The New Face of Social Networking

It was not so long ago that we were a bit shocked to find out that someone had Googled our name in order to find out more about us. Now it is considered the norm. Our online profile has grown from those early days when we joined virtual networking groups, dipped our toes into some discussion forums and and had our first website designed. Now we are into the next phase called Web 2.0 and from that has developed the new social media or social networking. (Wikipedia provides detailed definitions of these terms).

You may already be part of MySpace or Facebook or just wondering whether it's for you or not. MySpace is more for personal networking but for those of you with children there have been some serious controversies. Networking sites such as Facebook rest somewhere in the middle with both personal and professional profiles. This can cause some problems, I recently heard about this occurrence. A business woman used Facebook as a personal arena to keep in touch with family and friends. That is definitely one of the functions of Facebook, however she accepted as a 'friend' someone who she did business with and knew socially. This 'friend' said that she was shocked by some of the jokes and comments on the profile page and was not going to recommend her anymore as a business colleague. So, you need to be vigilant on how you control what happens within your page.

Enjoy and utilize the different functions of your social network but remember that expectations of privacy may not be met once you put yourself out there; it is still part of the 'world wide web'. It is important to know what you want from the new social media and to use it accordingly. Pay attention to your privacy settings and only share with persons who are in accordance with the nature of the page.

For me I like a middle ground when it comes to any social media; I feel it is alright to show the lighter side of yourself but not by losing your professionalism. I have a Facebook profile, it is not one of those really fun ones but it allows me to quickly see what friends are up to, what colleagues are doing and I have my business information listed there. And I found an old friend that I had not seen for over 10 years.

I have another community page with Chapters bookstore, this I especially enjoy as it allows me to be a coach and share my love of books - Jill's Chapters profile page

For professional networking:
There is LinkedIn and they now have a page where you form professional groups.

Hillary Clinton's home pagedemonstrates good usage of professional social networking - scroll down to the lower right side, under Communities.

From the business perspective you can manage your online brand to your advantage through the many resources on the web. There is also nothing wrong with showing your personality, interests or volunteer activities; just be sure to keep the personal photographs, interactions and general fun stuff separate because unfortunately not everyone may enjoy cousin Bob's joke.