The Jeff Pulver Blog: Your Social Identity. Remember to be the Master of your own Domain.

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August 16, 2008

Your Social Identity. Remember to be the Master of your own Domain.

If you are active in the world of social media, you owe it to yourself to create and maintain a social identity that you can use across multiple networks and multiple platforms. Whether you choose to use your name, a nickname, or something else, whatever you choose, be consistent. If your name is no longer available then when you use a nickname instead, be sure it is a name that you want to be associated with and a name you wouldn’t mind wearing on a name badge at a future tweetup. The way you brand yourself matters.

A few weeks ago when I gave a talk at a Web 2.0 breakfast in New York, I was amazed when about half of the audience members who were active on both Facebook and twitter admitted in using different social identities on these networks, and I believe this is a mistake. It is hard enough to establish your name and build your presence on one network but to have to maintain multiple social identities creates more work for you and will make it harder for your friends to discover you as your presence on multiple social networks grow.

If you are someone who has adopted twitter into your social media lifestyle and you are someone who isn’t known by the same name as your profile on LinkedIn or your profile on Facebook, why is that? And if you do have any regrets about not using the same names, why not take a moment and fix that today? Every day you wait is another day others won’t make that connection

It is a social media world outside. If you want to get ahead, make it a point and use the same name every time you find yourself signing up for a new social network. As Social Media continues to consume your internet lifestyle, your internet presence can only grow if you made it easy for people to find YOU.

And I was wondering, how do YOU approach Social Media? Where you someone who decided to make the transition from your nickname to your real name? And if so, how did the "syncing of personalities" play out for you?

Tags: Social Media, Social Communications, Facebook, LinkedIn, twitter, Jeff Pulver

Please consider leaving a comment. And feel free to find me on twitter and continue this conversation.

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Posted by jeff on August 16, 2008 10:40 AM | Permalink

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Posted by: injection molding at June 16, 2009 10:22 AM

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Tony James

Posted by: tony at October 25, 2008 10:56 AM

Dean,

I guess it depends upon your approach to how you use each platform and how you choose to communicate with your friends across these platforms.

While many people may separate themselves with different social media identities across both their personal and professional networks, they should always keep in mind that these networks will overlap with each other despite their own best efforts. There isn't much anyone can do to prevent someone from discovering "the other you."

And even if friends don't make the logical connection across our social identities and our social networks, you can expect to see the next generation semantic search engines make that connection. So expect whatever information shared to eventually be discovered across your social networks and across the universe of people who you consider a friend.

In the future I wonder if more people will approach social networking with a blended approach.

Posted by: Jeff Pulver at August 18, 2008 12:25 PM

Jeff

I disagree that it's always a wise idea to keep a single ID across multiple social platforms. In particular, some people (myself included) still manage to keep work & professional networks separate. I have very few "business" acquaintances on FaceBook, and intend to keep it that way.

Those few people who are both "social" and "professional" contacts know me well enough to know how to reach me via multiple routes.

Conversely though, I still have only one main mobile phone # that I use for both business & social purposes. I'm starting to wish that I'd kept 2 separate ones instead, as it's annoying to have business contacts in other timezones calling or SMS'ing when I'm "off duty".

Dean

Posted by: Dean Bubley at August 18, 2008 02:50 AM

Here's a suggestion. Give some help to Google and other search engines by using the rel="me" tag - http://microformats.org/wiki/rel-me

On every account I have (at least the ones that have profiles), I've included a list of links to the other sites that includes the rel="me" tag on each link. The result: Google nicely lines up all of the accounts on the SERP of my name, even though on some accounts I use rexblog and others (most) I use rexhammock and on Twitter, I'm /r

Posted by: Rex Hammock at August 17, 2008 08:14 PM

Jeff,

Sometimes it becomes difficult to get the same name across all platforms. If I am right, Chris Pirillo used a very unique name as his brand name (l0ckergnome) but some troll registered this name in some social network (if I am right, it is pownce) and started posting there. It is a big problem and you cannot always be alert to register your identity in every possible social network that opens up. The best way to solve this identity crisis is by using a mechanism like OpenID which you can direct to your own blog/domain. This will put users in control of their brand name and stop trolls from hijacking the names, even if it is for fun.

Posted by: Krish at August 17, 2008 05:35 PM

I think a transition has to occur for us Generation Xers and Baby Boomers. When we first got email (mostly likely at work), we were assigned a user name and it most likely adhered to the "first initial / last name protocol." By the time AOL, Yahoo and Hotmail came around, we used the same user name for personal emails in order to be consistent, I did.

But then Facebook came around and realized that I have a first name and prefer to be called by it. Even Yahoo! hasn't figured that out. When I signed on to Twitter, I wanted to maintain the intimacy that comes with being addressed by my first name. So as to not be selfish, I adhere to a "first name / last initial" protocol. This protocol supports at least another 24 Hermann's. But that is the best I can do.

I won't go back and change my Yahoo or Gmail moniker because there are some people who may need to get in touch with me in the near or distant future. If I ever go back to corporate america (if they'll even take me back after that event with the snake), I can't dictate what my user name will be. And I won't change Facebook or Twitter because I like being called by my first name.

To be consistent, however, I maintain the same picture for my profiles, changing only the color of my tie to signify professional (red) and personal (changes). See http://www.facebook.com/srch.php?nm=hermann%20mazard.

That is the best I can do. Luckily, your name is Jeff Pulver and you have many choices without contributing to character clutter. But riddle me this batman, what would you do if your name were Rikki Tikki Tembo No Sa Rembo Chari Bari Ruchi Pip Peri Pembo.

Hermann Mazard
@HermannM

Posted by: Hermann Mazard at August 16, 2008 04:03 PM

@geechee_girl,

I also think it is important to understand how people define what is a "personal" and what is "professional" identity. For some of us, there is a blur happening along the edge.

Posted by: Jeff Pulver at August 16, 2008 10:34 AM

I think the problem people are running into is volume. Unless you are a true early adopter like myself and others, there was no way to anticipate the sheer number of social services and copycat services that would rise up from the web space. Combine that with the original thought that you could have a separate personal and professional identity, and people tried to compartmentalize their lives online. That is no longer feasible - there is no more "separate identity" - your whole person is truly your brand now. So many are playing catch up because of those two things. Luckily, many services (not all) will help you change your name if you ask them nicely.

@geechee_girl

Posted by: Leslie Poston at August 16, 2008 10:19 AM

August 16, 2008

Your Social Identity. Remember to be the Master of your own Domain.

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