Each new social network seems to spur a rash of customised home pages. It’s easy to brand identify yourself throughout the social web and doing so is often overlooked in it’s importance. I see this as part of taking control of your online presence. As a designer this is crucial – you could argue that as anyone that interacts online this is also crucial. You can get your ‘identity’ out there on most sites you use and this is a good thing I think.
Customisation is of course a double edge flashing gif sword. All too often people miss the crucial word of ‘design’ and insert ‘fugley’ in it’s place. I think those that don’t create a consistent identity across the sites they use (if those sites allow them) are missing a bit of a good point. There is something about clever marketing to it. I know I’m on x’s page no matter if using (insert social site here) or (insert another one here). It makes sense you brand yourself in this way and it’s a simple thing you can do.
There is something about just glancing an icon (an icon being the simplest form of branding yourself online) and knowing it’s x or y. Yes, if people got there in time they will have their usual user name – the thing is this isn’t always the case. I also think the power of an icon or branded identity shouldn’t be lost to the realms of client’s only. Branding yourself is something I’ve been thinking heavily about. I’ve got this coffee bean thing that runs throughout my icons and online presence, but for me I want to focus this identity and hence this is a big focus of mine currently. I never think you should underestimate the power of branding yourself even socially on the web.
I’ve seen some great examples of people thinking intelligently about their online presence through their icons and page customisation. It doesn’t have to be overkill, a simple colour for fonts or background often suffices. Yes, there are those that css to the max every chance they get and format all to look like their web page – I’m not sure this is the way it should go but it’s an option. Creating a thread of branding though is something you really shouldn’t over look online and it’s not hard to do with most sites, I can’t think of one that doesn’t at least let you use an icon.
