We all have a personal brand. For soon-to-graduate students there are a multitude of online, social media and in-real-life (IRL) things to consider.

1. Your personal brand
ONLINE, ON SOCIAL MEDIA … AND IN REAL LIFE (IRL)
AS YOU TRANSITION FROM COLLEGE TO THE WORK WORLD
Mike Johansson, Senior Lecturer, School of Communication, Rochester Institute of Technology
@mikejnymikejny mikejny ForFreeBlog

2. What is a personal brand?
- The picture others get of you when they hear your name or see
you somewhere (online or IRL)
- It is made up of …
◦ Personal impressions you leave with people you meet
◦ Everything that exists anywhere on the web
◦ Everything on social media about you – whether posted by you or not
◦ What other people might say (or write) about you
- Which of these do you control?

3. The online you
WHERE THE MOST IMPORTANT PEOPLE – RECRUITERS,
FOR EXAMPLE – WILL FIRST ENCOUNTER YOU

4. What will people find?
- You are what Google says you are = Yougle™
- How to search for “you” like a stranger
- Managing the online stuff you can control
- Working with others to manage the stuff you
don’t control

5. Making you … better
- Blogging and other activities to boost positive associations of you online
- Using a tool such as Brand Yourself

6. Owning your name
- Own your own name as a URL and
having a “home base” website about you
- Use Nameck.com to find a version of
your name to use across all platforms
- Using Google alerts to track where your
name shows up

7. Protecting your good name
- Stay on top of where images of you appear online and work to
remove anything that is less-than-flattering
- Re-check (regularly) the privacy settings on your social networks
- Only post things online that reflect well on you
- Work to get others to consider you when they post about you

8. Online connections
- Optimize your LinkedIn profile
- Belong to (and contribute to) relevant LinkedIn groups
- Foster online professional relationships by helping others
- Help others connect online

9. How to stand out
- Blog on a topic that sets you apart from others
- Develop a content plan for your social networks that reflects you
- Seek opportunities to publicly share your expertise …
◦ Offer community classes
◦ Do some relevant professional volunteer work for not-for-profits
◦ Write letters (for publishing) to relevant trade publications (online/offline)
◦ Seek out media appearances

10. The social you
WHERE YOU ARE TELLING YOUR STORY ALL THE TIME,
WHETHER YOU MEAN TO OR NOT

11. The usual cautions
- Never post anything that could reflect badly on you today or
5 years from now
- Say only positive things on social platforms
- What goes on social media stays online for eternity….
- Have a plan for what you will post on social media
◦ This doesn’t mean you need to stop being human

12. The not-so-usual cautions
- Review your social media connections, platform by platform
◦ Do this at least annually and disconnect from people you …
 Don’t really know
 Have not interacted with in very long time
 Know to be unpleasant online
 Know to be dead (seriously!)
- Delete social accounts you have not used in over a year

13. Things you aren’t even thinking of…
- Who has access to your social accounts and those of key people in
your life if something awful were to happen?
- Backup all of your important information from social networks at
least every three to six months
- Review all of your “secondary” social connections and quit the
irrelevant ones – LinkedIn and Facebook groups, for e.g.

14. The IRL you
WHERE YOU MAKE THE GREATEST LASTING IMPRESSION

15. Know ‘the rules’
- A first meeting is your best chance to make a favorable impression
- Have a firm, authoritative hand-shake
- Have a one-sentence greeting that explains who you are and why
the other person should take an interest in you
- Listen twice as much as you talk
- Be ready to leave behind two business cards (one for them and
one for them to hand to someone else)

16. Make connections
- Have a professional and attractive business card … include multiple
ways to contact you: phone, email AND social networks
- Develop a 30-second elevator pitch about who you are and the
value you will bring to an organization
- Seek out events where professionals in your
desired field hang out and go to those events
- Use your existing contacts to make new
connections … this is real networking

17. Join an association – be active
- Join an organization of professionals in your desired field
- Look for any opportunity to do things beyond attending meetings.
These might include…
◦ Volunteering
◦ Organizing
◦ Project work
- Seek out a mentor in this organization

18. Help others
- Volunteering (as previously mentioned)
- Offer a skills update session for an organization or not-for-profit
- Be a mentor for a student or not-for-profit group

19. Questions?
@mikejnymikejny mikejny ForFreeBlog
Mike Johansson, Senior Lecturer, School of Communication, Rochester Institute of Technology
Feel free to connect or reach out to me….