#UOSM2008 Topic 6: Module Reflection
Digital literacy is becoming ever more important as our dependence on technology grows. The internet has become a strong presence in our everyday lives and we use it for a myriad of purposes: socialising, working, learning and even ordering our weekly shops or booking our dinner reservations. However, many of us are unsure of how to use the Internet to its full potential. Wanting to pursue a career in digital marketing, I needed to understand and learn how to harness this potential, which this module was perfect for. It allowed me to explore the digital realm and provided me with a breadth of knowledge and skills that are in great demand from employers.
When I embarked on the course, I was keen to develop my professional profile, as I needed to find an internship for my year in industry – a compulsory component of my degree. A personās online presence can be a major factor in deciding whether they get a job, and in the competitive world of entry-level employment this could be a make or break factor. Thus, I knew it was vital to find ways to stand out from the crowd. Ā I set out by building an about.me page and created a vizifyĀ to display my online activity. I was also keen to update my online profiles. Below you can see how I have developed my twitter.
Throughout the module I learnt a lotĀ and was able to build a strong personal brand online, which lead to me landing a fantastic internship at IBM. One comment that I received during the congratulatory phone call was that they particularly liked my blog. They found it valuable to see my writing style and my digitally competency. As Schools & Universities Attraction Coordinator, it will be my job to manage a number of social media pages, the graduate recruitment webpage and blogs. Across all these tasks I will be able to apply the knowledge learnt throughout this course.
One of the many things that I became aware of during the module is clout. Clout is sometimes referred to as a āsocial currencyā, which is really a value associated with your online brand. When I first started the module my clout score according to http://klout.com/Ā was only 20. To put this in perspective, Obama, one of the most influential nodes on Twitter, has a clout of 99. Now, at the end of the module, my clout has grown 42 due to my proactive personal branding tactics. Below, I have included a graph showing how my clout has developed.
I enjoyed the peer review aspect of the course. It encouraged conversation and information sharing, which allowed for a continuous learning experience. It was beneficial to be able to see otherās work and opinions. It was often the case that we had taken very different directions with the topic, so reading other work provided a wealth of information I had not included in my own.Ā It also encouraged me to become more active on Twitter, which was great for networking. I have connected and chatted with a number of marketing and social media companies, which Iām sure will be invaluable in the future.
I have really enjoyed writing my blog, and given the success it has brought me I will definitely continue to do so. My aim is to build-up a collection of works on digital marketing to manage and promote my professional profile further.Ā All-in-all, Ā the course provided me with a great deal of experience; it was valuable to have the time to think about my career path and ways of increasing my employability.