Social Media: The Networking Tool for Millenials August 23, 2010
Posted by seansimone in Build Business Relationships.Tags: business, Business Relationships, linkedin, Personal Branding, Pi Sigma Epsilon, PSE, Sales & Marketing, Sales and Marketing, social media, Twitter
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When Anjuli contacted me about writing for the PSE Blog I was very excited, but then I realized I had to pick an engaging topic that my fellow PSEers would enjoy and benefit from. With this in mind, I decided I would share my experiences in utilizing social networks such as LinkedIn and Twitter as a professional networking tool with 3 main goals in mind:
1) Reach Influential People
Reaching influencers is an important part of using social networks such as Twitter and LinkedIn. The key is remembering that these “businesses” are actually people with interests and needs similar to your own. I have been actively using Twitter for less than a year and have been able to contact the CEO of Netvibes.com, the author of Me 2.0 and other innovative entrepreneurs around the world. The key is providing content that is valuable and interesting to the people that you contact in under 140 characters. A great way is to send influencers interesting articles and videos that deal directly with what they do. If you connect with them they will be sure to remember you.
2) Establish Credibility for myself and my brand
These online platforms are so important to me as a college student and bootstrapping entrepreneur because it is a simple and engaging way to broadcast my personal brand to the other billion or so people engaged in social networks around the world. I am able to learn from each interaction and this helps me to stay creative and really think about the simply dynamics of my brand that I want to showcase.
3) Learn and Have fun!
Having fun and learning it really a big part of social networking as well. Personally these networks are a great way for me to stay in tune with current events and people I truly care about; in a business setting it tunes me into what the market and what people (potential clients) are looking for.
So now it’s your turn: I dare you to get started! Take 30 minutes a day to engage in social networks on a professional level and it will launch you and your brand way past others. Did I mention it was free?
You can find my company on Twitter @VisionAndGrowth
Sean Simone
Louisiana State University
Twitter is a great tool and can be very useful as you point out. For people doing job searches you can even use it to find a job. Go to http://search.twitter.com and you can use different searches to meet your needs.
For people interested in learning social media for their companies a great training program is the social media training from the University of San Francisco. It’s completely online and can be completed in as little as 8 weeks.