Handles: Creating a name for yourself

You all have a 'given' name, but what do your friends or family call you?

If your name is Robert, people at work may call you Rob, your friends may call you Bob, and your family may call you Robbie.

These are all names or 'handles' that others use to identify you based on the persona that you represent with them. It is something that is easy to say or use and clearly is recognizable as you.

What about on the web or social media? Who are you? How do people find you, specifically? What is your handle?

A username is used to identify a unique person in a network or within a software system.  This is the primary security method companies implement to identify users within their systems and networks. Typically, companies assign usernames. With the public use of the internet and the web, individuals have been required to create their own usernames for the different web services, such as email accounts that they have setup.

The difficulty is that a person may end up with many different user names. This can create confusion for not only the user, but also for those attempting to connect with that individual. The advent and growth of social media has made this an even more daunting task as there are many different social media tools to be used.

Ideally, there would be one identifier that could allow an individual to move between all systems and networks. This is where our digital life is all headed, a unique identifier represented by avatar software that carries the identity. However, this will take awhile as the technology and social recognition of a complete digital persona becomes accepted.

Today a person could create a domain name for which to own an IP address associated with themselves. This can be used to create a website or blogsite where others can view information about an individual. What this does not do, is to identify a person within the social networks such as Twitter, Google+, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, or Instagram.

All of the social media accounts allow a person to be identified by a unique, alphanumeric identifier, or simply a 'handle'. This 'handle', as Twitter refers to this identifier, allows individuals to create a nickname by which it is easier and quicker to identify someone uniquely within a social network. It allows an individual to create something unique by which to be found within a social network. The key is to establish one 'handle' that can be used on multiple social networks.

Social networks require the association of an email account with access to their social network. Setting up a 'handle' begins by creating a username within a web email account, such as Gmail. The username then becomes not only the name by which people can send you email, but also how they can find you in a social network. As an example, if you want to send me an email or find me in a social network, you can simply use 'dominele'.

The quandary that many people have is finding the 'handle' that will work on different social networks. The first item is to consider how you want to be identified. Is it related to just your name or is there another element of your life for which you want to build upon, such as your profession. The second item to consider is wether this 'handle' is available on the social networks. Doing both takes some time. Recommend coming up with several different 'handles' that could be used and investigating their availability at namechk.com.

Establishing an effective professional persona in social media requires that an individual be able to control how they are discovered. For now, this begins with an individual creating a name for themselves as a 'handle' that can be used in multiple social networks and as an email address.