My name is Monica Karkhanis and I am currently a sophomore communication major with a focus in public relations at the University of Maryland, College Park. This is my first semester as an intern for Think Talk and I am really excited to blog about social media and how it can help your career. Find me on Twitter and be sure to continue following ThinkTalk!

Hey ThinkTalkers! I hope all is well in Internet land for all of you! This past week I spent my time at the Public Relations Student Society of America National Assembly in Austin, Texas. The field of public relations involves a great deal of social media and knowing how to implement these Internet tools to not only brand yourself, but to network with other students and professionals. At the assembly, students were required to attend three separate seminars. The one that stood out the most to me discussed how to affectively and appropriately use your social-networking tools to earn professional respect and to hopefully land a job. One of the presenters mentioned how Twitter can either make or break you—depending on WHO is following you and WHAT you are posting on your account.

It may not seem like a big deal to you to tweet about your night out on the town after a few drinks. It may not even seem like a big deal to insult your boss on Twitter. However, when you tweet about inappropriate things, it may actually ruin any prospects that are tracking your movements online or worse, get you fired. When using Twitter, it is beneficial to post tweets with some substance. I know, I know… How can a 140-character message have much value? At the seminar, I learned a great way to get your name out there in a productive and positive way is to post links to helpful or interesting blogs or sites you may have found while perusing the Internet. You should also follow professionals to see what types of tweets they are posting.

Ask yourself what you would find valuable in a tweet—and then tweet it! Be careful and make sure what you are saying is appropriate. No one wants to know when you’re “Tweet’n from the toilet” – a message like that can definitely ruin your chances of being hired. (That was the example the hiring manager who spoke with us used in deciding whether to hire one individual—you can guess what he decided).

What if one of your followers or someone you are following is the guilty of inappropriate tweets? Unfortunately, this can make you guilty by association. There is no escaping it—it’s like hanging out with the wrong kids at school. If you are following or being followed by an individual on Twitter that could potentially tarnish your personal brand or identity, I say UNFOLLOW!

For more ways to appreciate your following on Twitter and how to better use your Twitter as a personal marketing tool check out this article called, “How to Value Your Following on Twitter.” Here's a list of the best people to follow for more information on personal branding and using your Twitter! And if you too are trying to enter the world of public relations, feel free to follow me!

"Fun Twitter shirt seen at LIFT" courtesy Robert Scoble via Flickr Creative Commons

Hey everyone! My name is Monica Karkhanis and I am currently a sophomore communication major with a focus in public relations at the University of Maryland, College Park. This is my first semester as an intern for Think Talk and I am really excited to blog about social media and how it can help your career. Find me on Twitter and be sure to continue following ThinkTalk!

For the past couple weeks I have discussed how utilizing social media tools to further your career aspirations and development can be essential in your quest for a job. Then I realized, although I have several networking profiles, I have been neglecting some of my accounts. For example, I have had a registered LinkedIn account for almost a year, but I have only made five connections--two of which are college friends--and that according to my profile, I am still currently a sales associate for Pacific Sunwear in Frederick County.

Even though the information on my page was true at one point, letting get out-of-date can be misleading when potential employers and contacts come across your page. Although I am usually quite dedicated to keeping up with my social-networking accounts, I sometimes find myself overwhelmed with managing all of them- yet I’m not willing to let go of any of them!

On my pursuit to successfully clean up my profiles and get them up and running once again, (as a serious and proactive student), I came across a helpful blog to detangle my mess of social media websites, HOW TO: Manage Multiple Social Media Profiles. The author, Ben Parr, created a simple five-step guide to keeping your social networking profiles fresh, consistent and less tedious to manage.

Parr’s first step in refreshing your profiles is to first understand your current position. During this step you must uncover just how many social media profiles you have by checking usernames from websites like Funny or Die to LinkedIn and everywhere in between. Seems time consuming, but with this handy website called Knowem, all you need to do is type in your name and the site does all the work for you to locate long lost profiles. You may be just as surprised as I was when I discovered a link from an online journal I had when I was 13 years old on the blogging site, Xanga (can you say DELETE).

After you sort through the multitude of online social media websites that has your name attached to them, Parr suggests choosing your platforms realistically. He advises recruits to sign up for the most popular social networking sites, “regardless of whether you are going to use them all.” Parr’s theory in doing so is to prevent another individual being mistaken for you, thus protecting your personal brand and your identity on the Internet. Even if you do not plan to use them all, you can fill out your contact information and place links to the profiles you use the most.

Third, organize, organize, ORGANIZE!!! Parr recommends creating a bookmarks folder for the main social media services you use and filtering your e-mails so all of your notifications are sent to individual inboxes. If an e-mail and folder system is not for you, there are several others you can come up with, the most important thing is to find a system that works for you and stick to it.

The fourth step, which is also my favorite, is to automate and combine your profiles. Basically, use Internet tools that can update all of your social media profiles at once by grouping them together. Atomkeep syncs all of your accounts on to one social network to reduce “information redundancy,” making it easier to manage all of your social networking profiles. Atomkeep can be used with Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Youtube, Digg, Google, flickr and an abundance of other websites.

Lastly, Keep it fresh. If you plan to use social media to brand yourself, you must continue adding new content – after doing so you can proceed to network! Parr’s article includes several mini tips on maintaining your online networking identity, so be sure to check it out!

"50 Social Media Icons" courtesy Ivan Walsh via Flickr Creative Commons

Hey everyone! My name is Monica Karkhanis and I am currently a sophomore communication major with a focus in public relations at the University of Maryland, College Park. This is my first semester as an intern for Think Talk and I am really excited to blog about social media and how it can help your career. Find me on Twitter and be sure to continue following ThinkTalk!

Generation Y (that’s us!) can capitalize on knowledge of social media in jobs and internships—finally all those hours on Facebook and accomplishing staying within the 140-charater tweet limit is paying off. According to a blog written by Sarah Amandolare for Finding Dulcinea, students savvy in social media can benefit from their knowledge in the workplace. Known as a reverse apprenticeship, companies are encouraging and assigning their junior staff members to serve as social media guides to senior employees. These apprenticeships as social media guides can consist of formal programs or informal sit-downs among staff members and employees.

Andrew Robertson, CEO of advertising agency BBDO Worldwide, mentions that people normally think about mentoring programs or internships for younger employees. However, he sees things differently. Robertson says in order for his company to remain competitive he turns to younger employees to mentor the older ones, thus “breaking down the corporate hierarchies” as younger employees begin teaching their seniors about new technologies.

New intern positions are opening up at businesses and organizations in need of social media makeovers. These positions are often called social media interns or experts. For more, check out this video of Andrew Robertson discussing this new trend!

Hey everyone! My name is Monica Karkhanis and I am currently a sophomore communication major with a focus in public relations at the University of Maryland, College Park. This is my first semester as an intern for Think Talk and I am really excited to blog about social media and how it can help your career. Find me on Twitter and be sure to continue following ThinkTalk!

This week I wanted to focus on something a little different than social media (okay maybe a lot different): mentors.

I am teaching a public relations related course for the University of Maryland, and the professor is notorious for over-emphasizing (in good way!) the importance of having a professional mentor in the field that you plan to work in. Before taking the role as a teaching assistant for this course, I took as a student.

When he first assigned every student the responsibility to find a professional public relations practitioner in the field we are most interested in (mine being entertainment) I felt awkward and unsure. Now, I have my fair share of socially awkward encounters and experiences with people, but the thought of e-mailing a professional- or even calling- really freaked me out. Why do I need to contact someone I do not know and expect them to provide me guidance? I thought, hey I have my academic advisors and an internship lined up—I’m good to go. WRONG.

Having a professional mentor while you are still a college student can be incredibly beneficial to your own professional and individual growth. Professional mentors can answer any inquiries you have about a given field and offer helpful tips, advice and wisdom. I am actually very thankful that my professor required us to all have a mentor—my mentor has given me great advice about public relations internships and has even gotten me in contact with other professionals in my industry.

Now that I have the role as teacher, I really try to get through to my students that they too will have even more opportunities thanks to a mentor. Establishing a relationship with a professional can give you a leg up on getting an internship and/or a job. If you form a bond with your mentor they may be willing to provide you with a formal recommendation when needed and suggest opportunities for you.

Mentors have been where you are sitting and they understand what it is like to be a college student; they have already run down the path you are trying to find and can encourage and guide you in the right direction. According to this article at The Internshiprs blog, not only can mentors be a great source from you to learn from, but also acquiring a mentor expands your connections (which can be of great help after graduation).

So, where can you find mentors? For starters, if you visit your campus’s career center your advisors can recommend and help get you in contact with university alumni. And, for those of you taking advantage of all the social media and networking tools available for free online **wink** you can find a mentor through researching different companies and contacting a person who works there. Contacting a mentor can go beyond e-mails and phone calls. You can follow them on Twitter and tweet for their advice, or make a connection on LinkedIn. Good luck!

Hey everyone! My name is Monica Karkhanis and I am currently a sophomore communication major with a focus in public relations at the University of Maryland, College Park. This is my first semester as an intern for Think Talk and I am really excited to blog about social media and how it can help your career. Find me on Twitter and be sure to continue following ThinkTalk!

In my last blog I talked about how establishing a strong online social network is important both for companies and for yourself. Having Facebook or Twitter not only keeps you in touch and up to date with your friends and family, it makes is possible for future employers to find out more about you as well. Whether or not you choose to use your social networking profiles for more than just, the obvious- social networking- potential employers can take advantage of Web sites we all know and use to find out lots of little details about you.

Employers can (and most will) Google you, Facebook you or find you on Twitter. Sounds scary, right? Fortunately (or unfortunately—depending on how you look at it as) you do not have to be a part of the CIA to find out everything you want to know about another individual. All you need is access to the Internet and you’re ready to stalk.

Last summer, Careerbuilder.com released the results from a survey of employers and how they use social media that should be enough to scare some sense into college students. According to the results, forty-five percent of employers use social networking sites to research job candidates:

Job seekers are cautioned to be mindful of the information they post online and how they communicate directly with employers. Thirty-five percent of employers reported they have found content on social networking sites that caused them not to hire the candidate. The top examples cited include:

• Candidate posted provocative or inappropriate photographs or information - 53 percent
• Candidate posted content about them drinking or using drugs - 44 percent
• Candidate bad-mouthed their previous employer, co-workers or clients - 35 percent
• Candidate showed poor communication skills - 29 percent
• Candidate made discriminatory comments - 26 percent

This presents a problem for many college students who are currently searching for a job or an internship while being careless with their profiles. Photos from the weekend and status updates that are being used to blow off steam can easily influence a potential employer’s view of you—before you even had a chance to be formally interviewed. This does not always seem fair, but the truth of the matter is, employers and hiring managers are going to be looking for an individual who appropriately represents their company or brand. What better way to do so than to see how you present your self through the World Wide Web?

You need to be aware of any and all content published to your pages—including photos, status updates, tweets, comments, groups you join and even pages you become a “fan of.” The second my mom friend requested me on Facebook was the second I realized I really needed to watch what goes up on my page. If you would not want your mother to see it, my opinion is to avoid publishing it to your website, because once you upload something it is online for more eyes to see than just those on your friend lists.

In an article about proper social networking etiquette in Forbes, Nancy Rothbard, a management professor at Wharton, emphasizes the damage you can do to your professional reputation by giving too much information away online:

Rothbard says that in face-to-face communications, people are much more careful about the volume and nature of the information they disclose. On the Internet, however, "there is a lot of lack of awareness--or obliviousness--about who is receiving this information." Someone using Twitter, for example, may think that only 20 people will read their message; meanwhile, millions of unknown people may stumble upon the information.

I know I’ve sometimes slipped up when I update my Facebook status, tweet my frustrations or forget to untag myself from unflattering photos that my college friends upload. We tend to forget that we are in a new hiring era now where our parents, professors and employers all use social networking as part of the hiring process.

You may be the most qualified for a position, with a laundry list of experience and well-deserved recommendations from college professors and former bosses, but if your Facebook page is stock full of provocative or questionable photos, you can be sure that your chances of landing that sweet internship or incredible job will be less than you would hope for.

On the plus side, because social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and others are becoming increasingly popular, using your networking sites in an appropriate and mindful way can help you land a job. This article from the HRGuru gives a run down on the top networking sites employers use to find good candidates for open positions.

So next time you see a fan page labeled “Wasted Wednesdays” or you are sent a group invite to join a funny but provocative club, I would think twice. Stay tuned to find what things job seekers should be doing to their profiles instead.