Devon Hopkins

Thanksgiving Spread by CarbonNYC on Flickr

Thanksgiving is probably my favorite holiday. Who doesn’t love gorging themselves on tryptophan-filled meat and fatty casseroles (actually, common misconception: tryptophan doesn’t cause drowsiness. Your body just burns so much energy trying to digest the disgusting amount of food and drink we consume that you feel tired after.)

But Thanksgiving isn’t just an excuse to eat and sleep a lot. It is an opportunity to use your built-in network (family) to your advantage. And you don’t even have to use any awkward icebreakers like you do at networking events, because you know that every single aunt and uncle is going to ask you, “So, how’s school/class/work/job/life going?” or the dreaded “What are you going to do when you graduate?”

Don’t throw away this opportunity! You might be tempted to respond with a simple “Good” or “I’m not sure” and wander your way back over to the gloriously delicious bowl of stuffing, but try to actually have a conversation. These people are resources to be tapped and bonus: they actually care about you.

So, here’s your checklist:

Have a Happy Thanksgiving!

not quite clear on the concept by WWWorks on Flickr

It’s easy to find ourselves stuck in the grind of everyday.  We get into the same weekly routine and take little time to think about what we are actually doing (how many times have you thought to yourself: “Wow, where did the day/week/month go?”)

Are you growing?  Are you pushing yourself forward?  There is a question that I ask myself at the end of every week.  It is simple:

What did I learn last week?

The secret to moving forward, in life, in school, in a job, anywhere, is that you have to be constantly learning and growing, and be aware of that learning and growth.  Some things to think about when you ask yourself this question:

Credit: The Life of Bryan on Flickr

In my last post on Facebook for the Over 40, I showed you how to change your privacy settings to keep your profile safe. Now that you are protected, let’s talk about interacting with friends and family. Here are a few tips for getting the most out of your connections.

1. Don’t be offended when your family members don’t friend you back.

Either you have already experienced this or you will. You friend your favorite nephew and, oh no!, they don’t accept your friend request. Do not take this personally. They probably have not cleaned up their online reputation yet.

Many facebook users, especially younger users, have their entire lives on facebook (they shouldn’t). Instead of feeling rejected, why don’t you point your family member to “How to Create an Exclusive Friends List”. That way, they can friend you and keep their profile private.

2. When responding to a wall post, respond on the other person’s wall.

So, someone wrote on your wall! Great! Now, how do you respond?  Maybe this tip seems obvious to you, but I’ve seen a surprising number of people respond to a wall post by writing on their own wall. This is like receiving a letter and addressing your responding letter to yourself. They will be looking on their wall for a response, not on yours.

When you receive a wall post, click “See Wall to Wall” in the bottom right corner of the box. This shows you the conversation between you and your friend. Now you can type in the response box and the comment will go directly to their wall.

3. Control your feed so you can hear from people you actually care about.

Most people don’t know that the main feed on the facebook homepage is fully customizable. Unless you really want to see everything your 40 random high school friends from 1970 are doing, let me show you how to customize your feed to show you the activity of the friends you really what to hear from.

Now, when you login, your feed will be populated with activity from the people in your exclusive friends list, saving you time sifting through random updates from people you don’t really care about.

4. Create a facebook group for your family.

Facebook groups, while often used to idolize Britney Spears, are also a great tool for families looking for a communal space online. Create a group for your family and start sharing pictures, videos, links, stories, or anything else your family would find interesting.

Credit: Jordan Brock on Flickr

You might still think of Facebook as “that social network for college students” but in the past few years it has become much more than that.  Over 2/3 of Facebooks users are out of college and the fastest growing demographic of users is those 35 years or older.  What does that mean for you?  Well, if you are a college student, you probably have received (or will receive) a friend request from your mom, and if you are a mom, you’re probably feeling like you are missing out on your child’s life.  With 13.9 billion minutes spent on Facebook in April alone, you might have reason to feel like you’re missing something.

There are plenty of guides online for beginners using Facebook. Facebook for Beginners has a good list of guides available online.  If you are looking to do something specific, just type your question into Google and chances are you will find an answer.  I don’t want to regurgitate basic how-to’s that you can find online.  Instead, let me tell you:

The default privacy settings that you want to take a look at: (1) Profile, (2) Search, and (3) News Feed and Wall.  Of the three, you are probably most worried about your Profile Settings.  This area controls who can see you and what specific people can see about you.  Let’s start there!

1. Profile Privacy

The default privacy settings for Facebook allow for everyone to see your information.  You probably don’t want this.  Go through and change the drop-down menu to “Only Friends”.  You have to select this for every element of your profile.  Facebook calls this “increased customizability”, I call it “annoying”, but whatever. Make sure to changes the settings for your contact information as well.

Quick Tip: Still unsure whether your profile is actually private?  Test it!  Type a friend’s name next to the “See how a friend sees your profile” box and Facebook will show you how they would see your profile.

2. Search Privacy

Search visibility depends a lot on the purpose of your facebook account.  Take a minute and ask yourself: why am I on facebook?  Through Search Privacy, you can control who can find you in a search.  I often recommend being searchable, just not viewable.  That way, people can find you if they want, but you control what they see.  Here are the settings I suggest:

3. News Feed and Wall

The last section of your privacy settings, News Feed and Wall, gives you some control over what your friends see on their Feed (their Facebook homepage).  I unchecked all of the fields on my account, but it is really your choice.

So now you know why you need to manage your online reputation. As an artist or as a job-seeking individual, future clients and employers are looking and you need to take control of what they see. Let’s look at a few easy things that you can do today to clean up your Facebook profile and avoid missing out on opportunities because of embarrassing content.

chug chug chug (lochnessjess on Flickr)

1. Untag any pictures you wouldn’t want your boss seeing.

Be ruthless with this. I don’t want to see any pictures of your first keg stand or the outrageously inappropriate costume you wore for Halloween.

2. Don’t let embarrassing pictures be taken of you in the first place.

If you are thinking to yourself, “I’m going to have to untag this” then maybe you shouldn’t take it in the first place. Also, there should be absolutely no pictures of underage drinking or illegal drug consumption in your profile.

3. Make an exclusive friends list for your pictures.

Most people create a “Limited Profile” list of friends, where they choose who they don’t want to see their pictures and other content. Instead of this, try creating a “Pictures Viewable” list of friends, where you choose who you do want to see your pictures. This reduces the number of random people viewing your content, because you have to consciously choose who gets to see it.

• Go to your Friends page and “Create New List” titled “Pictures Viewable”.
• Now click “All Connections” and select the friends you want to see your pictures by clicking “Add to List” and selecting “Pictures Viewable”.
• Go into your Profile Privacy Settings. Select “Custom” on the drop-down menu next to Photos Tagged of You.
• Select the bullet “Some Friends” and type in “Pictures Viewable” or whatever you named the group.
• Uncheck any networks you had selected previously.

Click here for full picture tutorial.

Now, in order for people to see your pictures, they must be manually added to this exclusive group.

4. Change your privacy settings.

Facebook, by default, allows almost everyone to see your profile. This is probably, not what you want. Explore the Privacy Settings menu and customize to your liking. In my opinion, the safer the better. Here are my suggestions:

• Limit your profile visibility to “Only Friends” or something more exclusive.
• Have your Search visibility set to Everyone, but only allow people who find you in search to see a Profile Picture, link to add you as a friend, and a link to message you.
• Create a public listing for search engines. You still want people to be able to find you, just not able to stalk you.

5. Don’t forget your profile pictures.

Even once you have created an exclusive friends list for your pictures and untagged any embarrassing photos, you still have to go in and manually delete any profile pictures that you might not want visible. Click directly on your profile pictures to browse through your Profile Pictures Album. Hit Delete Photo for any pictures that don’t meet the same criteria you used to clear up your other photos.

So let’s talk Twitter.  Twitter is a free micro-blogging tool that allows you to create messages of 140-characters or less.  It is a great tool for community building, self-promotion (yes those are two different things), and actively engaging fans in your brand.

1. Broadcast promotional material.

Twitter was not created as a Press Release System.  Some users employ twitter as a tool for one-way broadcasting.  Please don’t do this.  Social media is about creating a relationship with your community.  I want to connect to you, not promo tweets written by your marketing team.

Interact with people on Twitter that are interested in you, your product, or your field.  Use @ replies and Retweets to build relationships.  People often wonder “why is no one tweeting me?” or “why isn’t anyone writing on my wall?”  The answer is almost always because you haven’t invited them to.  Ask a question.  You’ll be amazed.  No one is going to interact with you without being invited to, unless your audience is 13-year-old-girls… and you are the Jonas Brothers.

2. Use a username with “gurl”, “hot”, “boi” or any variation thereof.

This isn’t your AIM screen name from high school, so resist the temptation of a “prettypony6794” or “monkeysRcrazy4242”.  Be consistent with your brand and choose something that people will easily identify as you.  You can change your display name in Settings without creating a new account. (acceptable options: your name, band, gallery, company, etc.)

Internet rural (Credit: Caliaetu on Flickr)

3. Only tweet at night.

Most artists work weird hours.  But keep in mind that a high percentage of Twitter users are on a 9-5 work schedule and that is when you are going to get the most visibility.  This doesn’t mean that you can’t do anything at night, but save a large percentage of your tweets for the day, when you will be most likely to elicit a response.

4. Tweetflooding.

Also known as spamming.  Your 30 tweets about The Real Housewives of New Jersey are unappreciated and unnecessary.  Overtweeting is a good way to get unfollowed.  Also, people are less likely to want to interact if you are overwhelming them.  Think before you post.  Exceptions: If you are live-blogging an event like a conference or breaking news story, it is acceptable to tweetflood as long as you use #hashtags.  Find out what hashtag other people are using and add it to your tweets to help connect with other people talking about the same thing.

5. Miss out on conversation.

I see this all the time and it kills me.  If someone is talking about you or something that you are knowledgable and passionate about, you should be right there in the conversation.

• Use Twellow to connect to other people in your industry.
• Set up alerts on Tweetbeep and Google Alerts so that you know whenever someone mentions you, your brand, or something you are interested in.
• Check out Tweetmeme for what links people are most talking about.

When I say “rapper”, what do you think of? Probably not a preteen girl spittin’ rhymes about how she isn’t ready for a boyfriend yet. This documentary might change that.

PStar (Credit: ewphoto on Flickr)

P*Star Rising is a documentary by Gabriel Noble that follows the growth (literally) of a 9-year-old female rapper from Harlem named Priscilla Diaz, stage name: P*Star. While I don’t know if I would have picked a name for a 9-year-old that produces google searches about the adult entertainment industry, I was instantly won over by this little girl’s wittiness and extremely apparent charisma. The film recently premiered at Tribeca Film Festival. Check out the trailer.

We can all learn a few things from P*Star, the artist, and Priscilla Diaz, the girl.

Connections make you or break you. P*Star wasn’t born rapping (although that would be pretty sick). She didn’t get signed by a record label because of her musical genius. She got signed because her father, an ex-rapper from the 80s, knew the right people.

While most of us aren’t lucky enough to be born into families with connections in the field of our choice, we can use social media to forge connections with people that will help advance our career. Start seeking out people on Linkedin, Facebook, and Twitter that will provide you with an outlet for your work. Maybe it is a museum curator, or a record producer, or an employer. Join the communities that these people are part of and start a conversation. Make a connection by asking questions or establish yourself as competent by answering other people’s questions. The questions can lead to an email, the email to an interview or audition. Most successes don’t come from luck; they come from someone saying “Hey, I know this great person you should hear about.”

You can’t do it alone. There are going to be hard times. Really hard times. I don’t care how strong you are, you can’t believe that you are going to make it without some support system. Whether it is monetary or emotional support, you need someone that will always be stable, because there will be times when everything else is not.

Have an interesting story. The thing I like most about P*Star is that she has a story. She grew up in poverty with a heroine-addicted mother and cocaine-selling father. Her father cleaned up his act and took her in, teaching her how to rap. She had her first gig when she was 6, was signed to a record contract at 10, and now has a leading role on PBS’s revival of The Electric Company. Find some things, or a series of things that make people go, “Cool!”

Originally published on StillIndie.com

This is my first blog post. I’ve shied away from the idea in the past because of something I think all artists have: self-doubt. Because we grow up in a highly competitive atmosphere, we are constantly questioning ourselves: “Why do I deserve to do this?” and “Why should I succeed over that person?” What I have come to realize is “Who cares?” You probably aren’t unique, but even if you are, it doesn’t really matter. The focus should not be on whether or not you deserve to succeed, it should be on how you can succeed with the skills that you have. That’s where social media comes into play.

No one cares how good you are if they don’t know who you are. From a very early age, in any art form (dance in my case), we are taught that the only way to survive in the world of art is to be the best. “Do you think people will pay to see that pirouette?!” “You think you can fill seats with that documentary?” We are constantly pushed to be the “best”, when in reality, many of the best artists fail. So You Think You Can Dance just started its 5^th season and after auditioning thousands of dancers over 5 years, they are still finding exceptional talent, enough so that the show is already auditioning dancers for a 6^th season in the fall. There is an endless pool of talented artists in all fields and your job is not to be better than your peers. Your job is to get noticed first.

Thousands of people are competing for the same success that you are. Marketing yourself effectively is about making people remember who you are in a crowd of people. I recently got to work with a choreographer, let’s call her Anya. After college, Anya knew that she didn’t have the years of technical training necessary to become a well-paid professional dancer, so she decided to try out choreography. She, like dozens of other dance hopefuls moved to New York, put together a show, and invited critics and members of the dance community to view it. She, unlike the dozens of other dance hopefuls, fed her audience food and got them drunk on cheap alcohol, convincing them it was “part of her Estonian background.” Was it illegal? Probably. But by marketing herself and turning her art into an event, she enjoyed consistent rave reviews while most of her hopeful dance buddies did not.

Art is not just about creating something. It is about effectively sharing that something with a larger community. Anya acknowledges that she is not the best dancer now, nor was she ever in high school, college, or in her graduate experience. Yet now Anya is a very successful professor at one of the best liberal arts schools in the nation. How? She knew how to market herself and her works. What Anya did to make her art look like more than just another post-modern dance piece, you can do using social media. With all the social media tools (Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, Blogger, Digg, Flickr, Youtube) freely accessible, it is now your job to distinguish yourself from all the other artists doing what you do. Independent artists and labels won half of this year’s grammy awards, due in part, no doubt, to their talent, but also to their access to and skilled use of online social resources. It’s easier now than ever to make a name for yourself, by yourself.

“How?” you might ask. Well, that’s what I’m here to tell you. Subscribe so you won’t miss my next post.

Note: Originally published on StillIndie.com