Profile Photos on Social Networks

It not been much of a time since I have been playing with social networking website and I do feel that these websites have a massive effect on an individual’s life in many ways.  Twitter is a cool tool for letting your friends know your thoughts and save your one liners when those witty words pop up in your mind. Even save and share the quotes and news you would like to share with your friends. One can share anything that might be useful and interesting for everyone and gather a good number of followers as well.

Blogging has been a wonderful excercise for the brain and its great to spread ones thoughts by reducing them to writing, but then who would be really interested in knowing what you thing. Twitter and facebook not only gives exposure to the writeups but also lets you know who ‘likes’ your post. There are several tools out there to connect the blog feeds with twitter and then twitter with facebook. As I said earlier its great to be on a social network and be known from a perspective you want.

Facebook has been a wonderful website that not only brings back old memories by uniting some of your very good friends of the past as well as those of today. The effect of such a massive network growth is viral and has to be discussed some other day, but now to the profile issue on the social network.

As the word suggests it is “YOUR” profile. The things that you want people to know about you so that they can recognize you. Who knows you might end up with a bichra huwa bachpan ka saathi lost in the kumbh mela :-).

Just like brevity in being witty in any other thing so it is in the profile. Be a little precise, cautious and limited in what you make available in your profile. Everything else being secondary, I regard the profile picture as being the most important aspect of the networking site. The profile picture is supposed to display who and what you are in a thousand unspoken words. People who know you will instantly recognize you from your profile picture even if you hide your other details from the public profile.

Many people on face book have their profile picture as a group photo where the actual object “THIS IS ME” is quite far off in the background that makes it difficult for people to recognize or even if its a single picture with a single pose, the one photographed is hidden in the background.

It should be remembered that if you hide your photo album from the public, which the case always should be, you should always have a closeup profile picture which would show “YOU” and not anything else in a thumbnail. That is, if you want to be recognized anyways.

The most absurd thing that anyone could do in the profile photo, which is not an avatar, is to use pictures of some celebrity or object. It does not prove anything. In fact it does prove that wanting to be something else is a waste of what you actually are.

Here are a few rules to keep in mind:

1. Always use a close-up picture that shows the face properly.

2. The picture should have an expression about the kind of person you are, pictures have a lot to say. If your profile is all about business have your picture in a ‘Suit” maybe.

3. Avoid group photos as profile picutes.

4. Better to avoid very High resolution pictures. The profile picture is supposed to be open for everyone and it should not be manupilated.

5. Try to avoid too much facial expressions, rather try to be recognized.

6. Last but not least, try to see yourself from the perspective of your visitor.

Social networks can promote you, your business and even make you a celebrity but then there are certain rules that should be observed.

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