Everybody wants the blue check. On social media, possessing a verified account is an important mark of status, and it’s something all college athletes should want.
However, achieving that distinction is a process that should be carefully respected. That is the advice of Jim Cavale, one of the nation’s leading experts on personal branding and CEO and founder of Influencer (INFLCR), a software-as-a-service that helps teams partner with their brand ambassadors to grow each other’s social-media audience.
“Social media verifications are something I get asked about all the time,” Cavale says. “If you’re not verified on one of the platforms, I’m sure it’s something you’re interested it. But the reality is getting verified is something your school and team should help you with, and not something you should pursue on your own — especially if it means responding to a direct message from somebody promising you that opportunity.”
Cavale warns that the promise of quick and easy verification can come with significant risk, as a prominent college football star unfortunately learned this summer.
“One of our clients had an athlete earlier this year who did respond to a direct message and ended up getting hacked, lost access to his entire account and it was a really big project for us to work with Instagram to get his account back in his hands,” Cavale says. “Don’t let that be you. Follow the process.
“Build your following responsibly, get engagement from your followers and talk to the people who lead the media side of team and ask them about verifications. If they want, we’ll actually help them get on a portal with Twitter, Instagram or whoever else so that they can help you do that.”
ABOUT INFLCR
Influencer (INFLCR) is a social media CRM that allows teams and leagues to efficiently distribute their digital assets across the social channels of their most effective brand ambassadors (student-athletes, coaches, recruits prominent alumni and fans) while being able to track and measure the reach and performance of the content at scale via a convenient dashboard. With INFLCR, teams can store, share and track their digital assets (game photos, videos, etc.) as they flow through the social media channels of their brand ambassadors. Learn more at inflcr.com
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