Mixing Private and Business Personas

Posted June 15th, 2009 by Thad Peterson

I'm trying to work through whether it's best to try to keep your private and professional personas seperate when using social media. Anybody else grappling with this? What conclusions have you come to?

I'm leaning towards the conclusion that social media is all about people connecting with people, and so your true personality is bound to come out -- no real point in trying to hide who you are as a person. Furthermore, people are probably more likely to be interested in you and your knowledge if they have a sense of what you're like as a person. In some ways, I think small businesses can really use this to their advantage.

Very curious to get other people's thoughts on this.

What I want to know is why

dsgfysdz 1 week 1 day 14 hours 22 min ago

What I want to know is why you didnt think to include the other side of this issue ? There are so many things that youre missing here that I dont see how you could actually form an intelligent opinion on the subject. Its like you didnt even consider that there me be another side here. Best-In-Bedding.com

They will eventually find out...

GuadaPaga 2 years 32 weeks 1 day 3 hours ago

I've found that, even when you try to present yourself as "almost perfect" and a very interesting person who never makes mistakes, who you are will eventually show so why delay the process? I have only one account and I mix my professional life with my personal life. I'm lucky to be able to say that I've found amazing friends through professional networking and at work... and the reason we connected was that they saw something about my private persona that they liked.

What I am gearing towards...

Sophie Ouellet 2 years 33 weeks 4 days 11 hours ago

What I am gearing towards... is having 2 accounts, but without trying to conceal anything about it.

On one hand, I have our feature, Wonderword which I am trying to promote as much as possible.

On the other, I have cerebral palsy and I do all sorts of things (yoga, photograpy, translation, excetera), and to me, beng open about who I am as a person can raise awarenes and/or inspire other people.

I also believe that people interested in Wonderword might not be interested in interacting personally with me and vice versa.

I guess the way to approach it is that most clients also have a professional and a personnal life and if things are out in the open, there might not be that big of a dilemma after all...

Mixing peronas

Tyler LeCompte 2 years 33 weeks 4 days 19 hours ago

Thad,

I have heard this question asked several times by both citizens, parents, professionals and corporate communications directors, all coming to the same conclusion...you can't seperate these personas and still maintain some authenticity or transparency to your overall character. For those people that I have seen try to seperate, they have all come across as "Hiding" something...IF you want to hide something, then create a "anonymous" profile and express yourself through that (although someone will find out who you are sooner or later) although that is not the point of "social" media...

best of luck, thanks for the good question.

Tyler

This is a great answer.

Dave Lowe 2 years 33 weeks 4 days 17 hours ago

This is a great answer. Tyler's absolutely right - you cannot maintain authenticity or transparency running two profiles and hiding them from each other.

If I were more eloquent, my answer would have been like that.

Hi Thad, Its a great

Aditi Sawhney 2 years 33 weeks 5 days 13 hours ago

Hi Thad,

Its a great question, I pondered over it many times.

Good eg is : Zappos

Now Tony Hsieh, CEO of Z , maintains the Twitter account, which is a perfect blend of his personal and professional life at Zappos. I think if anyone is able to maintain that balance then its great .

My personal opinion is "same" as well, I will definitely try and give a personal touch to my professional account. Visitors to your online accounts are curious to know your other dimensions as well.

In case someone who is not comfortable in mixing both, seperate accounts are best suited in that case

Great Question:

Cheers

:-Aditi

How personal should social media be?

Rena Bernstein 2 years 34 weeks 10 hours 30 min ago

While I do agree that my business persona should include personal aspects of who I am, I do have significant reservations about having photos of my kids, or conversations between myself and old college buddies about the "glory days" being mixed in with my professional advice to clients.

I do maintain a professional Facebook page where I include some of my friends and I invite clients, associates twitter friends and vendors to join me, but my family, personal life and personal friends remain seperate.

I have nothing to hide, but the thought of clients seeing a photo of me at a friends BBQ tagged where maybe I was having a little "too much fun" or on vacation I think is just unecessary when it comes to maintaining a personal relationship with them and could affect my professional image.

I cannot account for what friends might say or which images they may tag and I see no more reason to display that level of my personal life anymore than I would go to a meeting in pajamas. I'm not hiding anything, but I would like to maintain a professional image.

I have 2 accounts with a fair amount of overlap. Its more work, but I am more comfortable with it.

Personal is good to an extent

Sarah Gill 2 years 32 weeks 5 days 16 hours ago

I agree with Rena - I don't feel entirely comfortable with my professional world contacts having access to all my personal photos and interactions with my group of friends.

Equally my business profiles do have an element of the personal in them, but it's more controllable in terms of how much I want to share and I can decide what is acceptable and what isn't! Gives me the chance to restrict the holiday photos from general consumption!

I was just thinking the same

Kelli Poliska 2 years 34 weeks 10 hours 55 min ago

I was just thinking the same thing right before I looked at this forum. It's good to know I'm not the only one wondering this.

I agree with what others have said, as long as you avoid TMI, merging your personal and professional personas online is a good idea. I think that it's better to let your personality show through, plus juggling two different sides can be complicated. Allowing the two to mix makes you more approachable.

Thanks for posing this question!

Mixing Private and Business Personas

Lori Santa Maria 2 years 34 weeks 13 hours 43 min ago

When I started joining Twitter, Friendfeed, Facebook, etc. I too was torn on professional versus personal. I started very business and then found it easier and more enjoyable to just be myself. I figure that as long as I'm not giving TMI, it's good to show personality. Plus, if I ever do business with anyone from my social network they'll already know a little about me and what they'll be getting themselves into. :D

Lori

Thanks

Thad Peterson 2 years 34 weeks 10 hours 37 min ago

Thanks Lori. Good to know we arrived at a similar conclusion.

It's a balancing act...

Zeenat Rasheed 2 years 34 weeks 13 hours 43 min ago

Thank goodness! Someone else feels like me!

I have been grappling with this question for a while. I started using social media solely for personal use, and so my profiles linked to my personal blog and my Twitter handle was a nickname-based username. Then, I began following marketing professionals and entrepreneurs on Twitter, and started using it for professional reasons... it didn't make sense for me to continue being personal with that type of audience... but I was hesitant to "change my personality" because I thought I should be me, and not compromise on that.

Eventually, I did crumble under the pressure to be professional, so Ichanged my Twitter handle and started linking to my LinkedIn profile and began a professional blog (also working on a professional website of my own). The content of what I say hasn't really changed or been censored, perhaps I'm a little more "interesting on purpose", but otherwise I haven't changed what I say - just how people know/find me.

I think you can choose to keep your identities separate - maybe create a personal Twitter a/c and a professional one (although Twitter does not yet allow you to link two usernames to one email address, hope that changes soon) - but that might get very tiring, very fast. It may just be easier to have one identity that balances out work and play - at least that's what worked for me.

FYI, you can follow me on Twitter @zeenatrasheed.

I am in the same situation

Sophie Ouellet 2 years 33 weeks 5 days 13 hours ago

My first interest in Facebook was completely personnal..

Now it's like, "whoa! gotta roll back, my business needs this stuff!

@lsophie09

Balance is key

Shae Laughhunn 2 years 34 weeks 9 hours 21 min ago

I think it's a really good idea that you changed your profile name. Although you are sharing the same information, you can't really be taken seriously when your profile is something like BabyGirl. Probably not the persona you want in your professional life.

But there is still the need to show your personality and your true ideas. This is a BIG challenge for me, although I see great examples of it all over Twitter and Facebook. Probably one of the best examples of how this should be done is the CEO at Zappos, Tony (@zappos). He once actually tweeted about losing his chapstick. Classic! His followers feel really connected to him, but it's not too personal where you feel like you know WAY TOO MUCH information. And once you feel like he is a genuine person, you want to learn more about his company.

I think the best thing is to just be yourself. You'll feel at ease which will make your followers (potential leads/customers) at ease.

Thanks

Thad Peterson 2 years 34 weeks 10 hours 36 min ago

Somehow it's reassuring to know others are grappling with this :)

I say together

Dave Lowe 2 years 34 weeks 13 hours 46 min ago

Your conclusion is on-point. I always think it's best to be yourself online. Not only is it extremely genuine, but it allows you to connect to people on different levels of formality (business contacts and friends in one place). Obviously, there are some sharing concerns with your private life that you have to watch out for, but that shouldn't be anything new for folks that have been online for a while.

I still reserve my Facebook account for primarily just friends and social media folks I've actually met in person or have had extensive contact with. Other than that, the field is open.

Chris Brogan (twitter.com/chrisbrogan) and Jason Falls (twitter.com/jasonfalls) would be two great people to discuss this with.

I'm with you...

Thad Peterson 2 years 34 weeks 10 hours 35 min ago

on the Facebook comment. If I made that accessible to the world, it would be outright embarrasing :)

Generally Agree

Eileen Bettelheim 2 years 34 weeks 10 hours 50 min ago

Are there some topics where personal and private cannot overlap? Where do personal politics or religion fit into the discussion?

Thats a relevant issue for me

Dave Lowe 2 years 34 weeks 10 hours 25 min ago

Thats a relevant issue for me as well. I'm pretty vocal about my political beliefts, but I just keep them offline.

I would advise seperate accounts or keep the discussion analog.

Yes!

Thad Peterson 2 years 34 weeks 10 hours 34 min ago

That's another concern I have. They say you're not supposed to talk politics at work. But I love talking about politics. And now Twitter is a professional venue (on some levels). It's a conundrum! :)

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