How Personal Do You Get in Your Business?

February 15, 2008

I often find that people comment on the fact that they like how I share myself with the outside world. I post photos and videos that provide some insight into my life. Whether it’s about my dogs, my husband or my family and friends, people feel like they get to know who I am.

Even though most people appreciate that and I do encourage others to infuse some of their personal life, I do have to caution that too much can be a bad thing.

One of the most common places I see this over-sharing of personal information is on social networking sites like Facebook. Business owners don’t segregate their personal Facebook profile from their business one and too much information is shared over these types of mediums.

Think about this - what if one of your personal friends wrote about an experience you shared that was particularly embarrassing or was something that could potentially damage your reputation. It may have even happened a long time ago and you may have gotten over that period in your life but let’s say that this friend wrote about it on your Facebook profile.

Your clients and colleagues see this and are mortified and whatever this thing is, it damages your reputation and causes you to lose potential clients. This very thing would have been prevented if you had a profile JUST for business and one JUST for personal.

Now, I do realize that is an extreme case but think about even your personality or your tone when you are with your friends as opposed to your business colleagues. You don’t want to confuse your clients by having split personalities and showing a totally different side so keep your two lives separate.

Your clients don’t need to know that you partied last weekend nor do they need to know that your best friend had a baby. Keep it focused on either your business or your personal life and all parties will appreciate it.

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