The role of social media in your career is often ignored. So the question arises. Is social media a necessity in today’s world? Does social media help you boost your career? But don’t know where to start or which is a better option for your professional needs?
WHY SOCIAL MEDIA?
Over the years, social media has become a profound and most influential medium in boosting your career and business and expanding your social network. Earlier it was seen as only a medium of entertainment, but now it’s a platform to reap benefits. Social media is currently being used by corporate to government organizations. In addition, it is now being used to collect data and conduct surveys to provide services to people for personalized.
- Social media can be used to connect with people around the world.
- Create and spread your ideas.
- Display and trade your craft and skills.
- Advertise and enhance your business.
- Voice your opinions and find like-minded people.
Social network platforms almost tripled their total user base in the last decade, from 970 million in 2010 to the number passing 4.62 billion users now. Globally, the average time a person spends on social media a day is 2 hours 24 minutes; if someone signed up at 16 and lived to 70, they would spend 5.7 years of their life on it. Out of 7.9 billion people globally, 58.4% of the population use social networks, regardless of age or internet access.
It is difficult to keep personal and professional use of social media separately, leading to a waste of time and potential. Even With privacy settings being strengthened, people still face threats and invasions of their privacy. So, it is always better to be vigilant and handle your social media activities seriously. Furthermore, you must keep yourself updated as a new platform comes up every now and then and make maximum use of the tools provided.
Let us now look at the Role of Social Media in Your Career and examine the most popular social media platforms.
LinkedIn is an entirely professional social networking website for individuals and business organizations. It allows you to update your educational and career development giving importance to your skillset. It is mainly used for the wrong reasons. The primary approach to using LinkedIn is to know like-minded people and connect with them. LinkedIn has a free version and a premium version. The premium version has different price options, and it is worth it for people job hunting as it allows you to send emails to unknown people with whom you would like to connect. Some of the best features offered on LinkedIn:
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TOOLS TO EXPAND YOUR NETWORK
Learn to use the recommendation feature to give and receive recommendations for people you have worked within the past. You should provide suggestions only to people whose work you are willing to vouch for. Use iLink Pro to visit up to 800 profiles daily automatically.
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TOOLS TO EXPAND YOUR BUSINESS
You can create a company page and build an online community around it on LinkedIn, getting customers and potential customers to follow you. Social Pilot for effective and efficient scheduling, development, planning, and publication. LinkedIn Small Business for tracking sales and building trust.
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TOOLS FOR JOB SEEKERS
The right content can open doors for new opportunities through LinkedIn. Spend time and tell how you want people to know you and what they can expect out of you. Connect to people you already know rather than strangers for job purposes as it builds a connection on a personal note. Profile view tracker lets you know the people who have viewed your account so that you can know they are interested and contact them.
Twitter is the easiest way to share your views, thoughts, and ideas.
About 380 million people use Twitter. It has expanded the character limit to 280 characters. Therefore, you can express yourself more. The terms used on Twitter should be clarified. Users interact through what’s called tweets.
Share and comment on others’ tweets using retweets, and add a quote to a post to let people know why you shared that post.
Replies are a public way to respond to others’ posts, start a conversation, and discuss each other’s views.
Direct messages, or DMs, are a way to connect privately with someone. Firstly, they have to be following you to receive one. A group DM is where a large group can talk about a common topic.
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TO EXPAND YOUR NETWORK
If you join Twitter, you can participate in global conversations beyond your friends and family. With Twitter’s live video tool, you can watch and interact with videos posted by people you care about. In addition, Twitter Polls enables you to provide users with up to four answers to choose between and see the results. This helps business people get responses for their products.
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TO EXPAND YOUR BUSINESS
The use of hashtags in a thoughtful, relevant way helps build your business. Make hashtags simple, straightforward, and unique. For example, use your brand name as a hashtag. Keep your message concise by using two hashtags per tweet. In addition, Twitter’s ad platform allows you to engage with a particular audience.
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TO FIND JOBS
It is significant who you follow to get a job. Monitor the activity of the companies and industries you are interested in closely and seize the right opportunity. Only the registered users can retweet, comment, share, and Dm. The unregistered users can only read the tweets, so it is better to be registered users for job hunting. Giving a clear Twitter bio regarding who you are, your interests, and accolades will make it easier for companies to approach you.
With more than two billion users worldwide, Facebook is the most powerful and influential of the social networks. It is a great way to connect with family, friends, and friends of friends. Facebook is used for personal networking and business and professional outreach. Like most platforms, Facebook offers privacy settings for your content so you can decide who gets to see what. Settings include content that everyone can see online, just your friends or customized groups you create. Facebook plays a vital role in government and political parties gathering support and election campaign.
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TO EXPAND YOUR NETWORK
It is an easy way to connect with family and friends and keep in touch across the globe. It helps you share your thoughts and views and raise your opinions on social issues. Facebook’s algorithm determines what content is shown to particular folks and depends on your own settings. It will depend on your content’s relevance and whether people will share, comment, and judge your thoughts.
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TO EXPAND YOUR BUSINESS
Facebook is an effective way to share updates, progress, ideas, and developments on your business page. It is necessary to connect with community pages to expand your business. Facebook ads work is essential for your digital marketing plans. Facebook Live shares behind-the-scenes videos, production works, events, and interactive sections with employees. It is an instant way to broadcast to the whole world, even for media, workers unions, and student unions to report any issues and injustice and gather support.
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TO FIND JOBS
Facebook can be used to find vacancies, new openings, and opportunities and even expand entrepreneurship. In addition, you can come to know the companies you like and follow their activities.
Instagram is one of the most popular social media platforms in present times. It has about 800 million users and goes beyond posting pictures.
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TO EXPAND YOUR NETWORK
Instagram helps you connect with many people, especially creatively connect. Visual representation in photos, videos, and reels are attractive options to catch attention. It is essential to find your niche and develop skills in that field. It is a great way to display your expertise or let it be an art form like music or dance for someone interested in photography. Reels are an easy way to showcase your talent. Similarly, using hashtags that fit your posts helps reach people who have seen similar posts.
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TO EXPAND YOUR BUSINESS
Instagram provides multiple pathways to upgrade your professional accounts. Advertising options in between stories showing offers and discounts make people give a check on them and save time as it is a quick way of shopping. Promoting brands through celebrities and paid promotions are other upcoming ways. Instagram is an easy and inexpensive way for small-scale businesses and homegrown goodies to advertise the launch of new products.
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TO FIND JOBS
You can use Instagram to learn about particular companies and their culture and determine what influences decision-makers in different fields. In addition, you can interact with companies of your interest. Being an influencer is the latest high-profile field for job seekers who wish for fame and monetary benefits. To know all potential of Instagram, refer to its official guide.
SNAPCHAT
One of the newest and most well-developing networks has about 250 million users. Snapchat makes sense to the younger generations and millennials. Snapchat provides guidelines and tips for businesses through paid ads. You can share messages and pictures (snaps) which will last only for a short period and become inaccessible, protecting your privacy which is raised as a significant question mark in today’s world. Snap kit is a tool that helps you to reach a large audience of users daily.
CONCLUSION
The utilization of social media to attain success in your career will vary from one field to another. A lot of effort and patience are required to reach the goal. It is essential to update yourself with the latest technologies and trends. Revaluate your methods from feedback received from customers to improve yourself. Ensure a cautious approach to what you post and share, and focus more on the social media platform that gives you maximum output.
Finally, social media is a community effort, and everyone is an asset, so don’t use social media to impress people. Above all Role of Social Media in your career can’t be ignored. Use it to impact people.
