Social Media Beginner – Best Practices for a Great Online Profile

Social media is great for your business or organization. It can help to illustrate your company values, display your company culture, and promote your service or product. It is important though to set up a profile for each of the different social handles with some sort of standardization by following best practices. All of the social site will be different, but almost all will have the ability to create a user/personal profile. This information will be shared with the community of users who also use that particular platform. Let's talk about creating an effective online profile.

Pick an Appropriate Username:

For a lot of the sites that are already out there like (Facebook) don't require you to have a specific username. For these types of profiles you use your real name so people can find you. It is actually a violation of the terms of service for most of those sites if you use a fake name as your username. Another example of this is LinkedIn. If you use a fictitious name you can expect to be kicked off. Applications and sites like Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat allow you to create any username that you want. As a business person looking to market your specific product or service, here are a few tips to create a username to reach your goals.

• Always first try and use your real name when it comes to choosing a username. For example, I use @StratagonKassi for my work Twitter handle, and I manage Stratagon's business handle that is named @Stratagoninc.

• Make sure that your username is clean and professional. Avoid using too many upper and lower case letters, symbols and using the number "0" in place of the letter "O".

• Try and be as consistent as you can across profiles that have you pick your own username. For example my name is Kassi Womeldorf so on a lot of my personal handles using @KassiWomeldorf, or @Kwomeldorf is consistent and easy to find (of you can get that spelling right!) Remember that the goal is to build your online reputation and brand so people will begin to recognize you.

Picking the Perfect Profile Picture:

In addition to a username, or your real name, almost all social sites will allow you to put a picture in your profile that is associated with your account. Remember that this picture is often associated with continued contributions that you make to a site. This could be comments, posts, shares, etc. Make sure you look up the correct dimensions of the photo so it is clear and not pixelated. Make sure it is a nice representation of what you look like in real person and make sure it's professional. If you are setting up a social profile for your organization, make sure you use a variation of your logo that is on brand. Try to use this consistently across all profiles.

Why the Profile Bio is Important:

You should always write a bio whether it be two sentences or a paragraph. This enables a potential friend, follower, or connection to decide whether or not they want to "hear" what you have to say. A missing bio is a missed opportunity. When writing your bio have in mind the people that you are trying to connect with and what they would be interested in knowing. Make sure you include a main point about your business (f

or a business social profile) and if it yours make sure you include a little about what you do. It is ok to add a little personality as well.

So What?

When you are creating social profiles it is important that you are consistent, and professional. By choosing the appropriate username, a professional picture, and writing a concise and accurate bio you can begin to populate your profiles with exciting posts and informative content!