This article presents a generous attempt to call your attention to simple and innocent activities you perform online that hurts your reputation, compromise your integrity and distort  people’s  view of  your personage

1). Your Identity
People create an immediate impression and conclude  within 16 seconds of coming in contact with you online. Your profile picture on social media represents your foremost identity. Your bio and some other details you provided reinforce your identity.  Leaving out the important information concerning your bio unfilled may portray you as fake or perhaps a scammer. Putting up the identity of someone much more than  you are may work against you in time of your needs. People who should help you may be looking up to you when you need help.

2). Your Association
When most of your connections on social media are the wrong kind of people, You are continuously being fed with unwanted messages in your news feed. You are constantly under the barge of unsolicited content, thus causing distractions and impoverishing you. Wrong associations derail relevant matters. Building the right association can make the difference between gaining access to opportunity and missing out on life-transforming opportunities.
You need to consciously choose the kind of people you associate with online. How then should your connection on social media proceed?  Your connections should constitute people who could add value to you, those looking up to you for knowledge, directions and leadership, and other connections should constitute your colleagues, family and acquaintances.
As someone with great dreams and vision, avoid the dangerous habit of exposing yourself to terrible associations, interactions or connections on social media.

3). Inappropriate Comments
Knowing what to say, when to say it, who to say it to, and whether to say it or not could mean a lot. Remember, Social media is great at documenting peoples’ ignorance. Anytime you publish a post or comment under peoples posts, you are telling the whole world something about you.  Whatever you post today may be archived by your opposition and use against you in many years to come.
Posting to insult and attack peoples’ opinions and policies as a result of your philosophy, political or religious leanings may continue to hunt you for the rest of your life.  Your funny photos, your binge drinking photos, the obscure jokes you post on social media will be visible to the whole world. These may work against you in the long run during your political ambition, when you go job hunting, attend interviews, or during the background check of your activities on social media by a potential hires, investors, or clients. Your social media handle, especially your Facebook or LinkedIn may be the first place some companies or Managers visit when they want to carry out a background check if they need to hire an employee, a contractor, a consultant or a partner. Many have been rejected for a job solely because of the content of their social media.  Being appropriate on social media is just as important for a political career as it is for finding employment, getting an investor or closing important deals

4). Misuse of Time
Do not post that which conflict with your organizational culture. As an employee, avoid using your work-time to post every hour as if you are working in the media.  If social media is up on your screen every time your boss walks past, It is a dangerous sign that you are mostly idle and cannot get involved in any serious work. It is not healthy for your company unless you are getting paid to work on social media or it’s an integral part of your job responsibility. If you continue this way, you may be considered in the first batch of rightsizing or downsizing when employees are to be laid-off in your establishment

5). Being Everywhere
Some individuals register their presence on most social networking platforms. You don’t necessarily need a presence on all platforms. You ought to choose the ones that resonate with your career and vision; choose the platforms that offer you advancement in life and probably connect you to relevant opportunities. Having too many social media account is a waste of time. It renders you ineffective. The more social media platform you have pulling at your attention, the harder it is to maintain focus on something important.

6). Working Remotely
If you are given a job that takes you out of your location and you post constantly on social media, your boss or manager would quickly view you as a time-waster.  It will create  doubt as to whether you are doing your assigned job remotely. If you are given sick leave for three days and in the morning of the second day you recover and your post is already up on social media, your colleagues or bosses may doubt if you are actually sick in the first place. It is better to take caution in posting on social media anytime you are away from your office

7). Posting your Travel Update
Revealing exactly where you are on social media at any given time is risky. it’s unwise to chronicle your travel history on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram,  letting anyone know which bus or car you are boarding, the hotel you’re staying at, which restaurants you’re going to, and which flights you’re arriving on. Posting your travel photos while you’re still on vacation is like given an open invitation for someone to come and rob your home.
There are criminals out there who troll social media all the time looking for opportunities to get information about people to defraud, scam or rob.  They do this for a living. It doesn’t have to be a stranger at times. It could be your friend’s delinquent brother who is seeing your post from your vacation and decides to break into your home
You should hold your vacation status until you get home. Save them on your phone to post after all. Refrain from posting travel countdowns in the lead up to your trip. You may just be giving criminals the time for planning to stage an attack against you

8). Lack of  Purpose
90% of social media users got involved in social networking by impulse-which means that they do not go online with a social networking plan in mind, you need a clear purpose for your activities on social media and you need a plan on how to achieve this purpose. Before you go back online, ask yourself these simple questions: what do I want to achieve with my social media activities?
Only interact with factual posts on social media. Do not respond to posts or share posts that you cannot validate: Be very mindful of what you post, share or respond to. if you share wrong, unverified content, you expose your mediocrity to people interacting with your post and this might hurt you gravely.
Pay attention to what you post online. Evaluate your activities and be sure it aligns with your values. Beware of negativity and criticism especially of your profession or relating to any authority that you are subject to. Always focus on posts that add value to people. As a rule of thumb, ask the following questions when you are about to make any post:

Would it make my audience say thank you?
Would it make my boss, customers or investor say thank you?
Would it make my family say thank you?
Would I ever regret posting this?
Reinvent your social media experience in such a way that People that matters would want to connect with you. Kindly share your thoughts and contributions. It will help expand our thought and those of our readers. Remember to like and share

By Olusegun Solaogun

CEO: Firstway Bookshop

Website:https://www.firstwaybookshop.com