The Importance of a Good Gravatar

Your Gravatar is an image that follows you from site to site appearing beside your name when you do things like comment or post on a blog. Avatars help identify your posts on social media sites, blogs and web forums, so why not on any site?

Many sites today access the Gravatar system, so when you comment on a forum, or post on a friend's blog, the icon next to your comment is the image that you want it to be, not just a generic icon.  You can help shape a more customized, personalized web experience for yourself and others.

If you don't have one already, go to Gravatar.com to set up your account today.  It is a simple process and your Gravatar is linked to an email address.  You Gravatar account can handle multiple images and email addresses. It as a central place to facilitate your consistent visual brand identity on the web.

If you set up a Gravatar a while back and haven't checked on it in a while, be sure to log in to your account and update your photo.  According to their recent blog post: "If you’re using a low-resolution image of yourself that you cropped from a friend’s Facebook photo two years ago, then it’s time for an update." They are now set up to handle images up to 2048px!  The last thing you want is for your avatar image to look pixelated like it was taken from an 8-bit Super Mario Bros game.

It is also a good idea - when trying to present a professional appearance - to use a professional photo.  It is not that expensive to have a nice portrait taken of you, and it will look much more professional than a cellphone snapshot. Let me know if you need help getting that image to look perfect or contact your favorite photographer.

Good luck and I hope to see you and your Gravatar soon!