How to Reach Out in the Digital Age

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Social media is great. It lets stay in contact with those we value, and to feel like we’re a part of a larger, global community of friends, family, and colleagues.

But for the uninitiated, the various social medial platforms can also be confusing—and sometimes downright frightening. Each of the big players—Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, and LinkedIn—operates in vastly different ways, and each has its own unique set of strengths, weaknesses, and dangers.

So what’s a person to do if they don’t know a PM from a hashtag? You could scour Google for the answers you need. But that takes time, and you might not even find the right answers. Alternatively, you could find it all collected in one handy place—right here.

To help you learn how to reach out in the digital age, let’s take a brief look at how to use each of the five major social media platforms.

Facebook

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Ah, Facebook—father of social media. Myspace may have appeared a year earlier, but Facebook just did it all so much better. That’s why it’s first on this list.

This is the go-to social media platform, used by grandparents and teenagers alike. Facebook is robust, and your posts can contain not only words, but also pictures, videos and links. If you want, you can share your entire life on Facebook.

To sign up, you’ll have to go to the official Facebook website. You’ll be asked for your name and email address or phone number, as well as your birthday and gender. Choose a nice, strong password, and you’re in. Easy!

Next, you’ll want to set up your privacy settings—this is where Facebook can be a little dangerous. Because you can enter everything from your religious preferences to your current employer, people can use the information you supply to discriminate against you, or even find you.

To keep your private items private, take a look at the tiny down arrow—it’s next to the question mark—in the upper right corner of your Facebook page. Click it, and you’ll find an array of options on the left side of the page. Third from the top is “Privacy”.

Here, you can control who sees what—go through each option and choose what best suits you.

Other than that, just keep in mind what the three main icons at the top right of the screen represent. The first one, which looks like two human silhouettes, will show you who has requested to be your friend. The second, which looks like a tiny lightning bolt in a chat bubble, will show your private messages—no one can see these but you. And the third icon, which looks like a globe, will show you any activity on your page, such as someone liking your posts.

It’s simple! So get on there and start posting.

Twitter

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Where Facebook is big, broad, and generalized, Twitter is short, concise, and to the point. It’s also great for sending out and getting news quickly.

Twitter takes some getting used to. First of all, your posts can only be 140 characters long. That’s pretty small—like a few sentences. That means you’re going to have to boil down what you have to say to the barest essentials. You can still, however, attach links and pictures.

The most essential element of Twitter, though, is the hashtag, which looks like a “#”. When you’re writing a tweet, placing a hashtag before a word—as in “#Example”—puts your tweet into a group of other tweets with that same hashtag. This means that anyone who searches “#Example” will find all of the posts with that particular hashtag.

So that means if you’re posting about the latest news about the Kardashians, you’re going to want to use #Kardashians so that people searching for that term will find your post. And if you want the scoop about the latest terrorist attack, you can try searching #TerroristAttack.

Besides hashtags, you can tweet directly to another Twitter user by using the “@” symbol before their name. So if you wanted to tweet to Beliefnet, you’d place @Beliefnet at the beginning of your Tweet—it’s kind of like sending a message. And if there are no characters before the “@,” only the recipient will be able to see it.

The basic icons at the top of your Twitter page are pretty self-explanatory, so log in and start up a #TweetStorm.

Instagram

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Like looking at yourself in the mirror? Are you an artist who wants the world to see your gorgeous paintings or photographs? Instagram might just be for you.

This is the most visual of the social media platforms—pictures are front and center here, and there’s little else to fuss with. The thing to remember here is that Instagram is designed for mobile, and you can only upload from your smartphone.

To begin, you’ll register with name, username, and email, and voila—you’re in. At the home screen, which you can get to by clicking the little person icon in the upper right, you can edit your information. There’s not much to put in here—just your name, bio, email, and a couple of other items.

To upload a live picture, simply tap the camera icon in the upper left corner and snap a picture with your camera. If you want to upload an image already stored on your phone, just tap the little square with the plus sign inside of it that’s at the bottom center of the screen.

When you upload an image, you can make use of hashtags in the same way you would on Twitter.

Again, this is easier than it looks, so don’t be intimidated. Instagram is one of the simplest social media platforms, and the most visually appealing. Try it out!

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Pinterest is like the prancing little kid with the pigtails, flowery dress, and constant smile—you can’t help but like it because it’s so darned endearing, and brings you the strangest gifts.

Pinterest is a bit different from the other sites on this list—it’s like a big bulletin board where you “pin” up images that you either upload yourself, or more commonly, that you select from those already pinned by others.

Once upon a time, you had to be invited to Pinterest in order to join—those days are now gone. You can sign up using your Facebook or Twitter account, which allows your friends on these other social networks to follow you more easily. Alternatively, you can just sign up with your email address.

Now that you’re on the home page, see that big search bar at the top? Type in something you like and hit enter. Now you can peruse pictures at your leisure, and when you find one that you like, you can pin it, which simply means that you save it to your own account.

You can create different “boards” which can categorize your pins. For instance, if you’re collecting ideas for wedding decorations, you can click the “Saved” icon in the upper right corner, and then click on “Create Board” at the center right of the page—you’d name this “Wedding” or something similar.

At this point, you can search for wedding decorations and click the big red “Save” button every time you find something you like—just select your “Weddings” board, and you’re good!

Besides that, Pinterest has a basic messaging option that you’ll probably never use—to find this, just click on the “Notifications” icon in the upper right.

If you love art, whimsical décor, and beautiful recipes, give Pinterest a try. You won’t be sorry.

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The first thing you need to know about LinkedIn is that it’s not for socializing—it’s for professional networking. This isn’t where you’ll post pictures of your cat. Think more along the lines of a resume, a professional headshot, and maybe a few self-written articles about your industry.

LinkedIn is for the career-driven professional, and here, you can contact recruiters and hiring managers, and you can add your professional contacts to your network.

Once you sign up—which works much the same as it does the other social media platforms—go for the free version of LinkedIn for now. It’s really all you need.

The biggest thing you’ll want to do now is to input your resume and add a professional photo. At the top of the screen, you’ll see an icon that says “Me”. Click that, and then click on your name when it pops up.

This will take you to your resume and qualifications page. Fill it out as completely as possible, photo included. This is your chance to let employers know the full extent of your experience, so don’t be afraid to mention anything that might help your case. Once you do that, you’re ready to network!

You can begin by using the search to find particular people to add to your network. Here, you’ll want to add coworkers rather than just anyone you meet—recruiters will know something is up if you have a thousand random connections.

Next, if you go back to the top of the home page, you’ll see icons for “Jobs,” and “Messaging,” both of which will be useful as you contact people in your quest for that next great position. You won’t be able to message someone unless they’re in your extended network—that is, you know someone who knows someone who knows them—but this is a great tool for directly reaching out to those who have the power to hire you.

Remember to be professional and tactful, and LinkedIn might just land you a new gig.