From The White House to... Facebook?

Facebook has been in dire need of a good communications team for quite a while now.Who might they turn to? Most people wouldn't think a former White House press secretary would be a good fit for the job, but that just may be the case. President Obama's former press secretary Robert Gibbs may be in consideration for the job.

Facebook is on the verge of an initial public offering in 2012 in which strong and strategic communication will be crucial. Facebook has been criticized in the past for its lack communication with users regarding changes and updates to the site. CEO Mark Zuckerberg tends to come under fire in regards to his less-than-professional business skills and techniques.

Gibbs would be responsible for communicating Facebook's message to users, investors, and the media. I'm sure he would also prevent any more PR crises from happening, and create stronger relationships with the most important people to Facebook- it's users.

A lot of things will soon be changing for Facebook. Possibly becoming a publicly-traded company in 2012 and adding more specialized features for users are sure to bring the company lots of press and attention- and they will need someone like Gibbs to get the job done.

Keep It Clean!

After a few months of developing my social media skills, I've learned that the most important thing to keep in mind is to ALWAYS be professional. At a recent PRSSA (Public Relations Student Society of America) meeting, a member of the featured alumni panel reaffirmed this by stating that potential employers notice things like grammar and subject matter in tweets and posts. Does a PR firm or other type of professional organization want to see pictures of your drunken weekend activities? NO! This is social media suicide, in that those pictures and comments will never disappear.

It may seem like a no-brainer not to do things like this when you have prominent people following you, but I see it happen everyday with students my age. After looking through my different social media profiles, I've realized that each has a different level of professionalism to it, and that I use each for a different function. From LinkedIn to Twitter, and even my personal blog (this one!), I like to keep things consistent by tailoring my messages to be about related things. I keep details of my personal life to a minimum and try to feature skills and interests that will hopefully one day help me out in the future. Although my Facebook profile definitely has a more personal feel to it, I am still conscious to not be posting things that negatively affect my image in any way. Privacy settings don't protect you from everyone, and questionable things on personal profile can always come back to haunt a person.

So yes, my Twitter page is more personalized than my LinkedIn page, and my Facebook page is more personalized than my Twitter page, but each one is consistent in the way I present myself. By "keeping it clean" I can positively present myself online to potential employers and form lasting relationships that may be able to help me in the future!

"Memolane"- A Scrapbook of Your Social Media

Photo albums, check-in's, status updates, tweets, videos...And the list goes on. Social media has allowed us to share things from vacations to breaking news with people in all of our various networks, and continues to rapidly develop.

Memolane, a new site introduced earlier this week looks to provide social media fiends with a way to keep track  of important memories and specific posts. The site serves as a virtual scrapbook by creating a scrollable timeline that allows users to search for specific events they may want to look back on. The user can see posts from all forms of social media from a specific date or event and they can also interact with friends and followers.

An interesting feature is the ability for multiple users to create a "story". By combining favorite memories from individual timelines, a group of users can create a new timeline that features posts from each person. 

After browsing through the site and creating a timeline, it's evident how useful this site is and how popular it will most likely become. It seems like there are some minor glitches that need to be fixed on the site, but as a whole Memolane is a great new tool to keep social media users live's a little less cluttered and a lot more nostalgic.

Twitter- What It's Taught Me So Far

In the past few months, I have been on social media overload. I have had a Twitter account for roughly a year, but never used it the way I do now. Before using Twitter correctly, I falsely believed that people only used it to track their favorite celebrities and to post about pointless activities throughout their day. Although many people do use Twitter for these things (sorry, not following you anymore!), many people do use it to positively interact and learn from people that relate to their specific interests.

I am honestly amazed with how much I have learned in the past few months from using Twitter. Not to diminish the quality of my education or the knowledge of my professors, but I have learned more "real-life" information from the people I follow than I have in the classroom.  By following the right people in relation to what I am most interested in, I have been able to precisely create my own little niche in the big bad world of social media. I recently looked through the list of who I follow and came up with the following breakdown: 30%- PR organizations and professionals; 20%- News sources; 20%- Peers and friends; 10%- Travel information; 10%- Political figures; 10%- Celebrities. By combining these categories, I can immediately get all of the information most important to me. In less than 5 minutes, I can scroll through my feed and see breaking news, helpful PR tips, and what other PR students are up to.

However, the most important thing I've learned so far is that Twitter and your experience with Twitter is only what you make of it. If you want to use your little slice of social media to learn and interact with people in your field, reach out to them first! By never interacting with your followers, they most likely will never notice you or care what you're tweeting about. Another important thing I've learned is to remember who you follow and who follows you. I keep this into consideration whenever I type a new tweet, and make sure to ask myself, "Is this somewhat relevant?", or "Who else does this affect?". This doesn't mean that each of my tweets is serious and professional, but it does mean that you will never see a tweet from me saying things like "I hate my lifeeeeee!", or "Ugh, so stressed out". 

To sum things up, Twitter has allowed me to get all of the necessary information I need throughout the day from current events to the latest social media trends. It has also let me interact with amazing people in the PR world from upperclassmen at Temple to CEOs working in the business. I can't wait to see where Twitter leads me next, and look forward to interacting with more people along the way!