Author Topic: Social Media and Self Promotion  (Read 3900 times)

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Branden

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Social Media and Self Promotion
« on: Mar 21, 2014, 03:50 am »
I'm a green Stage Manager, so I grew up with social media and the zillion things you can do online.

I know self branding is important, and I try to maintain a viable online presence [mostly to get the most out of networking]. I have a .com with an about me page and my resume, a Wordpress Blog, a Twitter, and a Facebook.

All of these things help me to stay in touch, establish new connections, and sometimes even get work.

With social media sites like Facebook, many times well-known actors would establish a second account for themselves, so they could keep the private separate from the public. Now, with my generation, we face a unique challenge. Facebook does not offer an easy 'clear posts and photos before a certain year' function, so many professionals my age find that their Facebook feeds contain a lot of information from Middle, High School, and College that they would rather not carry as baggage for networking.

The point being, it is more and more common for actors and designers to create a separate Facebook page for professional uses. A lot of actors who even just pick up a few gigs a year have their own account.

Is this a trend for Stage Managers? Should it be? Why not have a separate Facebook account for all your work as a visual CV?

What do you all think about this?
Branden Scott Stewart

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-The West Wing

MatthewShiner

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Re: Social Media and Self Promotion
« Reply #1 on: Mar 22, 2014, 01:31 pm »
It’s tricky . . .

I think a top tier, professional web site – that hosts your resume – is a good online presence.

Social media is tricky.  You need to understand the sporadic nature of how people read your posts – and how more popular posts get seen – so that one time you go the hospital that gets 40 comments, is seen by more people – and then – well, people remember you being in the hospital.  Tricky.

You have to figure out what sort of on line presence you want to have.  Posting all your jobs, makes you look busy, and if you are perceived as always busy, the people are mpy going to think of you for jobs.  Remember, most jobs will come to you from professional contacts, rarely from postings.   Always looking for work and posting about it . . . then you might look unemployed and unemployable.  It’s about finding the right balance for you.

Over self promoting smacks of desperation . . .

You also have to work about making sure you posts are positive, upbeat and consider yourself ALWAYS under the microscope.  There is a stage manager I know on Facebook, who recently posted about a bad work situation – none of her employers or co-workers saw it, but it definitely gave me an insight into how she works and deals with “issues” at work – just not my style.  Recently, she came to me about an opening I have on an upcoming show – we met, but it was impossible for me to shake the information I had from her in the heat of an issue.

Also, remember, if any social media becomes filled with professional contacts – be prepared for any and all vague comments to be associated with work – posting “Having a bad day!” could be about the fact water is out in your apartment – but if someone only knows you in a professional atmosphere . . . then we might and probably assume it is about work.  (Because, as we all know, stage managers have no personal lives).

Also, remember, there comes a false sense of closeness that comes with being associated with someone via social media . . . that may not exist in real life.  (There is also a flip side to be becoming popular on social media, you can develop “stalkers”.)

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Anything posted here as in my own personal opinion, and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of my employer - whomever they be at a given moment in time.

Mac Calder

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Re: Social Media and Self Promotion
« Reply #2 on: Mar 25, 2014, 07:48 am »
Be careful with your privacy settings - on Facebook for example, you can set your default privacy settings to exclude a certain group of people on your friends list - ie "Friends except 'colleagues'" - any potential colleagues who request you "friend" them can be added to this group and they won't see potentially embarrassing or incriminating posts. As far as what already exists, it is just a few hours of sitting there re-doing privacy settings and deleting. 

Branden

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Re: Social Media and Self Promotion
« Reply #3 on: Mar 30, 2014, 11:58 pm »
On a related note, how do you all feel about vlogging?

I'd love to give it a go, and I figure so long as I don't speak about work at all, or doing anything unemployable [like drinking or irresponsible stunts] it would be okay.

Thoughts?
Branden Scott Stewart

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MatthewShiner

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Re: Social Media and Self Promotion
« Reply #4 on: Mar 31, 2014, 01:37 am »
i think you will want to keep anything like this separate from your professional image.
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Anything posted here as in my own personal opinion, and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of my employer - whomever they be at a given moment in time.

Dart

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Re: Social Media and Self Promotion
« Reply #5 on: Mar 31, 2014, 01:38 am »
On a related note, how do you all feel about vlogging?

I'd love to give it a go, and I figure so long as I don't speak about work at all, or doing anything unemployable [like drinking or irresponsible stunts] it would be okay.

Thoughts?
What would you vlog about? I keep considering doing a work blog (since I spend more time than I'd like to admit blogging anyway) but I never really know what I would talk about - particularly over a long time, and semi-consistently. Most of my time is spent at work or at shows anyway, so even if I weren't to explicitly talk about work I would be talking about someone's work.

I have considered making it anonymous and just blogging ahead about theater, but how anonymous can it really be, or how interesting can it remain while anonymous? Something like "I went to a concert this week in an undisclosed venue in an undisclosed state where the sound mixing blew and the light OP couldn't light the black performers to save their life" (true story!) is unquestionably boring. But I also don't want to be making enemies in the industry by attaching their names and mine. And even in DC, which is pretty big, it would be fairly easy to find out who somebody is by taking a look at the venues and companies they most talk about.