Your Web Presence – Is it unique or generic?

A big part of Personal Marketing is promotion.

As you may have read in “Personal Marketing (Promotion)” I suggest that part of promoting yourself involves posting to a blog or participation in forums and commenting on blogs.  As you start participating in discussions on the web you will start to get noticed.

How are you noticed?

  • Your Avatar will be displayed
  • Your words will be read

Avatar: a graphical image that represents a person, as on the Internet.

“avatar.” Dictionary.com Unabridged. Random House, Inc. 08 Oct. 2009.

<Dictionary.com http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/avatar>.

Is your Avatar a big sideways “G”?  That’s an indicator that you haven’t setup an Avatar yet.  So you are associating your name and comment with a Generic Brand.  If you don’t want that to happen, then you might want to read on.

How do I setup an Avatar, so I won’t appear as a big “G’ or a Generic brand Avatar?

You need a Globally Recognized Avatar.  There is a service called Gravatar.com, see the video that follows to see more details about what a Gravatar is.

To setup a Gravatar is a very simple process:

  1. Read “Resizing your image for social network profile” before you setup your Gravatar.  You need the right scale image to make your Gravatar look good.
  2. Make sure you have an image ready that’s Gravatar sized.
  3. Visit Gravatar.com
  4. Click the Get a Gravatar Today button or visit Gravatar signup page.
  5. Enter your email address you want associated with your Avatar
  6. Click Sign up button
  7. Expect a confirmation email, check your junk email folder if you don’t receive a confirmation email.
  8. Confirm your email
  9. Login
  10. upload your Avatar
  11. Logout
  12. Verify your Gravatar is working, by posting a comment on this post.

Note: You might have to flush your browser cache in order to see your Gravatar show up.

Gravatar Overview Video

https://videopress.com/v/UyDfmflZ

About Wes Johnson

Wes Johnson is a software engineer with extensive experience developing desktop applications. He has also developed firmware for consumer electronics and OEM boards. His experties is C and C++ programming.
This entry was posted in Blog, Branding and tagged , , . Bookmark the permalink.

13 Responses to Your Web Presence – Is it unique or generic?

  1. Ray says:

    Checked in to test drive gravatar

  2. Ray says:

    Interesting

  3. Wes Johnson says:

    One extra note, you can have the same gravatar for multiple emails.

  4. Ray says:

    My observation “Interesting,” put into “Ray Context” relates to years of business experience where discussions about strategy and execution were common place. I see things in two ways. The first is the idea, or the strategy. Second is the execution, how is strategy translated into executable tactics in order to achieve the goal.

    The Gravatar post was “Interesting,” because you clearly stated the strategy, defined the terms and the executable steps to successfully configure a personal Gravatar.

  5. Jeff Martinez says:

    One of my favorite mrwes posts.

  6. Matt says:

    Wes, thanks for the great tip.

    I actually always wondered how people did that.

  7. Pingback: Linking209.com | Blog | Don't forget your Gravatar

  8. Jim P says:

    Checking to see if my Gravatar worked.

  9. Jim & Julie says:

    Did our Gravatar work?

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