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Tips for Great Avatars & Profile Pics

January 5, 2012

 

How important is your profile picture? Very.

If a picture really is worth a thousand words, than our profile pictures speak volumes. They serve as visual representations of ourselves and our companies/brands in the online world. You want to make sure you are representing yourself well.

Regardless of what people say, we all judge books by their covers. In social media, your avatar is your book cover. It can make the difference between someone reading what you have to say or scrolling right past it.

Some tips for having great avatars and profile pictures…

Consider the medium.

Your avatar on Twitter should be different than your profile picture on LinkedIn, and rightly so. They are social media outlets that serve very different functions. It isn’t crucial that your photo be the same across all your online outlets, but that your photo matches the platform it’s on. Twitter and Facebook are considered more conversational and personal. They lend themselves to profile pics that are fun and casual expressions of yourself. LinkedIn is professional and corporate. Your profile picture for those types of networking sites, or any platform where you specifically represent a company or brand, should be engaging but professional.

Size matters.

There is nothing more frustrating then clicking on someone’s avatar to get a closer look, only to discover the owner uploaded a tiny image. Use large pictures to avoid small, blurry, pixelated images.

Don’t change your photo too often.

On Twitter and Facebook where we quickly scan through the timeline to read only the bits we’re interested in, profile picture recognition is key. When you change your avatar often, it makes it more difficult for people to readily identify you and follow along with your conversations online. That doesn’t mean you should never change it — just avoid changing it every other week!

What would you add?
What tips do you have for profile pics?
Cross & Crown

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