School’s back in
session; now that summer’s over, most college students will be seriously entrenched in
classes, social life, and hopefully saving some brain cells for thinking about
their future career.
Before assignments start
piling up, take a pause to read these essential social media tips to help you save some cash and
for making that transition past the commencement gates easier:
1. Undo The Evidence Of Your Summer Fun On
Facebook
Did you have a great
summer? Maybe your future lover doesn’t want to see all the steamy details.
“Yes, you’re the only one,” works better when there aren’t hometown flings on
your Facebook timeline. Before school gets back to full swing, you should take
some time to review your timeline. Do the pictures paint the story you want to
tell your college buds? Set any undesirable posts to “Me Only” so you can keep
the memories without the shame. Try using a social media monitoring service
call Reppler.com.
2. Ask Your Friends About Their Summer
Jobs
Ever hear the
expression, “most jobs come from your network”? Well your college friends
are your network, and will become extremely valuable connections for you after
you graduate. Find out what your friends did, where they worked, over the
summer. Could be they have connections at a company you might want an
introduction into later on. What could be more flattering than to receive a
Facebook message from a friend asking you how your summer job went and what you
did there! Be interesting by being interested.
3. Sell Your Old Textbooks On
Half.com
The textbook industry
has it all figured out. They put the edition and year on each book, and then
get the classes to require the newest edition. But only very rarely are the
changes from year to year that significant. Greek history 2013 is probably not
too far off from Greek history 2014! Your college bookstore won’t give you more
than 20% of retail on your books. But if you sell your books on Half or Amazon,
you could get over 50% of the book’s value.
4. Rent Your New Textbooks On Kindle
There is something nice
about thumbing through a book. But there is also something nice about paying
only $19 to rent a digital textbook instead of paying $100 for ten pounds of
lower back pain to carry around all semester. With Kindle, you can take notes,
highlight, and even Tweet favorite passages. Consider renting your required
reading instead of killing trees this year.
5. Update Your Summer Job On LinkedIn
The longer you wait to
include your summer work on your LinkedIn profile, the more you’re going to
forget the details of what you did. Sure, it might not have been a dream job,
but it still counts as work experience. When I was looking for work after my
MBA program, I’ll never forget one interview question that took me by surprise,
“What kind of work did you do when you were an undergrad?”
The interviewer said
that nothing shows work-ethic more than when a student spends their summer
earning their own money rather than spending their parent’s money. So don’t
undervalue what you’ve done this summer. Record your work experience in your
LinkedIn profile. Also, try adding some of these new elements to your
profile: The New LinkedIn Profile Improvement Tool.
6. Get Summer Job Recommendations
Not only will you forget
the details of your job once school starts, but your boss will probably forget
about how much they liked you. With online job seeking, one of the most
powerful elements you bring to the table is what other people think about you.
In years past, this used to be a very formal process. You’d have to request a
letter of recommendation from your boss. Then they’d ask you to write it and
they’d sign it. These days, all you need is a few short paragraphs on your
LinkedIn profile. These notes from past managers will be assets that will serve
you well once you start your career search.
7. Use Mint To Budget Your Expenses
Ever ask yourself why
credit card companies promote their plastic so relentlessly on your campus?
It’s because they know many students will use their cards and not pay back the
debt for years. Then they can charge you fees and interest, while they fly in
their private jets. Stop funding private jets (unless it’s yours). Use an easy
and free budgeting tool to make sure you don’t overspend this semester. Mint.com
is a free financial management website that aggregates your bank accounts and
credit cards into one place.
8. Google Yourself To See Your Online
Reputation
Go ahead. I dare you.
Our generation has the unique advantage of being online from an early age. This
means you’ve been building an online reputation whether you know it
or not. Once your online reputation gets a blemish, it’s rather hard to fix.
Use a tool called BrandYourself.com to grade your online reputation and
get some free tips for improving it.
9. Manage Your Schedule With Google
Calendar Features
I haven’t use a paper
planner in years. I know some people love them. But when you have all of your
classes, clubs and meetings in one Google Calendar, your schedule is everywhere
you need it to be: on your phone and computer. You don’t have to shade out
three months of classes, only to find out after a week that you don’t like your
professor and will not take that class after all. Changing a calendar event is
simply a matter of deleting, not erasing. You can even put an inspiring photo
of yourself at the beach as the backdrop to help ease some of that mid-semester
stress. If your school hasn’t switched to the Google platform, use your Gmail
account.
10. Use RateMyProfessor.com to Save
Yourself
My $100,000 life lesson was, your education is only as good as the
professors who teach your classes. I don’t care what university you go it, if
your professor is tired, burnt out or just plain uninspired; your semester will
be hell. I’ve been to community college classes with the most enthusiastic
professors I’d ever seen. I’ve been to Ivy League classes with a washed up
professor who could put coffee to sleep. After you register for the class
because you think the title is interesting, head on over to RateMyProfessor.com to
make sure the professor can deliver.
www.careerealism.com
