Imagine you are at a social networking event, such as a chamber mixer event. It's a large room of people from all different walks of life. Some of these people are dressed in business suits, some in party dresses, some in overalls like they just came in from doing chores. Who would you tend to network with?

Now imagine all of these people in this room dressed exactly the same, like they are in uniform or something. Do you think you would migrate to the same folks? Even though everyone is dressed exactly the same I bet if you really studied this group you could still tell alot about these people by the way the shape or health of their body, their hair, skin, hands and nails.

With this analogy in mind take a look into some of the groups of different social networks. In twitter it's very simple to put together a quick group of people by searching on a trending topic or keyword at http://search.twitter.com. When your profile shows up in a group, how does it look compared to others the group? Does it fit? Do you think folks would migrate to you and want to connect?

Now let's go a little deeper into your profile and look at your profile picture. Is it portraying the image that best fits who you are? Is it a picture others would migrate towards? Next what site are you linking to. I don't know about you but to link directly to a lead capture page that's asking you to optin is a complete turn off to me. You should like to a site where folks can learn more about you, and maybe have an optional optin or to suscribe to your RSS feed.

One thing I really like about twitter, it's very transparent. With a quick look of someone's profile you can see if they are really using their account to network or promote. You can generally tell if they are using automated services to grow their friends and followers. If someone has over 10,000 friends/followers but has under 1000 updates it throws up a red flag for me.

If you have read the book "Tribes" by Seth Godin you will appreciate his recent talk at TED.

Why tribes, not money or factories, will change the world. Seth Godin argues the Internet has ended mass marketing and revived a human social unit from the distant past: tribes. Founded on shared ideas and values, tribes give ordinary people the power to lead and make big change.

I've got a question for you... does your profile look like a leader (of a tribe) in Social Networking?
For instance... if you are in the fitness business. Does your profile picture attract a "tribe" of folks intrested in fitness?

I honestly hope this gives you a different perspective on exactly what your current "image" in the social networks is attracting and who you decide to add to your social network. (tribe)

Cindy McAsey
Barefoot in the Garden
888.272.6701 Ext 1

KEYWORDS: Marketing Strategies, Cindy McAsey, Social Marketing