, not saying it, might be the difference between effectively marketing yourself and seeing your resume placed in the electronic circular file.

Now, if you are a regular reader of this blog, you know I constantly preach about being careful about what you post. I know of companies that require access to a potential employee’s Facebook page, Twitter stream and anything else the person has posted. Do you want a potential employer seeing those pictures of you drinking from a beer bong or making obscene gestures? I also know of companies that have refused to hire a candidate because of something they found on one of those social media sites.

The person I was talking to works in staffing. His company has been very successful in placing employees in many, many companies. He gave me examples of very qualified employees who lost on a job because of one stupid thing they posted. What particularly rankled him is that the post might have been made five years ago. As he rightly pointed out, people change and mature. The person may have changed completely, but is now haunted by something they did five years ago.

He also pointed out all of the information that be gathered about someone can be misinterpreted and misused. For instance, the state of Wisconsin maintains a website known as the Wisconsin Circuit Court Access Program. It is commonly known as CCAP. What it is a list of every infraction committed by Wisconsin residents from speeding tickets to first-degree murder. It also lists divorces and other civil matters. It does not list juvenile offenses.

The staffing guy pointed out that a listing on CCAP can follow someone around for life – even if they were acquitted of the charges. He said most people either don’t read the entire entry, or don’t understand how to read it. So they don’t see that the charges were dropped. Instead, they just assume that the person is a criminal.

He made another point I found salient. If someone did commit a crime, how long do we hold that against them? I agree with that. The point of incarceration is to punish someone first and then to rehabilitate them. So once they have served their sentence and been punished, is it fair to keep punishing them by not hiring them or ostracizing them.

Now mind you, I am not talking about all of those convicted of a crime. There are some offenses are so heinous that those who committed them should never be allowed back in society. I put sex offenders, child molesters and violent criminals in that group. I would also add in those who run large criminal organizations, such as drug dealers.

To me though, it makes sense to hire people who have “paid their debt to society.” You don’t want them committing more crimes do you? That is what they are going to do if they cannot get a legitimate job. Sometimes it is a matter of survival.

The problem is that social media makes it harder for some of those people to come back into society. The information is just too easy to access. Unfortunately too many employees are just too nervous to hire someone who they find might have committed an infraction 10 or 15 years ago. It’s too easy to find that information out now.

Is that fair? I don’t think so. What I think needs to happen is greater education and some redaction of information. I don’t see anything wrong with that, do you?

As I said Monday, every community needs rules. Otherwise, there is anarchy. No one can do anything is a community in that kind of atmosphere. Social media is no different.

So, here are some more divided by the applications I use most:

• So let’s talk about LinkedIn first –
  • If I do not know you, do not ask me to endorse you. I have over 6,000 followers on LinkedIn, all good smart people. But there is no way I will ever know enough about most of these people to provide an endorsement. I enjoy interacting with them, but that’s not a basis for a recommendation.
  • Join some groups on LinkedIn. That’s one of the best parts of the site, connecting with people who have similar interests. Once you are accepted into a group, don’t be a lurker. Comment on discussions and start discussions of your own. It’s how we all learn.
  • Speaking of groups, if I don’t accept your invitation to join a group, it means I don’t want to. Don’t keep sending invitations.
  • If someone sends you an invitation, and you do not want to accept, do not IDK them. Archive the invitation. As I understand it, if a person accumulates enough IDKs they are banned from LinkedIn. So be nice.
  • Now Twitter –
    • No one is saying you have to tweet 30 times a day, but once or twice a day is nice. Why else are you on there if you don’t tweet?
    • Retweet tweets you like. It is just common courtesy, plus it helps spread the word.
    • This is a personal one, but I do not like people who use bots to increase their follower numbers. I have almost 8,500 followers, but I did it organically, one at-a-time. So don’t send me tweets saying you have a program that increases my followers. This is not high school; the person with the most followers doesn’t win.
    • If you post a blog or something else, tweet about once. That tells everyone that it is out there. That’s okay. But only tweet once. Anything more than that is like ringing the doorbell 20 times in a row.
    • Don’t use auto tweets. I was guilty of this myself last year. It is wrong and I stopped doing it. It is just not honest.
    • Do not send me any tweets about multi-level marketing schemes. I don’t believe you and I will never will.
    • Facebook. I admit I have some issues with Facebook. I think there is way too much extraneous stuff on it. Frankly, I think marketing attempts get lost in the thicket of Farmville, Mafia Games and other stuff.
      • Now, I admit I have taken a couple of quizzes on Facebook. But, it was my decision. I do not play Farmville or Mafia games. I worked on a dairy farm as a kid. It is not anything like that game. For one, you do not get manure all over yourself and the cows don’t kick.
      • As for the Mafia Wars game, I covered the Mafia a lot as a reporter. Not a nice group of people, frankly. I hate it when people glamorize a group that killed people. I have never understood the appeal. What’s next, Al Qaeda Wars? So, don’t ask me to play.
      • Do not create a fan page of yourself and then ask others to become your fan. Remember that rule about not thumping your own chest in social media? Well, this is the penultimate example. To me, it is egotistical and narcissistic. You build fans by demonstrating value, not by asking.

I could write an entire blog about the dos and don’ts of blogging. I have been at it for over year. I think I will cover it next week.

Again, if you like or don’t like these rules, please let me know.

Since posting the very popular rant last Wednesday on there being too many social media sites, I have had some requests for a post on what is proper social media etiquette. I wrote on the same subject almost a year ago. Like Emily Post did, I think it is time to update. So, let’s get to it.

• Let’s start at signing up for a site. Think of yourself as being at a party or in a meeting. You would tell people your real name, something about yourself and what you do. It’s no different in social media. So:
  • First, use your real name – not something cute. This is the only way that people are going to know you. If you were hunting for an employee, or hiring someone to perform a service, would you hire “drunkguy05” or “sexxxygirl02?” Plus, if you want to be found, the odds are much better if you use your real name.
  • Second, post a picture of yourself, not your dog, not a pretty sunset, or some weird avatar. People want to know what you look like. Why wouldn’t you post your own picture? You on the run from the law?
  • If you have one, include a link to a blog, another site such as LinkedIn or Facebook. This shows you are a real person. Definitely link to your website if you have one.
  • Include a short bio of yourself. Again, this gives people an idea of who you are.
  • This next rule should be obvious, but people violate it all the time. DO NOT SPAM. If you are joining a site simply to sell me something, go away. That’s not the purpose of social media. I am glad you asked – it is to have a conversation, link with like-minded people and share information. It is not to buy real estate in Goa, or some system that promises me I will get rich working five a hours a week. Or a system that makes me into a spammer. If I get those kind of invitations, I will block you, and I will report you to the site administrators. Of course, that goes double for all of those porn people out there.
  • Once you sign up for a site, it is perfectly acceptable to invite your friends – once. Not six times. As I said last week, if I don’t respond to your invitation, it means I don’t want to join. After the third time, I am going to send you to my spam filter, never to return. And know something about the people you are inviting. As a personal example, I am an Apple; I will never be a PC. So don’t invite me to join Windows Live. It is not going to happen.
  • On that subject, there is quantity versus quality debate in social media. Some experts argue that the idea is to accumulate as many followers as possible. Their thesis goes you want to distribute whatever you are sending out to the widest possible network. The other side it is better to be followed by a 100 people who are influencers in their networks. I come somewhere in the middle. It is up to you to decide. However, this is not high school – the person with the most friends does not win.
  • After you join a site, get active on it. Why else would you join?  That doesn’t mean you have to spend every waking minute posting. But, if you join Twitter, tweet twice a day. If you are Facebook, post an update or two each day. You get the idea. I will not follow anyone who invites me to join a site, but has done nothing there themselves.
  • As part of the above bullet, respond to other people’s post. That’s just good manners. If you want people to respond to what you do, you should have the courtesy to do the same for them.
  • Another thing for you LinkedIn people – unless you know someone personally or have worked closely with them, don’t recommend them. And do not send out blanket requests for recommendations to total strangers. How good could a recommendation be if you nothing about someone? Plus, what if you called by a potential employer who asks you about some stranger you recommended? You are going to look dumb and the odds are very good that the candidate will not get the job.
  • A final note – there is no privacy in social media. Well really, there is no privacy in the Internet Age period. So, if you don’t want people to know something, don’t post it anywhere. Things on the web never really go away. Along those lines, all of you college kids who have those really cool photos of that weekend in Cabo where you took your clothes off and jumped into the ocean – take them down. Many companies will not hire someone if they see such photos. Yeah, it is not fair, but that’s the way it is.



The latest statistics from the U.S. Department of Labor estimate the current unemployment rate at 9.7 percent. That’s 9.3 million people who are unemployed. Globally, it is estimated by the United Nations’ International Labor Office that 212 million people are out of work.

As a note, in the United States you are only of work if you are collecting unemployment. Once you stop, you are no longer counted. There are some arguments that the real unemployment rate is 17.3 percent – depending how you want to crunch the numbers.

Things don’t look good right now for a lot of job seekers.  There are approximately 2.4 million job openings in the U.S. according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. You know that expression about the five pounds of feces and the one-pound bag – well, I think we are seeing it in action.

I wrote about job hunting back in November. Things have actually gotten worse since then. I thought it was time to touch in the subject again, Here are some other suggestions on finding a job.

How Does Social Media Figure Into That?
What does this all have to do with social media? It’s simple really. With approximately four workers for every position, it behooves anyone looking for a job to develop an edge. The days of just sending out a resume, or responding to a job post are long gone. Let’s face it; any company with an opening is drowning in a tidal wave of resumes and cover letters. I doubt most are even read.

You need to do something to stand out – I mean really stand out. Yeah, you guessed it – get active on social media. Why? It will help you get noticed

Remember, most positions are never advertised. Companies that have openings compile a list of possible candidates through their own searches.

According to author Richard Nelson Bolles in his job-hunting book “What Color Is Your Parachute?” the average hiring manager is scared to death that he will hire the wrong person. Anything you can do to calm that person down is a positive.

Incidentally, I highly recommend Bolles’ book. It is old media, but it is very effective. It helped me when I changed careers.

Here are seven things I would do if I were job hunting:

• If I didn’t have one already, I would create a LinkedIn profile. Studies show that 80 percent of human resources people make LinkedIn their stop with looking for a new employee. Although I not seen a reason why that is, I suspect it is because LinkedIn is a trusted resource.
• On that LinkedIn profile, I would make sure my former co-workers had posted recommendations about me. Again, employers seem to trust these more.
• Also on LinkedIn, I would join the groups that correspond with my profession. I would do that for three reasons:
  • Almost all groups have a jobs section. It’s a good place to start looking
  • It’s a great place to network. Tell people you are looking for a job. Probably 10 percent of my over 5,000 connections list themselves as “in transition.” Talking to others in your profession will give you a leg up in the job hunt.
  • It is a good place to demonstrate your expertise. All of the groups list questions and statement from members. Answer those questions and respond to the statements. Ask your own questions.
• Start a blog about your area of expertise. Several studies have shown that blogs are the most effective kind of marketing. However, blogs are also the rated the most difficult thing to do. It takes time commitment and consistency to produce a good blog. But, it is the best way to demonstrate expertise. Write about what you did in career, talk about how you solved problems and the challenges you faced. All things a human resources person wants to know. Make sure you link the blog to your LinkedIn profile.
• Create a personal web page. It is very cheap to buy a domain name through a service such as Go Daddy. Make is a “business” page with you as the company. Sell yourself as if you were a company.
• Create a video resume and post it on YouTube. Again, link it to your web page LinkedIn profile. This will give potential employers a chance to see and hear you.
• I know some of you are going to ask about Facebook and Twitter. Twitter is a good to tell people about your blog and ask questions. Facebook – well, I am not so sure. Yes there are now 375 million who use the service. But, there is so much noise on it. I will tell you one thing you should do on Facebook – if you have embarrassing pictures, or questionable posts, take them down. Many employers are now requiring employment candidates to allow themselves to be friended on Facebook by the company so the company can review the candidate. The last thing you want them to see is that picture of you in Key West, drinking from a beer bong. I know of companies that have passed on people because of such pictures.

Good luck.

Writers note: I would to thank all of you that signed up with Google Friend Connect. It is both flattering and humbling to know you think enough of this blog to make that commitment.

So, you review your new client’s needs and decide social media is the best course. Or, you are pitching a potential client and feel using social media would be the most effective way to meet their needs. The problem is the CMO and CEO are in their ‘50s and think The Wall Street Journal is the be-all and end-all of information dissemination. They think Facebook is a place where their kids waste time in mindless pursuits and tweeting is what birds do.

This is a more common situation than one would think. It is true that more and more major corporations are turning to social media for their marketing needs. However, there are still a large group of executives who frankly don’t get it.

As an aside, I have run into public relations executives who also don’t get it. They have told me they are taking a wait and see posture on social media. I get the feeling these people’s great-grandparents were buggy whip makers in 1908 when the first Model T drove by. They told themselves this automobile thing was a passing fad.

So, how to do you leap that hurdle?

So, how do you convince the person in charge that using Twitter, Facebook and other social media tools are the most cost effective – and just plain effective – way to market? It’s not easy, but it doesn’t have to be as hard as you would think.

The first step I take is to ask the person in charge if they use LinkedIn. According to the latest numbers I have seen, approximately 80 percent of employment managers go to LinkedIn first when looking to hire. So, the odds are fair to even that the CEO and CMO are at least familiar with LinkedIn. If you are really lucky, they have their own LinkedIn profiles.

The odds are also good that they don’t realize LinkedIn is a social media application. If they have a LinkedIn profile, explain they are already using social media. I often see resistance crumble at this point. Once they realize they are already using social media, explaining the rest is easier. You are not home yet, but at least you have hit a solid double.

But, what if they don’t use any social media?

Now, if they don’t have a LinkedIn profile, I sometimes show them social media’s dark side. “United Breaks Guitars,” the Motrin moms, and the Comcast stuff will often make the people in charge sit up and take notice. What I tell them is social media can kill your company before you even know you are bleeding. For instance, I have read estimates that United Airlines lost an estimated $100 million because of “United Breaks Guitars.” Watch a CFO’s ears perk up when he hears that number.

Of course, fear is not the only motivation you should use. After scaring them, tell them of social media’s successes. Southwest Airlines had one of its most successful fare sales ever primarily by using Twitter, Paula Berg, the airline’s manager of Emerging Media said at a conference I attended last fall. PepsiCo has pulled all its Super Bowl advertising. Instead of television ads, the soda company is going to spend $20 million on a social media campaign.

“… the Pepsi Refresh Project is about getting the global community to nominate projects that need funding in local communities, you upload your video/project profile, gather as many votes as you can by spamming the social sphere and the top projects will win finding from $5k multiple times per month up to $250k a few times every month,” according to the Digital Buzz blog.

There are a lot more examples of the successful use of social media. There are thousands of companies using Twitter. Ford, Honda, Jet Blue, the Marriot Hotel chain, Wachovia, and Sun Microsystems are heavily involved in it. You will find the same results for companies using Facebook.

Remember, most CEOs – especially in this business climate – don’t want to be a pioneer. They want to know that whatever you are proposing has worked for someone else. Once they know it has worked for others, they are willing to listen.

Now, if you find their competitors are already using social media, you have broken through another wall. Remember, those C-suite people are judged on results. Their board of directors, their shareholders, their lenders, analysts and journalists are all looking over their shoulders. Those company leaders do not want to discover they are losing market share to a competitor that is using Facebook or Twitter when they are not. In this case, they already see the benefit.

There is much more to talk about when it comes to pitching social media. I will cover more of the topic in next Monday’s blog.

I read a story the other day from the online Kansas City InfoZine about how easy it is to trick Facebook members into revealing personal information. This is a hacker’s dream.

IT security and data protection company Sophos “created two fictitious users with names based on anagrams of the words “false identity” and “stolen identity”. 21-year-old “Daisy Felettin” was represented by a picture of a toy rubber duck bought at a $2 shop; 56-year-old “Dinette Stonily” posted a profile picture of two cats lying on a rug. Each sent out 100 friend requests to randomly chosen Facebook users in their age group.

Within two weeks, a total of 95 strangers chose to become friends with Daisy or Dinette – an even higher response rate then when Sophos first performed the experiment two years ago with a plastic frog. Worse still, in the latest study, eight Facebookers befriended Dinette without even being asked.”

Of those who responded, 89 percent of the 20-somethings and 57 percent of the 50-somethings gave away their full date-of-birth, Sophos said. Nearly all the others hid their birth year, but this is often easy to calculate or to guess from other information provided. Even worse, just under half of the 20ish crowd, and just under a third of the 50ish crowd, gave away personal information about their friends and family.

I hope I don’t have to explain why doing what those people did is a huge, huge, snafu. I am sure most of you have heard of the researchers who were able to figure out social security numbers just from the information posted on Facebook.

Be Careful

The lesson from that story and others is be careful. The Internet is kind of a like a major city. It has high-end areas, middle class areas and its downright dangerous areas. The people who create those dangerous areas will try to move into the other two because that’s where the money is. If you exercise some common sense, you probably won’t have to worry too much about the bad areas.

I say you won’t have to worry too much because a little healthy paranoia will keep you safe – in life and on the Internet. Put another way; exercise street smarts when you are out there.

My rule is I only post information that is already public.

Yes, there are dangers lurking out there, but by using a little common sense, trouble can be avoided.

Do simple things and you should stay out of trouble. The biggest thing to do is be careful who you share your information with. I probably get somewhere around two dozen requests Twitter follow requests each day. I accept maybe half. Multi-level marketers, get rich quick schemes and other things of that ilk always get rejected.

I have a policy that I never, ever open a link from a Twitter direct message – even if I know the person who sent it. As I am sure you have noticed, many Twitter accounts are being hacked. The hackers use those accounts to send out viruses and other malicious things. I have the same rule for email – unless I know the sender.

As for Facebook, I am very careful who I share information with. That is why I have almost 5,000 LinkedIn contacts and only slightly over 400 Facebook contacts. Generally, the people I follow on Facebook have to already friended people I know.

Also, when I search, I very careful what links I open. Hackers have figured out how to create legitimate looking sites. If the site seems the least bit strange, I don’t open it.

That doesn’t mean pull your horns in though

Social media is here to stay. It is taking over, not going away. So, don’t shy away from using it. That’s just counterproductive.

There are some things you should do and not do when you use social media. They included:

• Post picture of yourself – not your dog or the sunset, a short biography and a link to blog or a website (if you have either) when you join any site. Don’t worry, this is not the kind of information that will be much help to a hacker. I wouldn’t put my street address or zip code in, but other information is okay. Those links are important. It will drive your readership up.
• Use your real name. I find it hard to take anyone seriously who uses a name of say “seoguru” or “happygirl77.” You are building your brand here, remember. You want to use a real name.
• You know those Facebook or MySpace pictures of that great Spring Break – the one where you posted pictures showing off the sayings your friends painted on your half-naked body when you passed out? Take them down and hope no one circulated them. I know of hiring managers who decided against hiring someone based on similar pictures.
• Social media means being, well, social. If you join a site, participate. If you join a LinkedIn group, answer questions, or post of your own. On Facebook link to interesting articles and comment on other people’s postings. On Twitter, recommend good people to be followed on #FollowFriday, retweet interesting comments, and post good stuff yourself.

A note about using Twitter – my rule on Twitter is the first time you post what you had for breakfast, or what cute thing your dog did, I will stop following you. To me, Twitter is a site to share information and debate questions, not get cute.

I hope those tips help.

Now, an announcement: starting this Wednesday, I will be posting an addition to PR 101. This new section will be my take on various advertising, marketing and public relations campaigns. It will be on the same URL: http://www.pr101.biz

I see my Monday blog as a kind of primer on marketing, public relations and social media. There is some opinion in it, but basically, I hope you are reading to learn what I know. I appreciate all of the hundreds of people who read and comment.

Because I try to keep the Monday blog to around 1,000 words – long for a blog I am told – I don’t have the space to say everything I want. So, I am starting the Wednesday blog. I don’t have a title for it, so suggestions are welcome. I do expect to start some debates; in fact I want to start some. It is how we all learn.

So please give it a read this Wednesday. Thank-you.

I have to make an admission right up front this week’s blog about job hunting: I am torn about Facebook and its effectiveness. I am not sure whether the largest social media site on Earth – 350 million users and counting – is where you want to be in your job hunt.

I know Facebook can hurt you in a job hunt. I plan to go into the don’ts of social media job-hunting next week. However, one thing I will say now – would you hire someone whose Facebook pictures included topless photos from Cabo or the beer bong drinking championships? I wouldn’t either. Take those pictures down ASAP. Those can never help, especially if you want to be taken seriously.

Be that as it may, I am going into the pros and cons of Facebook and let you decide what to do. I have to say that if I were looking for a job, I would not use Facebook. That’s my bias. I want that stated up front so you know. I will keep try to keep my bias out of this blog as much as possible, but just keep that in mind.

So, let’s get into it.

The Pros Of Using Facebook In A Job Hunt

The first reason to use Facebook is its sheer size. At over 350 million users and growing, it is the largest social media site on Earth. It is has penetrated the entire developed world – just about everyplace you would want to work. Judging by the 400 or so followers I have on Facebook, I would say that the people who use the platform are pretty representative of the Earth’s population.

Secondly, many, many companies are using Facebook for marketing and sales. A lot of people don’t seem to know that Facebook has business pages. A lot of companies use those pages. It is good place to check out potential employers. You can tell by a company’s marketing efforts that they are targeting for sales. It can give you a sense of their needs.

Third, a Facebook profile is more informal than LinkedIn’s. In this age of getting to know the real person, a potential employer will often feel that your Facebook profile is a better picture of who you are.

There are two things about your profile I want to say. This applies to all social media, not just Facebook.

When you post your profile, include a picture. I have face I think scares small children, but I still post my picture. Frankly, I am suspicious of people who don’t. Unless you are the run from the law, your creditors, or an angry ex-spouse, there is no reason not to post a picture. Excuse the pun, but it helps potential employers get a picture of who you are.

Okay, so maybe this is not the kind of picture you should post with your profile. But, it is important to post a photo.

Use your real name when you set up a profile. Again, why wouldn’t you use your real name? Any employer who is doing their job is going to search out all of your various social media applications. How is going to look when they find your Twitter name is “drunkguy39” or “sexxygirl?” Not good I think.

The Cons of Facebook

Before I get started, “The Cons of Facebook” would be a great movie title. It sounds like the title of an S.E. Hinton novel. It could be set in a prison. A group of convicts, led by an imprisoned hacker, could be trying to use the Internet to escape a despotic warden. Think it has legs?

Getting to the real cons, my major complaint about Facebook has always been there is too much noise. Besides profiles and pictures, there are games, ads, causes and a host of other things. It is a not a clean experience for any employer trying to check out an employee.

To me, Facebook is a place to play, while LinkedIn is a place to work. It’s that simple.

Plus, people tend to be more frivolous on Facebook. I don’t know why that is, but happens. I have been guilty myself sometimes. You find yourself answering quizzes such what “Sopranos” character one would be, or backing a political cause. Most companies shy away from any political involvement. It is just bad for business. You never know what a client’s political stance might be. So, I think a hiring manager might not contact a person who espouses some strong belief.

I am not saying you shouldn’t have strong beliefs. Just be careful who you share them with. And if you put them on Facebook, you have shared those beliefs with a lot of people.

Well, that’s my advice for this week. Next week, I am going to write about the don’ts of social media job hunting. I have touched on some of them, but I want to hit them all.

Also, if you have been using social media for job-hunting, I would like to talk to you. I would like some real world examples of what works and what doesn’t work. We can do this anonymously or I can use your name. Leave a comment if you are interested.

Finally, on a professional note, I find I suddenly can handle two more clients for my agency. We are a full service social media, public relations and marketing company. Contact me if you would like to talk. Thanks.

So, last week we talked about using social media to find a job. Here’s the second part of that.

I have been asked two questions on using social media in job hunting. In the first one, the writer said he had a hard time taking social media seriously. He observed that most social media applications were created and used by 20-somethings. He wondered on how many people older than that actually used social media.

That’s an important question. If social media’s primary audience is made up of teenagers and 20-somethings, what’s the point of using it to find a job?

Well, it is true those age groups are active users of social media. However, so are millions of people in their 30s, 40s, 50s and beyond using social media. As for companies, the last figure I saw showed over 15,000 companies using Twitter for a variety of reasons. According to Strategy Labs, the 35- to 55-year-old segment using Facebook grew 172.9 percent between 2007 and 2008.  In January of 2009, Strategy Labs estimated that almost 7 million people in that age group were Facebook users. The average age of LinkedIn users is 41-years-old.

Another statistic – according to Nielsen, 80 percent of employers start their search for employees on LinkedIn. Obviously, that’s a site a job hunter wants to be a part of. In fact, social media is a place a job hunter should want to be.

As for the second question – what does one write about?

Actually, that’s a pretty easy one to answer – write about what you are good at professionally. If you were a supply chain manager, write about the time your chief raw materials supplier suddenly couldn’t give you all of the widgets you needed. Talk about how you handled that situation. Or write about the time you primary shipper screwed up shipping product to your largest customer. Write about you how you solved the problem. You can also write about dealing with difficult employees or the time you planned the employee summer outing.

You get the idea. If you have specific questions, email me and I will try to help.

Here’s the key on whatever you write about: what you are doing is demonstrating your expertise by giving real world examples of how you used it. This is a much more dynamic way to show what a valuable employee you could be than handing in a two-page resume with a three-line description of the situation.

That’s the key to using social media in job searching – it is a dynamic way to show you are the person that fits the job. It is much better than blindly sending out resumes. Think of it this way, you are baiting a trap for potential employers. When they read your blog, they just might think this is a person they need to interview.

Which brings me to my next point, creating and setting that trap. I know I keep hammering this point, but it’s the key to social media: the hunters have become the hunted. While there are never any guarantees, social media can make you the prey for companies looking for someone with your skills. However, you are prey working to attract the hunter.

Another satisfied job hunter who used social media to get back into the workforce.

So, how to do you do that?

Well, the second point I keep hitting is that social media is a toolbox. As I have said before, you can build a house using only a hammer and saw, but it will go a lot easier if you use all of the available tools.

The blog should be your foundation. It will give you the most amount of space to demonstrate your expertise. LinkedIn should be next for three reasons:

• As I said, it is the first place most employers look for potential hires. A LinkedIn profile is more complete and in-depth than a resume. LinkedIn asks for a lot of information, which is a good thing. Someone looking for a new employee will be able to immediately evaluate potential candidates. Posting a link to your blog will help also.
• Most people on LinkedIn have third party recommendations from former co-workers or clients. These are invaluable. Someone who has garnered three or four recommendations will stand out from the crowd. One thing: it is perfectly acceptable to solicit recommendations from people who know you well. It is not to solicit recommendations from people for whom the only contact you had with them is through LinkedIn. How good could recommendation be anyway from someone who doesn’t know you?
• LinkedIn hosts thousands of different groups covering every possible profession. Joining those groups allows you to connect with professionals in your field. Members of those groups post discussion topics or questions. Joining in the discussion or answering the question is another way to demonstrate your expertise. In addition, most groups also post job openings. Those listing are a lot more current than anything you will find on a job board.

The next tool I would suggest using is Twitter. You can tweet about your blog posting – once – as I do. Once is okay because you’re telling people it is up. Anymore than that and you are bragging. In addition, there are many links to questions and discussions posted on Twitter. Again answering shows your expertise. In addition, you can join Twitter discussion groups. Discussion groups are delineated by a hash tag, which looks like this “#.” So a group would like this #publicrelationspros. You find groups by using Twitter Search. You are then talking to like-minded professionals who might just know about a job. Make sure your Twitter profile reflects what you are good at.

As a crazy suggestion, you might want to record and post a video blog on YouTube. They are usually called Vlogs. If you feel comfortable doing this, get yourself a web cam and go at it. I would suggest at least doing an outline of what you are going to talk about. And practice, and practice, and practice some more, before you record. , I have found rehearsing eight times is the most effective for some reason. I don’t why – it just seems to work. You want to sound natural when you talk.

Doing a Vlog gives a potential employee a sense of how you handle yourself. It can demonstrate your presentation skills. But, if you don’t feel comfortable or you are the kind of person who freezes in front of a camera, don’t do it. It will do more harm than good.

Well, that’s all the time we have. However, I am getting so many responses to the job-hunting blogs, I am going to continue writing about the topic next week. See ya then.

As all of you I am sure have seen, I am very active on social media. A key part of social media is connecting with people. In the last three months or so, I have seen an increase in the number of my connections who are out-of-work. I don’t care what Wall Street says, things are still tough out there. I have never counted how many job seekers I have connected with, but I would estimate it’s between 10 percent and 15 percent.

For a benchmark, between LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Plaxo, Digg and some other sites, I have more than 14,000 contacts.

I have a policy of replying to almost everyone who connects with me. I tell all job seekers the same thing – social media could be the key to finding a job. There are no guarantees on that. But, I think social media gives a job seekers a lot more than just a leg up in the market place. I think it gives them a Lambeau Leap up.

Note to my non-American and non-football fan readers: a Lambeau Leap is what Green Bay Packer football players do when they score a touchdown. The player who scores jumps about 10 feet up into the stands to celebrate.

By using a combination of blogging, a profile on LinkedIn, being active on Facebook and maybe even posting some YouTube videos – you can become a target for hiring managers. I cannot promise you will get hired, no one can. But, I can show you how to get your whole body in the door.

What social media will do for a hiring manager is provide a complete picture of your knowledge and skills. Let’s face, a resume is a like family portrait. Everything in that portrait and your resume are clean and neat. That resume no more defines exactly who you are than that family portrait shows what a family is really like. Does a family portrait show the work that goes into raising a family? Does a resume show how you spent weekends earning your Six Sigma designation?

Social media can, if used correctly.

As usual, I have more to say that I can fit in the approximately 1,000-word limit I set for myself. So I am going to take two weeks to cover this.

So how does social media help a job seeker? The same way it helps a company. It establishes your brand. Yes, you have a personal brand. You might not realize it – but you do. A brand makes you a standout in the marketplace. If you don’t maintain that brand, you will find yourself at the back of the line.

Job-hunting is very crowded marketplace right now. It’s a buyers market. Anything that can be done to make a candidate stand out is a good thing.

The first thing you have to know if you decide to head down this road is that takes more work than a traditional job search. You are not going to be just cruising the job sites, sending out resumes, networking, and cold calling your old contacts. In fact, most of that is going to go on the back burner – with the exception of the networking. You are still going to have to talk to people. But by using social media, they are going to know who you are and what you can do for their company.

That last sentence is key. You should not be using social media to pound your own chest. The same rules apply to personal social media as to business social media. Just as that attitude turns off customers, it also turns over hiring managers. What you should be doing is demonstrating your expertise in your profession. We will discuss next week the mechanics of doing that.

You want to be able to show that hiring manager that you really know about widget production or copyediting or whatever. As Richard Nelson Bolles says in “What Color Is Your Parachute,” a company wants to know how you can help them.

The other thing you should do is buy “What Color Is Your Parachute.” In my opinion, it is the single best job-hunting book ever written. It was a huge help to me when I switched from journalism to public relations. A good friend – Dave Vogel – gave me the book. I am paying it forward now.

Note to the FTC: I have never met Richard Nelson Bolles or any representative of his or his publisher. I not have not received any compensation – monetary or otherwise – to plug the book.

The second change is the same as business social media – the hunters have become the hunted. Nowadays, hiring managers are as likely to go looking for the right candidate as waiting for a resume to show up in their email box. Using social media will help you attract that hiring manager.

As Bolles and others have pointed out, the majority of available jobs are never advertised. Those that are on such sites as Monster, Career Builder and other’s attract thousands of resumes. Steve Jobs wouldn’t stand out in that crowd.

Social media could even help this guy. He could sell more apples - or get off the street and back into an office.

Another thing I learned from reading Bolles’s book is that hiring managers are terrified of making a mistake in their hiring decisions.

“As you go into the interview, keep in mind that the person-who-has-the-power-to-hire-you is sweating too,” Bolles wrote. “Why? Because the hiring interview is not a very reliable way to choose an employee.”

Bolles points out that a study conducted in the United Kingdom several years ago found that the chance of an employer hiring a good employee through the hiring process was only three percent better than if they had picked the name out of a hat. If the interview was conducted by someone who would be working directly with the candidate, the odds dropped to two percent. If it was done by a “so-called personnel expert,” the success rate dropped to 10 percent below that of the hat method.

Bolles lists 11 reasons why hiring terrifies company hiring managers. I will give you two that social media job searching has direct effect on:

• “That you won’t be able to do the job: that you lack the necessary skills or experience, and the hiring-interview didn’t uncover that.
• “That it will take you too long to master the job, and thus it will be too long before you are profitable to that organization.

You can see why the process terrifies those making the decision. Social media can remove some of that anxiety.

Next week, I will discuss how social media will demonstrate that you will be able to do the job from the day you hired.