The pluses and pitfalls of online job networking sites.

For this month’s Executive Coach column, I started out by exploring how people best use the virtual world to market themselves and connect to each other—and I found that for many people, the virtual world has been more painful than helpful. Tread carefully, online traveler, and keep some important warnings in mind as you set off on your virtual journey.

YAHOO! GROUPS A fantastically useful tool, Yahoo! Groups enables groups of any kind to share information, post photos, chat, swap documents and manage projects in a semiprivate forum. But even the most clever tools can backfire when used carelessly. Here’s my warning story: Lisa (not her real name) set up a Yahoo! Group for a volunteer work team and added 20 colleagues to the group.

The project lasted more than two years, and Lisa ended up leaving the group. Unfortunately, she didn’t pass along any of the moderator information to the other members, so they could not update the settings or mailing list. Other people also left the group, but couldn’t get off of the email list, so they continue to receive every email generated by the forum. Talk about unwanted spam.

LINKEDIN LinkedIn is a remarkable career networking site that seems to be expanding exponentially. I recently checked my pro..le on the site to see how many connections I have in my network, which I have never actively tried to expand myself. If I look at three degrees of separation, I’m connected to 943,600 people! As a result, I’m still in contact with a number of former associates, excellent candidates have contacted me for jobs and I’ve had the opportunity to recommend colleagues to others.

Remember this critical point when signing up for a site like LinkedIn: Don’t forget to keep your profile current, because people will find you on there. As an early technology adopter, I was very interested when I first heard of LinkedIn. I filled out my profile and promptly forgot about it. Two years later, people I hadn’t spoken to in ages came across my outdated profile and tried to contact me—using the wrong Web site, the wrong email address and the wrong company description.

CRAIGSLIST Craigslist is a favorite among would-be job finders and recruiters. Instead of paying for Monster.com, CareerBuilder or HotJobs, many swear by this friendly, functional and ad-free classifieds site. According to the Wall Street Journal (April 2000), Craigslist is in the most effective job board. But how does the site make money? The people behind Craigslist posted an explanation of how they cover the costs of running the site, which has remained blessedly free of ads since its launch.

In 1998, founder Craig Newmark asked users of the service how he should go about paying for the site’s operation. The most popular reply was to charge recruiters a minimal fee to post job listings. Despite some dips in the quality and frequency of posts following the introduction of the fee, the site rebounded, and by 2007 the number of listings had tripled in every city covered by Craigslist.

MYSPACE This site, like Facebook, invites users to create Web pages that showcase their interests and activities, and to connect with others who share these interests, creating a social network. Brent (not his real name), a database designer, uses MySpace to highlight his talents—as a musician. The popular site is a great forum for highlighting his after-hours activities.

But when his boss saw his online profile going around the office, Brent had a rude awakening. In his MySpace profile, Brent had posted some untoward commentary about his corporate life as a “drone in a meaningless grey cube, continuously motivated to lash out musically” at his colleagues, whom he dubbed “pencil-pushing imbeciles.” Needless to say, this did not go over well with his boss or coworkers.

Rules of Self-Promotion

• Do include references. The more people recommend you, the more people trust that your profile is for real.
• Do remember your passwords.

• Do highlight the positive outcomes of your work, not just the work itself.

• Do keep your profiles up to date.

• Don’t include your personal contact information in an online profile—that’s a recipe for identity theft.

• Don’t share your personal online identities with your work colleagues.

• Don’t share confidential information on a public posting site, and please please don’t speak ill of those on your listserve.

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KARLIN SLOAN, M.A., is founder and president of Karlin Sloan & Co. (karlinsloan.com), based in New York City and Chicago, which provides executive coaching, team building and leadership development services. Email Karlin at editor@executivetravelmag.com.