How To Create An Attractive MySpace Profile

If you are thinking in terms of MySpace.com as being a great place to network with other business professionals and promote your business at the same time, you are right. The potential for expanding public awareness of your business through MySpace is virtually unlimited. However, if your profile is to stand out, there are a few basic ideas you need to keep in mind.

First, you want your profile to be easy to load. You know from your own web searches that nothing is quite as exasperating as researching for a vendor on the Internet, finally coming across a likely prospect, only to find yourself having to navigate through animation and other bells and whistles. For people that want to get to solid information, including contact names, emails, and phone numbers, having to wade through slow loading special effects can be such a turn off that they back up and look elsewhere.

MySpace.com does allow for both fixed backgrounds as well as animated backgrounds. If you really want to make sure the page loads quickly (and if you are targeting a residential market, where dial-up connections are still the name of the game in many parts of the country), then you will want to go with the fixed background.

Artfully created repeating backgrounds are great for many purposes, but if you want people to stop and read without visual distractions, keep it simple. The faster your page loads, the more quickly your potential customer will find out what you are all about.

Second, don’t use a lot of filler in your descriptions. You want to put a lot of fact in relatively little space. This allows people to quickly see what you do and how it can be helpful to them. Because of the blog feature on MySpace.com, you can easily include links to parts of your blog to expound on various points that you highlight on your home page. Keep the verbiage snappy and to the point.

Last, make sure the arrangement of information represents a logical succession of thought.

As an example, if you are reselling teleconference services, don’t begin with a laundry of list of how to make a conference call. Instead, lead off with information concerning the many ways people use conference calls. Once someone understands they need a conference call service, then you can educate them in proper conference call etiquette.

Using a MySpace profile to further your business interests is a great idea. By paying attention to a few basic concepts, you can ensure your profile is attractive, readable, and easy for your potential customer to navigate.

How To Design An Attractive Basic MySpace Profile

Once you’ve made the decision to create a presence on MySpace, one of the things you want to do is make sure your profile will catch the eye of people that you would be interested in getting to know. In order to do this, there are several matters you should consider.

First, there is the matter of the content of your space. MySpace.com provides you with some basic fields that you can use to share information about yourself and the reasons why you have the MySpace presence.

Before you dump just any old bit of information into these fields, consider carefully what image you want to project. In many ways, what you say about yourself and your interests on your MySpace profile is no different from what you would share on a job resume or some other public document. Make sure the text is informative and at the same time makes the reader want to know more about your or your subject matter.

Next, there is the matter of visual images to help enhance the look of your profile. When you select photos to upload to your profile, do so with an eye toward presenting the public persona that you want to portray.

As an example, if you are a single person who wants to meet other singles in your area, it is probably not the smartest move to upload a bunch of pictures of you with love interests from years past. Instead, focus on using recent pictures of yourself that show you at your best. If you look great in business attire, then have one shot that shows you dressed up.

Perhaps you like to play tennis or bowl; include a shot of yourself having a good time engaged in your favorite sport.

Remember! That the photos should show you as you are today and honestly portray part of your life.

Color schemes are important as well. You may want to include some sort of cartoons or sketches as part of the images you upload. That is great, as long as the images tell something about you and your outlook on life. Make sure the look of your pages is pleasing to the eye, not jarring or hard to read because of the template choices. You want people to find your page and settle down to read your profile, not take one look and head for the next site on the search engine.

MySpace.com offers a number of tools to help people with their profiles. Check out the tutorials they have on the site, and you are sure to find some great ideas that will work for you.

How To Contact Celebrities On MySpace

How To Contact Celebrities On MySpace

According to a recent Nielsen/NetRatings survey, 46 million people visited MySpace in July 2006, each spending an average of two hours and 15 minutes on the site. So what makes MySpace so popular? First it lets users create their own free profile, including photos, videos, and music. Users can also completely customize the layout, colors, and text of their profiles including blogs, event announcements, bulletin posts, and more.

Celebrities know that one of the benefits of being on MySpace is that when they make a post to their MySpace blog talking about something they're working on or announce an event such as a live appearance or autograph signing, their messages will be viewed directly by their fans without having to rely on email lists, spend a lot of money on advertising, etc. that may or may not get their message out in time.

Extremely popular with teens and young adults, MySpace is part of a growing new trend on the Internet of social networking sites. Although there are multiple social networking sites online including Friendster, Facebook, and Xanga. MySpace is the most popular. It also has the most celebrities as real members. MySpace is so popular, in fact, that News Corp. bought it for $580 million.

To use MySpace, first you set up your profile. Then you invite your friends to link their profiles to yours and that's when the fun begins! Most of the people linking to you and to your friends will have the same interests, live in the same town, etc. So it's a great way to keep in touch with old friends and also make new ones, which is why MySpace is called a "social networking" site. Think of it like six degrees of separation (but in actuality it's more like three degrees online!).

Although MySpace is currently used mostly by teens, more young adults and adults are signing up every day (including celebrities). So despite what you may have heard about old men setting up profiles on MySpace to lure young children, most people use it to keep in touch with other people like themselves and to make new friends. You can search for people by zip code, city, high school, college, networking category (marketing, publishing, etc.), and more. This lets you find other people you already know or would like to meet, because they share either the same background or the same interests, career, or hobbies you do.

MySpace allows its users to share intimate details about their life (sometimes a little too intimate!) that you would perhaps never learn without it since most people put on airs in person. As society becomes more and more socially cut off with technological advances like caller id, email, and text messages, people are now looking for more and more ways to connect on a personal level while still utilizing "cool" technology. MySpace lets them do just that, and celebrities are no exception. They can now communicate with their fans without having to give out their personal information. Now when they meet their fans they can say "look me up on MySpace and send me a message!"

Larger-than-life celebrities use MySpace to promote themselves. Madonna, for instance, posts news about her latest album releases, song downloads, screen savers, and more on her profile (http://www.myspace.com/madonna). Recently it linked to MTV.com so fans could vote for her in the five MTV Video Music Awards categories she was nominated for. Celebrities like Madonna make no qualms about using MySpace as a savvy marketing and promotional tool.

However, many celebrities actually set up their profiles themselves, read their messages, and respond to fans directly. Janice Dickinson, the former "love her or hate her" judge on America's Next Top Model has her own profile (http://www.myspace.com/janicedickinsonmodels). She used it to announce casting calls for her reality show The Janice Dickinson Modeling Agency on Oxygen, and lists Jose Canseco as one of her top friends. Adult star Jenna Jameson uses her profile (http://www.myspace.com/jennajameson) to blog about her life and show off photos of herself with stars like Paris Hilton. (Of course, Paris has her own profile (http://www.myspace.com/parishilton) with sister Nikki Hilton as one of her friends as well). Kathy Griffin's latest assistant got hired because she sent a message to Kathy's MySpace profile (http://www.myspace.com/kathy_griffin). She explained she was looking to get into the entertainment industry as an assistant, and it just so happened Kathy was looking to hire one.

So how do you know if the celebrity's profile is real or not? (Unfortunately, there are many celebrity imposters--also known as "fakers"--on MySpace.) There are three main ways to tell: number of friends, personal photos, and the profile's design. Usually, the celebrity's profile with the most friends is the official one. For example, if there are two profiles for Madonna, and one has 200,000 friends and the other has 48 friends, you can bet the one with 200,000 friends is hers. (As of this writing, her official profile has 195,820 friends.) The second way to tell is if the celebrity's profile includes any personal and/or candid photos. You usually have to have your own profile in order to view photos, so you'll need to create one on MySpace first (see below). Imposters usually don't have personal photos of the celebrity. The third main way to tell if a celebrity's profile is real is how professionally the profile is designed. MySpace knows that celebrity profiles bring in a lot of users, so they work to make sure the celebrity's profile is customized and professional. Imposter profiles will not look as slick.

To set up your own MySpace profile, visit http://www.myspace.com and click on Sign Up in the top right-hand corner. From there, fill out the information it asks for and follow the rest of the instructions. After you've set up your profile, you can download profile templates from sites like MyGen. Do a search on Google for "myspace profile templates" to find other similar sites.

After you've set up your own MySpace profile, you can send private messages to celebrities you find after you add them as friends. Since most celebrities understand that when you add them as friends to your profile they may gain additional fans among your friends, they'll usually approve your friend request even though they don't know you. You can also post comments on their page that includes your picture. A great way to request a free autographed photo from the star is to send a message to the one you want one from, making sure to include your name and address in the message.

For a constantly-updated list of celebrities on MySpace, visit http://www.CelebritiesOnMySpace.com .

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Jordan McAuley is the Founder of www.ContactAnyCelebrity.com located in West Hollywood, California. His online database contains the best mailing address, agent, manager, publicist, production company, and charitable cause for over 54,000 celebrities and public figures worldwide. You can reprint this article as long as you link it back to www.contactanycelebrity.com or earn 50% monthly recurring commissions when you join our affiliate program at www.contactanycelebrity.com/affiliates and link back to it as an affiliate.