It’s so easy to hide behind a screen on social media and hit “send” that you don’t always consider the consequences of your digital footprint. Although social media networks, like Instagram and TikTok, allow you to connect with like-minded people from all over the world, every comment or photo you post could potentially harm your reputation later in life. In this episode of the SmartSocial.com Podcast, Josh Ochs chats with University of Florida Social Media Professor Andrew Selepak, PhD about ways students can manage their own social media reputation and branding.
Selepak's Tips for Cleaning Up Social Media Profiles:
The best way for students to clean up and protect their online presence is to do a regular social media audit. Students should reexamine their Instagram posts, go back through their Twitter posts with Advanced Search, check their TikTok videos, and review their daily Facebook Memories notifications for posts that no longer accurately reflect their reputation or could damage their reputation.
Too often we make posts when we are emotional that doesn’t accurately reflect our true views or at least our more articulate and subdued views, or posts we made when we were younger that embarrass us today. While it is always important to pause before making a social media post that might be made in anger or despair, it is just as important to pause and review any old posts that were made under similar emotional distress, or made without thinking.
Parents and educators should also remind students that posts made today for likes, comments, and follows, could be the same posts that tomorrow prevent a student from getting a job, internship, or letter of recommendation.
Learn more: https://smartsocial.com/social-media-clean-up/
About our guest: Andrew Selepak is the Program Coordinator of the Master of Arts in Mass Communication Program with a specialization in Social Media at the University of Florida in the College of Journalism and Communications. He also teaches courses in the Department of Telecommunication at the University of Florida. Andrew holds a B.A. from the University of Virginia in American History, a M.A. from George Mason University in Communications, and a Ph.D. from the University of Florida in Mass Communications.
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