Your Career Needs a Top-Notch Public Image

If you want to boost your career prospects, then you need to proactively manage your public image. This includes not only your social media presence, but also your professional reputation. In today's article, I'll focus on social media.

Every time you go online, you are impacting your public image. Have you thought hard enough about the type of image you want to create?

The average professional now creates and circulates more content than a TV reporter did twenty years ago. The reporter was lucky if she got four or five stories on the air in a week. In the same time frame, you probably circulate dozens of social media updates. (If you think my numbers are high, be sure to count the activity updates that many sites share when you visit.)

To save a bit of time, I'm going to assume you already know not to post online photos of yourself in bed, with a caption such as, "Too drunk to work today." Let's skip the obvious fact that you shouldn't post anything unless you are okay with it being publicly available... forever.

So here's my question: what public image would you like to create?

Yes, you want to be viewed as being trustworthy and professional. But what else?

Here are four questions you might want to consider:

Predictable or unpredictable? People expect a comedian to constantly deliver fresh material, but they want their trash collector to come at the same time every week and do the exact same job. Do you want your image to be fresh and original, or be safe and consistent?

As an example, financial types often want to avoid surprises; creative types generally want to surprise you. But sometimes the opposite happens. For example, I have seen "creative" professionals with profiles and posts that read like a banker's brief; this is what can happen when an artist tries to master a business-oriented social media site.

Try reviewing a month's worth of your social media activity, and make sure you are comfortable with how it comes across as a whole. If you want to get serious about this review, copy and paste all your activity into a single document.

Human or machine? People are going to write less and less of what you read online. Software programs are already writing content that is distributed under our names. The Moves app on my iPhone congratulates me when I take more steps in a day than is my norm; if I let them, my apps would post updates on Facebook and Twitter.

In such an environment, it's going to be hard to stand out. Social media is going to get crowded with automated voices.

When you post content, do you want to speak with an original voice, or are you comfortable blending in with the machines, mostly sticking to the facts? There are good arguments in favor of both options.

As bizarre as this might sound, speaking "human" can be the hardest challenge. Posting online, you are often communicating with people you do not know, rather than speaking face to face with another person. It takes real effort to craft updates that get across your personality and also express whatever information you wish to convey.

If you wish to sound human, my best advice is: write two, three or more drafts - and always proof your work before submitting. (Yes, I'm talking about a post online. Proof it.)

All business or not? Some people like to keep their work and personal lives strictly separated. This is entirely your choice, although I feel that mixing a little bit of your personal life with business - and vice versa - makes it easier to build strong relationships on both sides of your life. People have a tendency to trust others when they have a more fully formed sense of who they are.

20 years ago, a business contact in Hong Kong invited me to his apartment, and introduced me to his family. To this day, I have a higher regard for that person because he honored me by sharing the personal side of his life.

Of course, it is possible to take this too far. I "hide" people who insist on posting updates regarding their latest stomach ailment or skin condition.

Understandable or not? The more ideas you have, the harder it is to make your communications understandable to others. It never ceases to amaze me that the social media activities of many people I know don't accurately express what is special about them.

Some people are far too understated online; they seem withdrawn or even antisocial. Others jump from one random thought to another, never getting across that they are actually a smart and insightful person.

If one minute you write about accounting principles, and the next you write about quantum physics, you run the risk of confusing others. This is not to say that people can't have multiple interests. The trick is to share your interests in such a manner that makes it easy for others to follow you.

One easy rule of thumb is to stick with fully-formed ideas. If you want to discuss quantum physics, fine, but recognize you are committing yourself to explain fully an enormously complicated subject. If you just toss out "reminds me of what happens at a quantum level," you are going to sound, well, superficial.

The bottom line: The first step to creating a solid public image is to do so proactively and not just accidentally.

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Bruce Kasanoff (Twitter: NowPossible) is co-author with Michael Hinshaw of Smart Customers, Stupid Companies. You can download a free excerpt at Kasanoff.com.

Image credit: Flickr member Curtis Gregory Perry