How To Be Visible – Virtually

I was at a networking event on Monday morning for job seekers where the leader had written about 8 tips on the board. One of the professionals in transition asked what one of the last tips, "Be Visible," meant. Of course the moderator responded with "you need to be in the right places – like this meeting." I agree that meeting was a good one to "be visible" in, but there are so many other local meetings where you need to be visible, which I’ll cover over the next few months.

This month I want to talk about how to be visible virtually. As our world becomes flatter, and networking over the internet is perhaps easier than networking in person, its critical to understand a few key points to be successful in this environment. All of the following suggestions have the same thing in common: you will get value out of them if you contribute sincerely, and add value to the discussion. Go into these settings with a giving attitude, expecting nothing, and you’ll see your efforts pay off.

There are a few forums (also known as discussion boards) that are active and valuable. Its easy to find forums for just about anything, but I recommend that you only participate if they are well-read or popular. One of the best ways to be visible in a forum is to volunteer as a moderator. This will take extra time and effort but you’ll have the opportunity to meet forum participants and interact with them at a much deeper level than if you just posted messages occasionally.

Here’s a tip to get started: A promising forum that I just came across is by personal branding expert David Sandusky, located at www.yourbrandplan.com/forum/. Go register for this forum and begin to contribute to the discussion, either answering questions or asking questions.

E-mail discussion groups are a great place to be visible. You can go to Google Groups or Yahoo Groups and find tens of thousands of e-mail groups. When I look for groups to be involved in I look for two criteria. First, I want to know how many people are on the group. If it is a group of 50 people I doubt that it will be worth my time (with a few exceptions). I actively participate in the LinkedIn Power Forum where there are about 5,000 LinkedIn users that share ideas, leads, questions and general discussion about networking and LinkedIn. This is an awesome environment as people contribute from different countries and different perspectives and backgrounds. Second, if the group is small but the topic is interesting, and the participants are pretty active, I’ll get involved. A group of 50 people on a group that all have their own active network is a great, intimate setting where you can contribute and become known.

Here’s a tip to get started: Go to Groups.Yahoo.com or Google Groups and search a term common for your industry or profession (for example, search for "project management"). Then, join the group and watch the discussion for about two weeks. If this is something you can be involved in, begin to participate. If not, you can just unsubscribe from the group.

Blogging is an excellent way to be visible online. I’ll talk about blogging in a separate article but for now I’ll give you a little hint on how to be visible without blogging. First, set up a decent LinkedIn profile. Make sure that you have the "public profile" set up so that people can get a decent idea of who you are, and perhaps even an e-mail address where they can reach you. Then, find blogs that are in your field or interest area, and begin to add value to the posts by contributing comments. When you add a comment it will ask for your URL – that is where you put your LinkedIn public profile. Voila! You are now actively participating in the blogosphere with no commitment, and becoming visible to the blogger’s established network of readers!

Here’s a tip to get started: Search on "recruiter blog" and your city. If you are in Minneapolis you’ll come across the Minneapolis Headhunter site. This is a great blog to follow and comment on, since its local to you (the same applies if you want to move to Minneapolis).

Finally, there are a number of places where you can have an online presence to help establish your virtual visibility. Many professionals have multiple profiles spread across various websites including business network sites like LinkedIn, Ecademy, Xing. There is another class of sites including Facebook (which recently opened up to anyone, not just college students), MySpace job-focused Jobster. Non-social sites where you can "claim" a profile include Ziggs, ZoomInfo, Jigsaw.

Here’s a tip to get started: Assuming that you already have a profile in LinkedIn, go to another site like Jobster and set up a profile. One benefit of a site like Jobster is that it has high rankings in the search engines, and your profile should come up towards the top if someone searches on your name.

Aside from my initial advice of "make sure you add value to the discussion," I recommend that you check out the audience of each of these resources. Some are very regional, others are geared towards a certain industry or profession. Think about who should know about you, and then begin to participate in the places they frequent on-line.

Contact Jason at JasonA@TheNationalNetWorker.com or TNNW Blog.
 

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