Professional Networking - Why It Matters

TheDigitalConsultant LinkedIn Network
(Associates named removed)
Click in image then click again for the larger chart

The Tools and Links section of this blog contains links to many programmes that can create visualisations of your networks.

One of the more interesting is LinkedIn Maps which maps your professional network and demonstratesthe relationships between you and your connections.

In today's world where skills are increasingly being traded as much as money, your personal brand is all important.

Visualising your professional networks will enable you to see the areas where you can and need to build associations. Restricting your associations to school friends and employees is not going to get you far.

As LinkedIn's Ali Imam says. "With it you can better leverage your professional network to help pass along job opportunities, seek professional advice, gather insights, and more."

Joining LinkedIn groups allied to your brand also provides a great marketing opportunity for the products and services you provide. In the case of this blog for example,  referrals from LinkedIn outnumber those from Facebook 2-1.






 DJ Patil is the Chief Scientist at LinkedIn and in the above video he is explaining his network on large sheets of paper. Clearly I have a lot of networking still to do!

Related articles

• Professional Social Network LinkedIn Prices IPO At $45 Per Share, High End Of Range (techcrunch.com)

I've Been Framed

The expression "I've been framed" takes on a whole new dimension with the launch of Intel's interactive ad campaign, The Museum of Me.

The Museum of Me

After connecting with your Facebook account you will be transported through a  "visual archive of your social life" which some may find a bit off-putting.

Your tour of the virtual galleries, displays personal photos, video and your friends' profile pictures. The Museum of Me also displays your location on a map, status updates and other wall content, but Intel promises no personal data is collected or stored.

Each gallery comes complete with a digital set of gallery goers checking out the exhibits, all of which revolve around you.

A word of advice; the application is meant to load quickly but I found it 'hung', irrespective of which browser I used.  This may have been a  temporary state of affairs due to heavy usage?

It is only at the end of the video that the company's advertisement for its Core i5 processors appears.

As Paris-based, Amar Toor in enGadget writes in his review:

"You've mastered the art of the high-cheekboned self-shot. Your acute taste in Iranian New Wave cinema is on full display. That leggy blonde who just so happens to appear in all 200 of your Spring break photos? Why yes, you two do have a thing going on, but honestly, it's no big deal. You didn't even tag her. Yes sir, your Facebook profile is in top form -- a veritable shrine to your unparalleled wit, your ferocious intellectual prowess and your unearthly solipsism. But is it enough? Is your life really getting the Stalinesque digital commemoration it so sorely deserves?".

Based on his observations it might suggest that the user would end up with a tour of a "Playboy Mansion" rather than a "museum".  I guess it all depends on your Facebook content.

A 'Museum of Me' Montage - Thedigitalconsultant

Related articles

• Intel's Cool - or Creepy - Museum of Me (blogs.wsj.com)
• How To Turn Your Facebook Profile Into A Virtual Museum Of Your Life (businessinsider.com)

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It's Simply Not (All) Cricket - Social Media In India

An online survey of 2000 people from all walks of life in India has revealed that its population now spends more time on social media than they do on email.

The Nielsen Company commissioned the survey which is shows that nearly 30 million online Indiansare members of social networking sites, with nearly two-thirds of them spending time on these daily.

Such activity continues to gain momentum in India with an estimated daily joining rate of 45,000 online Indians joining up to these sites over the next six months.

“The social web appears to have gone beyond supplementing communication. Online Indians today are using social media to facilitate activities that range from leisure like entertainment, improving their livelihood through job searches and researching prospective partners,”  Suhale Kapoor, EVP, AbsolutData is quoted as saying.

A quarter of Indians are able to recall brands from their social media interaction and while no single brand yet dominates the social media space, there is a growing number of consumers who claim to be following brands in this manner.

Three other important statistics emerge from the survey:

• 40 million Indians use online reviews to make informed purchase decisions
• 67 percent of Indian web users use online reviews to assist with purchasing decisions
• 60 percent of Indians who use social media are receptive to an approach from a brand

AbsolutData Research & Analytics conducted the survey across top five metros and Tier 1 cities.

There are some 26,691,760 Facebook users in India which represents just under 33% of the online population so clearly there isstill room more massive expansion.

The top five brands using Facebook are:

1.  Tata Docomo - the GSM arm of Tata Teleservice with 2,069,772 Fans
2.  Vodafone Zoozoos - a telco games, video site with 1,840,243 Fans
3.  Axe Angels club - cheer leaders with a deodorant and cricket twist! - 1,593,124 Fans
4. Mumbai Indians -  professonal cricket team with 1,572,847 Fans
5. Fastrack - brand of watches and graments targeting the urban youth with 1,513,096 Fans

Facebook is still very much a male activity with less than 30% being female users.

Source: Socialbakers

18-24 year olds account for almost half of all Facebook users in India with a further 29% coming from the 25-34 age demographic.

Source: Socialbakers

According to Website-Monitoring.com in April of 2010, Twitter was then getting some 3 billion requests per day generated by 180 million unique visitors.  They calculated that 8.2% of this traffic came from India.

Here are a snaphot of Twitter topics from major Indian cities on May 30th, 2011: