10 ways to look your best on social media

It’s hard to separate personal from professional on social media. Follow these tips to make sure you and your brand are always at your best.

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Can you really keep your professional and personal lives separate? To quote my accounting professor, it depends.

While I agree with Mari Smith that there are three categories on social media—personal, professional and private-the reality is nothing is ever private on social media, or the Internet for that matter.

Once you put information out there, it’s public. If there’s something you don’t want anyone to know, don’t put it on social media. Even if you believe it’s private, there’s always the chance someone will expose it. (Here are the social media 10 commandments.)

Even if you spend a lot of time on social media, periodically review how you present yourself. Here are 10 points to help you decide how to best show yourself professionally and personally.

1. Be a real person. People expect interactions on social media to seem human. Even if you represent a firm, be yourself and respond as you would to another human being. This means communicate like you would in real life with real language—not corporate speak.

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