Maureen Alley's Blog

I strived to get my students to understand how important LinkedIn is for their online reputation and networking. Some understood, created a profile and asked for a recommendation. Others said they wanted to wait until they had some value to add – experience – to their industry. Why not get the ball rolling now? Why wait until you’ve graduated to get your online reputation/networking started?

So what do you do after you’ve set a LinkedIn profile? Take notice of content. This is where content really matters. Think of your LinkedIn profile as your resume. Put all your accomplishments and work experience on your page. Find a handful of groups to join – but make sure they apply to your industry. Don’t go willy-nilly and join tons of groups just to have tons of groups. It’s Quality over Quantity here.

Add your picture – and like Facebook make sure this is a professional photo – no binge drinking. Add links to your website, blog, Twitter. And customize your LinkedIn link so people can remember it. For example, mine is linkedin.com/in/maureenalley.

Next step is to add connections. Again remember Quality over Quantity. This isn’t a competition to add as many people as you can to beef up your profile. Think of your connections as people you can vouch for – and who can vouch for you. Write recommendations for a few of your connections who are great professionals. Most likely they will return the favor – which in turns beefs up your page.

Make sure people can send you e-mails. And keep your profile updated. Don’t abandon this page – it can turn out good leads and connections.

At the end of 2009, Google announced that it was going to start indexing Twitter as well as adding real-time activity into search results. These two announcements make participation on the real-time Web more important than ever. Why? Because Google is the number-one search engine, with 65.2 percent of all searches in February 2010 alone, according to The Nielsen Co. If you’re not tweeting or using Twitter correctly, then you’re missing out on appearing in this new scope of search results.

Need convincing? The amount of time users spend (5.5 hours) on Facebook and Twitter grew 82 percent from December 2008 to December 2009, according to Nielsen. In addition, Nielsen reports Twitter increased unique visitors by 579 percent, with 18.1 million unique visitors from December 2008 to December 2009. These are massive numbers that you can’t ignore, and numbers that Google is no longer ignoring.

But simply using social networking sites like Twitter isn’t enough — especially if Google is indexing your Twitter profile. Here are a few tips to ensure you’re using the medium correctly and taking full advantage of Google’s index.

1. Tweet info your readers want and need. If you wrote a new article that is timely, tweet it. If there’s breaking news in your industry, tweet it.

2. Use reporting for the links in your tweets. There are many URL shorteners that include analytics and reporting. Take advantage of these free tools to watch what works on Twitter and what doesn’t. Ow.ly, Bit.ly, and Goo.gl (owned by Google) are just three of many on the Web.

3. Add personality. People like to see that a person is behind the tweets. Put your picture as the Twitter avatar. Or if you put the magazine’s logo as the avatar, make sure it’s clear in your tweets that there’s a person behind the information. Add commentary and interest.

4. Be involved. Listen to what others are saying and get involved in the conversation. Think of it as networking at a trade show event and making connections.

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Originally published on ASBPE’s national blog.