I’m on LinkedIn – Now what? Part 2

This blog was written by Brittany Moore, CU-Boulder senior pursuing a double-degree in business marketing and broadcast news.

With over 150 million members, LinkedIn is the leading professional social media site on the web.  Resumes are no longer enough, LinkedIn is the best way to network with professionals and search for jobs. With 80% of companies using LinkedIn to recruit it is crucial to have a professional online presence.

Building a Professional Network

Now that your profile is complete the next step is growing your network.  There are several ways you can build a professional network through LinkedIn.  The first and most basic way to do this is by using the contact tab to upload contacts through on your email account.  Additionally, you can search professionals by name using the search bar. Another effective way to network online is by joining groups.  You can do so by using the directory under the groups tab.

You can search groups for alumni, college, high school, fraternity, sorority, clubs, etc.  Some of the best resources for CU student’s are the LinkedIn alumni networks, including CU Herd, Forever Buffs, CU Alums, etc.  As a part of the Association for Women in Communication networking group I have worked a lot with the CU Alumni groups, which gave me a lot of great networking experience.

The group directory on LinkedIn is useful because it also distinguishes members by location, so you can search for professionals in your area. This tool is particularly useful for students looking for jobs away from Boulder. Say you’re going home for the summer, you can plug in your home state and seek out professionals nearby, which will help you build a network at home as well as in Boulder.

When you are asking new connections to be a part of your network it is important to send a personal message with your invitation. This can be as simple as adding on a sentence or two about how and where you met the contact as shown below:

Once you have made connections it is important to build and maintain your network. One way to do this is reaching out to professionals in your network to set up information interviews. You can send a private message that says something like this:

"I am doing career research and interested in learning more about your occupation. Could I talk with you for 20-30 minutes to ask you questions about your background?"

Some questions you could ask during an informational interview or even through a private message on LinkedIn are:

• How did you get into this field?
• What do you like best about your job?
• What recommendations do you have for breaking into the business?

You can also use Twitter and Facebook to search for jobs and network with professionals as explained here.


How to Market Yourself Through Social Networking

In lieu of our ever-changing technological society, Career Services’ Peer Career Advisors (PCAs) facilitate innovative workshops to share resources and opportunities to market yourself through social media. Our “Linkin’ It Up” workshops focus on how to use primary social media sites in a professional way.

The first half of the workshop reviews the best practices for attracting employers on Facebook, Twitter, blogs, and personal/professional websites. The second half focuses on LinkedIn with a demonstration and thorough review of the website and its many benefits for students. LinkedIn is extremely useful and easy to use and our Linkin’ It Up workshop is a great way to keep up with new digital media and learn how to adequately market yourself in a professional manner! Participants are encouraged to bring their laptops to follow along for a hands-on learning experience.

I’m on LinkedIn – Now what? Part 1

This blog was written by Brittany Moore a senior pursuing a double degree in Business Marketing and Broadcast News.

Part 1: Building your LinkedIn Profile

With over 150 million members, LinkedIn is the leading professional networking and job search social media site on the web.  Resumes are not enough anymore. With eighty percent of companies using LinkedIn to recruit, it is crucial to have a professional online presence. 

Building Your Profile

The first and most crucial aspect to creating a LinkedIn page is setting up your profile.  Building your profile begins by setting up your experience and educational information.  You can do this by either uploading your resume or inputting your experiences manually.  Regardless of the method you use to upload your experience, double check the experience descriptions and make sure it is in-depth and accurate.  Contrary to the resume, you have as much room as you need – so use it!  This also means you can add any high school experience in order to gain more networking contacts. 

Another step towards building your profile is creating a keyword rich summary that is concise, specific, and the spelling/grammar is correct.  The summary can be up to two paragraphs and is more or less considered to be your general cover letter explaining who you are and what you want to do. 

The next step to building your profile is collecting recommendations.  Similar to asking for references and recommendation letters, you should ask someone you know well to write a positive and professional note. Give them enough time to write a recommendation and don’t expect it that same day. Remember to thank them once they have written one for you. Suggestions for people to ask for recommendations include: professors, supervisors, bosses, and colleagues.  Recommendations are usually a couple of sentences long and highlight one of your strengths or accomplishments.  An example of a LinkedIn recommendation looks like this:

Brittany has worked for me as a Peer Career Advisor.  In an effort to increase the information our office provides for students, Brittany initiated and co-created a presentation on using social media in the job search for CU-Boulder students.

Finally it is important to link your profile to all of your other efforts including: Twitter, personal websites, professional websites, blog, work portfolio, etc. 

Once your profile is finished, it is important to advertise it through your email signature line, business cards, and the contact information on your resume. 

For more information about using Twitter and Facebook to job search and create a professional online presence visit the following web pages:

1. CU Career Services Twitter Help
2. CU Career Services Facebook Help
3. Create an Online Presence 
4. Leverage Social Media 
5. Linkin’It Up  Presentation

How to Market Yourself Through Social Networking

In light of our ever-changing technological society, the Peer Career Advisors are facilitating an innovative workshop to share resources and opportunities to market yourself using social media. The workshop will focus on the primary social media tools and how to incorporate a professional edge when using these sites. The first half of the workshop will review best practices for Facebook, Twitter, blogs, and personal/professional websites to further your knowledge on the sites and how to use them to attract employers. The second half of the program will focus on LinkedIn with a demonstration and thorough review of the website and its benefits for students. LinkedIn is the primary professional networking site and is extremely useful and easy to use. Linkin’It Up is a great way to keep up with new digital media and learn how to adequately market yourself in a professional manner! Participants are encouraged to bring their laptops to follow along for a hands-on learning experience. The next workshop is April 5^th from 5:30-7:00  in C4C S350 so be sure to join us!

Stay tuned for Part 2: Using LinkedIn to Job Search on April 5^th!eam. As a young person, I envisioned the rewarding career in Broadcast Journalism and what it would provide. Due to my outgoing and determined personality, I started achieving many goals throughout high school and in college.

Googling Yourself: Why Should You Do It and How to Clean up Your Image

Have you ever Googled yourself?  Try it – you might be surprised by what comes up.  When I Google myself, I get 3,650,000 results of which approximately 20 are directly related to me.  The results I immediately noticed were my professional pictures, my LinkedIn account, my personal website, and a Spokeo search on me.  Seeing my professional pictures, LinkedIn account, and my personal website be among the first 10 searches was exactly what I wanted to see.  These are positive online sites about me that will enhance my professional image for recruiters and employers searching for me online.  On the other hand the Spokeo account can be a little disturbing and is something everyone should be aware of. 

Nowadays, there are sites such as Spokeo, whose purpose is to seek out intimate information about individuals including: personal addresses, phone numbers, email accounts, etc.  It is important to be aware of what personal information is on these sites and always try to minimize this information by privatizing personal social networks and acting with caution with your online presence.   

Nonetheless, Googling yourself is the first step to identifying what is online about you.  Once you know what is out there, you can minimize the negative things; and more importantly, enhance the positive things.   

MINIMIZING A NEGATIVE ONLINE PRESENCE

1. Scrutinize anything personal online, including your posts on Facebook and Twitter.
2.  Don’t post ANYTHING you could potentially be embarrassed about – once it’s online it’s hard to really remove it forever. 
3. Screen your friends’ postings about you (this can be customized in your account and privacy settings).
4. Separate your personal and professional online presence by not linking the two together and privatizing your personal account. 

ENHANCING A POSITIVE ONLINE PRESENCE

1. Create at least one professional online profile (Twitter, Facebook, Blog, Personal Website, Info-graphic Resume, LinkedIn, etc.).
2. Quality over quantity:  Just because there are many social networking sites to choose from, doesn't mean you have to be on all of them.  It’s better to master one and then move on to more social media sites rather than be on all sites and not put that much effort into them.
3. Sign up  for a LinkedInProfile.  
4.  Although you don’t want to completely privatize your professional profiles (since you want people to see it), make sure you don’t put personal addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses online unless you don’t mind the whole world having access to that information.
5.  Consistently update your statuses.  Social media won’t be useful if you don’t make an effort to update your profiles and engage with other people on the social networks.

For more information about creating a professional online presence visit the following web pages:

1. Create an Online Presence 
2. Leverage Social Media 
3. Linkin’It Up  Presentation

How to Market Yourself Through Social Networking

In light of our ever-changing technological society, the Peer Career Advisers facilitate an innovative workshop to share resources and opportunities to market yourself using social media. The workshop will focus on the primary social media tools and how to incorporate a professional edge when using these sites. The first half of the workshop will review best practices for Facebook, Twitter, blogs, and personal/professional websites to further your knowledge on the sites and how to use them to attract employers. The second half of the program will focus on LinkedIn with a demonstration and thorough review of the website and its benefits for students. LinkedIn is the primary professional networking site and is extremely useful and easy to use. Linkin’It Up is a great way to keep up with new digital media and learn how to adequately market yourself in a professional manner! Participants are encouraged to bring their laptops to follow along for a hands-on learning experience.

Written by Brittany Moore

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