Career Advancement with Social Networking Technology

 We hear it over and over again. It's not about what you know, but who you know. If you're like most people, you probably have at least 200 people in your rolodex. Having contacts is one thing. Making the most of those relationships is another challenge altogether.

With busy schedules, effectively staying in touch with people and using connections to get doors opened is difficult. Just within the past few months, technology has been developed to meet these challenges and help people make the most of their social networks. This technology is appropriately called "social networking software."

Of course the most basic technology in this area is having an electronic address book. Microsoft Outlook is basically the industry standard program to use. After inputting your contacts in Outlook, you can synchronize with a personal digital assistant (like the Palm pilot). You can also use Outlook to interface with any of the major social networking applications out there, including all of the ones mentioned in this article.

Keeping in Touch

If you have 300 contacts in your address book but you only keep in touch with 40 of them on a regular basis, the remaining 260 contacts are in danger of going "stale." Think of what happens when you flip through your card file or rolodex and come across a contact you haven't heard from for a couple years. Unless you knew the person well, chances are you'll just throw out the card. You may not ever remember how you met them!

A social networking software program called RelationshipSecure was developed to address this specific problem. It provides several features that help you maintain your existing relationships and keep them from getting stale. It provides a verification feature that lets you send out e-mail mailings to your contacts asking them if their information is correct. If it isn't, they can make any changes necessary and your Outlook address book is updated automatically. It also lets you send out other mailings like Birthday and Anniversary e-greeting cards.

To find out more about RelationshipSecure, visit www.RelationshipSecure.com.

Expanding your Network

While RelationshipSecure is a powerful tool for maintaining your existing relationships, other companies have developed technology to help you expand your network of contacts. These concepts aren't mutually exclusive: in fact, it makes sense that you'd want to keep in touch with people so that the relationship won't have gone cold by the time you need to ask them for an introduction, a job, a meeting, etc.

LinkedIn.com is one of the most popular services for expanding your network by getting introduced to other people who can help you move ahead in your career. How it works is this: you enter your contacts' email addresses or import them from Outlook. LinkedIn then gives you a window into people your contacts know and depending on their privacy settings, the ability to contact people who may be able to help you. LinkedIn.com is most popular among executives and other high-level professionals because of the exclusive nature of their service and its powerful privacy features.

Ryze.com is another service similar to LinkedIn.com, but with fewer privacy controls. It is not as popular among executives but it's worth checking out, especially if you want to network with people who aren't in LinkedIn's demographic.

Reaching Recruiting Contacts

While these tools provide a powerful way for you to tap your existing networking resources, it may be the case that you have to reach out of your network to find someone who can help you. I recommend using a service like ResumeArrow.com to get your resume in front of recruiters and employers you wouldn't be able to reach otherwise.

About the Author

Scott Brown is the author of the Job Search Handbook (http://www.JobSearchHandbook.com). As editor of the HireSites.com weekly newsletter on job searching, Scott has written many articles on the subject. He wrote the Job Search Handbook to provide job seekers with a complete yet easy to use guide to finding a job effectively.

 Scott Brown

More Articles 

Career Advice - Richard Lowe
I often get asked questions about careers in IT (Information Technology). After all, I've been a Vice President of Consulting (twice for two different companies), Vice President of Development, Senior Technical specialist many times and now I am a...

What a Career Coach Can or Cannot Do For You - Marilyn Tellez
I want to start with what I think good career coaches do for people who are looking for new jobs, facing downsizing, ready to retire, but want to work longer, etc. Any category of job seeker is who we want to work with. I'll start with my own...

Are You Sabotaging Your Career? - Brent Filson
My experience working with thousands of leaders world wide for the past two decades teaches me that most leaders are screwing up their careers. On a daily basis, these leaders are getting the wrong results or the right results in the wrong...

Make The Right Career Move - Colin Ong TS
It is not realistic for HR Managers to believe that there will not be any staff turnover in the organisation. Having regular staff turnover need not be a negative proposition as it may imply that the industry is very dynamic. There are also...

No Knowledge No College GOODBYE Career - Kacy Carr
Wondering what to give the children for Christmas, wondering what gives joy, wondering how to educate/occupy and provide fun at the same time. Well stop wondering because we now have the eighth wonder of the world, and that is the Internet. ...

Starting A Career In Another Country - Dana Goldberg
There are few things in the world quite as exciting as moving overseas and trying to get a job. Starting a new career overseas can be difficult but if you follow some key steps it is not half as hard as some would have you believe. The very first...

Home Inspection School - The start to a bright Career - http www InspectorJoeHomeInspection com
A /Home Inspection School offers extensive home study and classroom courses in order to help you become a quality inspector or to increase your skills if you are already in the Home Inspection business. Home Inspection Training schools train...

Career Planning Advice: Avoid the 10 Success Killers! - Paul Megan
Sticking to fundamental business principles is the basis for successful career planning. To us this means that our customers are able to lock up job high-paying offers in as little as 14 days or less. Old-fashioned methods that require...

Speakers, Communicate Your Speaking Career To The Next Level: Top 7 Tips To Talk Your Way To The Top - Karen Friedman
Not too long ago, I walked into a room where some of the country's top oncologists were preparing to launch a new cancer-fighting drug. The occasion was the group's rehearsal before a big presentation to the Federal Drug Administration....

Networking: Some Basic Tips to Improve Your Career - Teve Torbes
Everyone is always talking about "networking" - you see people all the time who got jobs that you don't think they're the best person for, or you watch people pass over you because they've got the right friends. Networking is something everyone...

9 Ways to Catapult Your Affiliate Marketing Career - Jason Gazaway
Affiliate marketing involves the promotion of a website by a person known as the affiliate. He is the one who acts as the middleman between the merchant and the customer. The nature of an affiliate’s job is to advertise and promote a merchant’s...

Lying on Your Resume Could Be the Best Thing You Could Do For Your Career - Derek Johnson
Lying on Your Resume Could Be the Best Thing You Could Do For Your Career By Derek Johnson Have you ever been passed over for a job despite the fact you KNEW you could've done the job in a stellar fashion? Are you frustrated...