By Summer Yang
Katie Wynkoop, a COC student who is one of the main vocalists in the band Cover Charge, uses social media to promote her music. Wynkoop has her own YouTube channel and posts her singing covers of the music she likes. She also uses Instagram to let her audience stay updated with her most recent YouTube videos.
“Social media affects my music through the ability to promote and create content better,” she said. Wynkoop stated that since social media has become really easy to access itself, there have been a whole bunch of indie songwriters rising up, which inspires her to put her music on YouTube.
Social media became the most efficient and quickest way to spread information and to gain attention or popularity.
“I feel like social media really helps you portray the way you want to be portrayed,” Wynkoop said. “Whether it’s rock, pop, or as an indie artist, social media helps me connect to people I might not meet otherwise.”
Social media has made society more connected than ever before, more and more people use social media as a way to advertise themselves.
According to the website Hootsuite, 88 percent of Americans 18-to 29-years olds uses social media and the average American Internet user has 7.1 social media accounts.
Just like all other millennials, Sugandha Kumra, a COC business major student, is very dependent on social media.
“Social media affects me both positively and negatively,” Kumra said. “Social media helps me stay in touch with people I can’t meet or live far away from me.”
Kumra stated that social media helps her keep up with what is happening around the world and the newest updates from her family and friends.
“I think social media affects me more negatively because it’s extremely addictive and wastes a lot of my time,” Kumra said.
Whenever Kumra is preparing for a test or doing her homework, the notifications on her phone always keep her away from getting work done.
“It’s hard not to check your phone when you see the notifications popping out or hear that buzzing sound,” she said. “Social media surely wastes my time and also decreases my resting time.”
Kumra said she was studying for a test and then she got a notification from a friend who lives in New York. She end up talking to her friend through social media for two hours and which lead up to her studying for her test until 1:30 a.m..
This illustrates how social media has become a huge distraction for students and is more likely to make people procrastinate.
“I am always on social media,” COC student Zoe Lozano said. “It basically consumes my whole life and I feel anxious without it.”
Lozano stated that she needs to know what is happening all the time when it comes to her favorite celebrities, shows, and films.
“It’s literally the first thing I check every morning and the last thing I am on at night,” Lozano said. “It’s terrible!”
Students had become so addicted and dependent on social media that they feel empty without using it. It also drains a lot of time.
“Social media not only drives society but is also the reflection of society,” COC Media Entertainment professor Dave Brill said.
If people see movements on Facebook or Twitter, what happens is society tends to follow along.
“Society likes to copy,” Brill said. “Society likes to have a herd mentality.”
He lists the example of Cecil, the lion that got killed about two years ago.
There was a poacher that shot this lion on a nature preserve in Africa.
“Everybody threw a fit about it,” Bril said. “So if you went on social media for the next two or three weeks, there were all these tributes to Cecil the lion.”
People going on all over Twitter and Facebook and saying things like “what a magnificent creature” or “how could you do this?” to the point it sounded like they actually knew Cecil.
“No one had any idea who Cecil was before it was killed by the poacher,” Brill said.
Society tends to conform and people like to hook into things in a herd mentality. It can happen to politics, activism and certain popular cultures. Social media breeds all those things.
“The positive effect is the connectivity people get with social media,” Brill said. “It gives people a platform which people can share common experience.”
Brill shared the examples such as Game of Thrones and Avengers: Endgame.
“Everyone is sitting there basically sort of sharing the excitement how both of these examples ended or how they played out,” Brill said.
Social media is like a build-in community with people that don’t normally know each other but can have a familiarity over some certain topics. But it can also sometimes inflame public opinions over things generally won’t get people upset about and because it is a group thing, they do.
“It’s good for building friendships and staying in touch with people,” Brill said.
Facebook can be very useful because it is a great way to keep up with how people are doing through pictures and posts. Brill stated that, up until social media came along, the most influential influence in our lifetime from a media standpoint is television. Society is very prone to images, but now images and messaging are instantaneously put together which forms social media.
“There’s no question that it is the most powerful mass communication on Earth,” Brill said.
According to social media advertising statistics, 53 percent of businesses use social advertising. About 7 million businesses use paid advertising on Facebook and 2 million businesses use paid advertising on Instagram. Not just social media can be used for communication and stay updated with the world. It can also used in business.
The website Totaljobs surveyed 8,599 candidates and 268 recruiters to understand their pre-interview preparation process. The survey had shown about three quarters of interviewers check candidates’ social media before an interview. It has also become a tool for company to understand the applicants better.
“Social media is a primary vehicle of communication today, and because much of that communication is public, it’s no surprise some recruiters and hiring managers are tuning in,” Rosemary Haefner, the vice president of human resources at CareerBuilder, said.
Social media has become a useful resource for companies that can affect hiring decisions. People’s profiles on social media basically identifies them and the way they portrays it can influence their job opportunities.
“It can help them get a more accurate idea about who you are outside of your resume — a more personal view into your life,” Hallie Crawford, U.S. News Careers contributor, said.
Resumes are not enough for interviewers these days, so social media an add-on for recruiters to view. People’s social media has many personal details about them and gives the company an overall idea about who they are and how are they like.
“A resume can tell them your qualifications, but your social media profile can help them determine your personality type and if you would be a good fit for company culture,” Crawford said.
Applicants’ social media has become another consideration for companies to decide whether to recruit the applicant or not.
“I’ll admit that I have had reservations about moving forward with candidates who do not have a social presence, but I think it’s in part due to the type of positions I was recruiting against,” Ben Eubanks, an HR analyst at performance improvement research company Brandon Hall Group, said.
Companies prefer job seekers who owns a social media page so they can do background checks. Social media provides a lot of background information about applicants and it tells the recruiters if they are qualified for the job. It became a good platform for business.
Brooke Torres, a social media and community manager, started her job at The Muse and found out her boss discovered her Instagram page during the interview.
“She liked my creativity,” Torres said. “It helped me land the job.”
Knowing how to manage social media profile is essential. Applicants need to assume that everything they posted on social media public.
“You don’t want to underestimate the power of your social media profiles to show off your skills, give employers a peek into your personality, and land you a job”, she said.
Social networking provides many great opportunities. It can either help build or ruin one’s reputation. According to website The Muse, one out of three employers reject candidates based on something they found on social media. Three out of four managers and recruiters checks social profiles.
Taco Bell is a good example of social media recruiting. They spotlights workers’ contributions, with around ten million likes on their career page on Facebook. Taco Bell’s Facebook page often posts their employees’ selfies wearing their uniforms and shows jobseekers how to work at Taco Bell.
With better communications with consumers, companies can improve their service by listening to the consumers’ suggestions.
