3 ways to prepare for your interview

3 ways to prepare for your interview We may receive compensation when you click on links to products from our partners. When I started to job search in college I knew I needed to have my resume and portfolio in perfect condition. What I didnt realize is that its not uncommon for an employer to do a Google search of a candidate before they even look at the applicants resume. And its frowned upon now, but many employers asked candidates to log in to their Facebook accounts during an interview to check for any unsavory content. You can always find ways to clean up your resume and sharpen your cover letter, but it can be difficult to edit your online persona. Thankfully I did some social media profile clean up before I started applying to jobs, but sometimes the line between showing your personality and turning off employers can be fuzzy. If youre questioning what sort of grooming you need to do to your online presence, here are three simple steps to prepare your social profiles for a job interview. Understand the Company Culture The best way to gauge how your social profiles will be perceived by a potential employer is to determine how the company portrays itself, and how employees use social media. Is the company only tweeting about its business trends, or are they making YouTube videos? Monitoring a business social media is a good indicator of what the company expects from its employees. If the only profile you can find for anyone you know at the company is LinkedIn, theres probably a reason for that While you can get an indication of a company culture from the web, its not always straightforward. If youre not sure what kind of company would be a good fit for you, a staffing agency may be able to match your personality and skills with the right company, since they work directly with companies to fill positions. Once youve determined what the company culture is like, you should figure out what personal information is available online. Search for Your Name Simply searching for your name is a great way to determine what others can see when they search for you online. When youre searching and viewing your online profiles, log out of your account so you can view your account as a potential employer would. Once youve finished searching for yourself in one search engine, switch to a different one and dont forget to check the images. Depending on what you find, it may be time for some damage control. If not, its still a good idea to double check all of your social media profile settings. Set Your Privacy Luckily, social media networks allow users to manage their privacy account settings your first step is just remembering which profiles you have and how private you want them to be. Facebook is notorious for making less than agreeable updates to privacy settings, but theyve recently made it a little easier to manage your settings. This tutorial can show some of Facebooks recent updates to privacy settings. Though each profile is important, Facebook is the social network that any potential employer is most likely to try to access during the interview process. Social networks like Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn have more of an all-or-nothing privacy setting. When choosing your privacy level, its important to pay attention to your account settings and linked accounts. Its easy to have Instagram photos you think are private be automatically pushed to Facebook or Twitter for example. A public profile may seem risky, but giving employers a glimpse of your personality before they meet you can help you stand out from a stack of resumes. Regardless of the social media privacy approach you take the most important thing to remember is to make smart decisions when it comes to posting content online. Social media profiles may be only a small piece of our online presence, but theyre becoming increasingly important to potential employers. If you keep these tips in mind and think before you post, your social media profiles can help you get the job youre looking for. Book Corner [easyazon_link asin=B00F8Q4VPG locale=US new_window=default nofollow=default tag=caree07-20 add_to_cart=default cloaking=default localization=default popups=default]LinkedIn Mastery: Quick Easy Guide to Dominate LinkedIn (Networking, Profile, Marketing and Job Search)[/easyazon_link] Brittney Sheffield is a freelance writer for Incepture, a Florida-based staffing agency serving Tampa, Orlando, Miami and Jacksonville. For more career advice, visit the Incepture blog. We are always eager to hear from our readers. Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions or suggestions regarding CareerAlley content. Good luck in your search,Joey Google+ Job Search job title, keywords, company, location jobs by