Social Media 2011 – Top 11 Personal Branding Trends. Part 2.

This is a 2nd part of "Top 11 Personal Branding Trends". Let's discuss your personal branding in social networks and social media tools. Please enjoy! 6. Web Purity Omnipresent social networks, myriad blogs, always-on and always-connected workplaces and work spaces, constant online job searches—the Web has become a noisy and crowded place. No wonder it's difficult for people who google you to get a clear picture of who you are—especially if you have a common name. They can't be sure whether you're the John Smith who ran the Boston marathon or the one who faced insider-trading charges. Services will soon become available to help you stand out from others with your name. In 2010, Vizibility launched, offering the opportunity to build a "Search Me" button to share pure Google results with your contacts. Look for more products and services that will help you highlight accurate and relevant content. 7. 3-D PB As blended search becomes the norm and Web researchers demand more multimedia content, images, video, and real-time content will become more important to those researching you. People who look you up on the Web can get a 3-D view of who you are and what you have to offer. That means sites like Flickr, YouTube and Twitter will become even more important, and new tools that integrate all forms of media will become available. Multimedia is critical for personal branding. It provides the opportunity to build emotional connections with people who are making decisions about you. A picture is worth a thousand words, and video delivers more complete communication. Those who make the most of this trend will stand out from their peers. 8. Personal Portals Many of you have spent time creating a LinkedIn profile, building a blog, creating a Twitter bio, friending on Facebook, etc., which has resulted in a fractured personal brand: There's the Facebook you, the YouTube you, the Twitter you, and so on.. Each person who connects with you via one of those sites sees only one facet of your brand, which may not provide the complete story about who you are and what you do. Personal portals, such as about.me and flavors.me, are a new category of online tools that allow you to link all the different facets of your brand in one place and create one customizable Web page that connects all your profiles from various social networks. 9. RevYOUs Visibility is important in personal branding; credibility is even more important. One of the best ways to build credibility is to have others speak for you. LinkedIn has provided the opportunity to get recommendations from network members for years. Recommendations and testimonials have always been a part of the job-search process and a tool for making decisions about prospective consultants, colleagues, and business partners. Soon, there will be a new class of tools that will make reviewing and evaluating reviews easy. 10. Augmented Reality The vast amount of Web information that has been built up about people in recent years (thanks to all the personal branding we've been doing) will spawn augmented-reality applications. Run your mouse over someone's photo and you will be able to learn where they live, who their employer is, where they are at the moment, what their interests are, what they are reading, and what they blog about. Although this is a long-term trend, it seems likely that we will start to see different aspects of augmented reality in 2011—making it important for you to decide what parts of your brand are relevant and to ensure your online content is up to date. 11. Google Gatekeeper And the Google factor won't affect just job seekers. Good grades and high SAT scores won't be enough to get prospective students into college. According to a November 2010 study by Kaplan, 9% of business schools, 15% of law schools, and 14% of medical schools are already using social networking sites to help evaluate college applicants during the admissions process. Where there's fierce competition or limited enrollment, digital dirt or a lackluster online brand may close those ivy-covered gates. In the coming years, online personal branding will become almost as important as academics to those aspiring to attend college. Yes, personal branding will soon be coming to a high school near you.