HOW TO: Manage Multiple Social Media Profiles

Start counting the number of social media websites you have a profile with, right now. Out of fingers yet? Facebook (), Twitter (), Flickr (), and YouTube () are just the start of it – for people active on social websites, you could have several dozen social media profiles, half of them using a really old picture of you. Heck, some of them probably have inboxes filled with strange messages from some girl named “Leota” who wants you to visit her sexy singles website.

 

 

While inbox spam and old pictures may not be the end of the world, keeping up a consistent image across the web and keeping your content fresh is vital to good business and strong relationships. With a little upfront effort, the task of maintaining multiple profiles can be less tedious, freeing up time to better connect with other people.

 

 

---

Step 1. Understand your Current Position

---

The first step is to exactly know where you have a social media profile and where you do not. Start by checking with Check User Names, which will search dozens of popular social media websites to see if your username is active. Check any you normally use. If any don’t ring any bells, see if it’s yours or if somebody already owns.

Tip: Always keep note of other people using your most common username. Making sure people don’t confuse you for somebody else is important for friends and potential employers alike.

 

 

---

Step 2. Choose Your Platforms Realistically

---

People may disagree with me, but I believe you should sign up for the most popular social networks regardless of whether you are going to use them all. This prevents someone else being mistaken for you and protects an account that you may want to use later.

This doesn’t mean you should be active on all of these services. Take a long, hard look at all of the services available and your time constraints and choose the ones that pique your interest the most. Keep some focus when choosing platforms. For the rest, place a note on your profile with contact information and links to your favorite social profiles.

 

 

 

---

Step 3. Organize!

---

This is the most important step! Don’t be satisfied with a disarray of bookmarks and email notifications. Organize a bookmarks folder or two for the social media services you are using. Filter your email so that all of your notifications fall into their own inbox/label. Schedule time to log into these accounts and make sure they are in order.

Tip: The most important thing to remember is to find a system and stick to it. These are the profiles that need your attention consistently; keep them free of spam and outdated information.

 

 

 

 

---

Step 4. Automate and Combine Your Profiles

---

No, I am not suggesting using a bot or having autoresponders. Instead, I am talking about grouping similar tasks together. One of the most common actions on social media is sending an update that you have updated your blog. Normally, you would have to copy and paste this type of message into Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace (), not to mention Plurk (), Brightkite (), or FriendFeed ().

However, with services such as Ping.fm () and Twitterfeed, this can be done without any work on your end. Find tools that can help you spread you reach without eating up your time.

Tip: Atomkeep is a cool tool for updating all of your social media profiles at once – it connects to your Twitter, LinkedIn (), Facebook, and other accounts and allows you to change bios and profile pictures with one action.

 

 

 

---

Step 5. Keep it Fresh

---

It’s easy to tell if someone has abandoned an account and left it to grow weeds. If you intend to use a service, keep adding new content! You can’t expect to meet new people on Digg () or Stumbleupon () accounts without digging or stumbling. And it can be confusing for other people if your profile has an old email address or says you’re still in a relationship with your high school sweetheart.

Tip: Use a Firefox () extension like Shareaholic to help make adding new content to your profile easier.

 

 

 

---

Go Forth and Network!

---

Once you’re organized and understand where you really want to spend your time, managing multiple social media profiles becomes less of a chore and more about sharing experiences, discovering new content, and building new relationships. That is why you made these profiles in the first place, right?

View my My Posts Facebook Twitter LinkedIn FACEBOOK FAIL: How to Use Facebook Privacy Settings and Avoid Disaster

 

Facebook provides users with the opportunity to share just about everything: photos, links, videos, virtual gifts and random musings in the form of status updates. Under the guise of “being social” and “maintaining transparency,” Facebook () fiends post anything and everything about themselves on this now omnipresent social network.

This begs the question, how much is too much? Younger generations have no problem sharing nearly every detail of their lives, but is publicly posting all this minutiae really such a good idea? Knowing what you had for lunch is hardly ever going to be interesting, unless you’re a chef, and seeing your drunken antics very well may get you fired. So where do we draw the line, and for whom?

The beauty of Facebook’s many features is that now you can choose what you show and to what type of people. By using friend lists and playing with your privacy settings, you can create different views for each segment of your life.

---

Segmenting your friends into lists

---

Facebook Friend Lists can be utilized for a variety of purposes, but the biggest draw for the average user is that they can label their friends for easy adjustment of Profile Privacy Settings. Creating Friend Lists may sound harsh or judgmental, but this categorization happens every day in real life; Facebook just allows you to put it to good use.

The names or types of Facebook Friend Lists you create will depend on your use of Facebook and the overall purpose of your Profile. If it’s personal, I suggest “People You Don’t Know,” “Real (offline) Friends,” “Work People,” and “Online Buddies” for effective tweaking of privacy settings to control each list’s level of profile access.

There is no limit to how large a Friend List can or should be when discussing Privacy Settings; however, if you want to use lists to batch invite, message or tag people, you will need to create smaller, more targeted lists. But for privacy purposes, you can make each list as large as you’d like.

You can create a list from the Friends page, or choose them individually by name while working on the Privacy Settings page. Simply choose a feature you want to limit, like your Wall, and select “Customize” from the drop down. Then enter the name of the person or list you want to keep from seeing that feature. You will be prompted to create a list if you enter multiple names by hand. Privacy settings can be adjusted by hovering over “Settings” in the upper right corner of Facebook and clicking on “Privacy Settings.”

---

What’s safe to share?

---

How much you’re inclined to disclose on Facebook depends on a lot of factors, and can change based on what you did last weekend, who has recently joined the network, and what your overall goals and use of the site are. But a basic breakdown looks like this:

1. People you don’t know (your public profile listing)

First, adjust how someone you aren’t connected to views your profile. Allow them to view a bit of personal information, in case a potential employer, networking contact or old friend is looking for you. To do this, make your profile available to “My Networks and Friends” and your search visibility to “Everyone.” You should also make sure that the “Public Search Listing” box is checked off so your profile can be indexed.

Now decide what you don’t want non-friends to see and change these settings, allowing “Only Friends” to see that information. This also sets up the all-access version of your profile for your friends. “Safe” stuff typically includes Basic Info, Personal Info (depending on how much detail you provide), Education Info and Work Info. That means no photos, no videos, no wall. Applications with a more professional focus, like your blog or LinkedIn () profile, are also okay.

2. Your “real” friends

You may or may not consider online-only acquaintance to be “real” friends; if so, put them in this list. Either way, these are the people who get the full version of your profile. Things reserved exclusively for actual friends might be Photos Tagged of Me, Photo Albums you upload, Videos Tagged of Me, Wall Posts and the ability to post on your wall. You also might want to limit “fun” applications to this list as well.

3. Online buddies

In the old days, people would recommend hiding indentifying details from this group of friends, but that goes against the nature of Facebook. However, if you have children you may want to block these friends from viewing photos of your kids. Decide what works for you; you can switch your settings at any time.

4. Coworkers

Sometimes coworkers are friends, sometimes they are a kind of in-between friend. If it’s the latter, you may want to shield them from some of your Photos, Status Updates and Wall Posts. People have been caught lying about “sick” days on Facebook and fired for it, so think long and hard about how friendly you get with your coworkers.

5. Family

Yes, Facebook is finally popular enough that you might need a separate list for your family members. Depending on how cool your family is, or how out of control your photos and various Facebook antics are, adjust your settings accordingly.

---

Final tips

---

No one will know you’ve changed settings, either for them or in general; these updates will not show up in your news feed, so block people with abandon. Also note that photo albums settings must be changed individually, either when you set up a new album or by going to the Photos section of the Privacy page. However, any photo you use as a profile picture goes in a separate album called “Profile Pictures” which the settings cannot be changed for. So don’t make an inappropriate photo your profile pic. But you knew that.