Here in Day 5 of our "Top Tips for a Successful New Year Career" we're talking about the importance of your profile on-line as part of your job search. Many job seekers still ignore the importance of managing their on-line profiles even though 35% of employers have rejected candidates prior to meeting them purely based on stuff they find on the internet about them. So - what do you need to be aware of? Firstly, from a business perspective, LinkedIn has to be one of the 'go to' places for potential future employers, if for no other reason than that's the search that's most likely to come up when your name is googled. Make sure your profile is at 100%. It requires a little bit of effort but really not very much. Get some endorsements on there from co-workers, clients or business partners and try to get some recommendations (but avoid those that are just reciprocal - most clients will see through this). Be careful what you tweet. Take a look at our article about Waitrose who fell in to hot water after a slightly misguided twitter campaign. If your personal twitter profile is the same as your business one and easily findable (ie it's the same as your name), then just make sure you're being relatively discreet about the nature of your tweets and be particularly careful about being too outspoken on any issue - you never know who you might offend.

Facebook is potentially the highest risk area for you in your job search. It can become the window the your soul, showing your true colours on everything from how you generally communicate with your friends to your personal preferences on cars, cosmetics or careers. We appreciate that often media like Facebook will seem personal to you however you'd be amazed how many rogue pictures end up online and with you tagged in them. Beware! There are of course many different platforms on-line where you can become 'exposed' so just be aware that your profile here may well form the initial part of a selection procedure - would you want to be rejected because of it? For more information watch this video excerpt from a workshop we ran recently. http://youtu.be/DSU40rfkOhI Join us tomorrow where we'll talk about the value and importance of networking (I know - you hate it - but it works!)