What does your online presence say about you? Does it say you’re professional and knowledgeable? Does it say to a potential employer that you can be trusted not to tarnish the company’s image if hired? When employers start seriously looking at a job candidate, they start seriously looking at the candidate’s online footprint. This includes your Facebook page, your Twitter account, and your LinkedIn profile.
Now hopefully, most job seekers already know it’s important to remove any questionable content (i.e. inappropriate photos, controversial comments, unsuitable items in which you are tagged, etc.) from their social media profiles, but do you know what you should be putting out there in cyber space to brand yourself and your skills?
There are several things you can do to build a more marketable online presence.
- Upload a critiqued resume to CareerConnector, Belmont’s system for job and internship postings.
- Fill out your LinkedIn profile completely. This includes giving detailed descriptions of past internships and part-time jobs that also incorporate any positive results your work had on the company. A complete profile also comprises any and all sections in which you have experience to add or highlight (i.e. education, relevant projects, current or past volunteer work, technical and transferable skills, certifications, test scores, relevant coursework, languages, organizations in which you belong, and more).
- Make every part of your LinkedIn profile keyword-rich. Include the keywords from your chosen industry everywhere it makes sense to, even in your name! For instance, I am an image consultant and instead of just my first and last name, my LinkedIn profile name is “Lori Bumgarner | Image Consultant.” That way people who come across my profile immediately know what I do and I show up higher in the list of search results when people search those particular keywords. Yours could be “[your name] | Aspiring A&R Assistant” or “[your name] | Entertainment Studies Graduate.” Also find a way to use keywords and personal branding in the professional headline and your personal LinkedIn URL. Look at other profiles for a variety of examples.
- Share your knowledge by participating in online discussions on topics related to your field. Make thoughtful comments to LinkedIn group discussions and industry-specific blogs. Start your own group discussions by posing pertinent questions to the group members. Even create your own blog sharing your expertise on a particular subject related to your chosen field and promote it on your social networking sites.
- Showcase your past work with an online professional portfolio. Utilize platforms like SlideShare.com and Behance.com to accentuate your skills with uploaded writing samples, class projects, presentation slides and videos, etc. Once you have your online portfolio set up, then promote it on your blog and your LinkedIn profile by adding the portfolio’s URL to the appropriate sections.
By showing care in how you represent yourself online, you will gain both the interest and trust of potential employers, and perhaps even a job!