How to Manage You or Your Company's Online Presence

How To Manage Your
Online Reputation

Go ahead, Google yourself. Everyone else is. Whether you’re an adult or a teenager, what they find can affect your personal and professional life. Did you know employers and colleges search the internet for information about candidates before they make selection decisions? Here’s what you should do:

Find out what’s out there about you (or your company)…

• Search your name on Google, but don’t forget Yahoo, Bing and Ask. Put quotation marks around your name, and use keywords (your city) to narrow the search. Try it with your nickname or middle initial.
• Search again but click on “Images” and again on “Videos.”
• Check alumni sites, genealogy sites etc. Ask your friends if you’re in a video they’ve uploaded to YouTube.

Be proactive about protecting your reputation…

 Safeguard your personal information, particularly on social networking sites. Open a secondary email account or use a different persona for social sites, chatrooms, web forums, etc.

 Use privacy settings to set the right level of control, especially for Facebook and MySpace. Don’t give access to “Everyone.” That makes it visible to search engines, too.

 Set up a Google Profile. Go to www.google.com/profiles to build a personal page that helps people get the right information when they search your name. You can do the same thing on Yahoo at profiles.yahoo.com.

 Monitor your online presence by signing up for Google or Yahoo Alerts. They’ll let you know if someone searches for certain phrases, such as your name or company name.

 If you find something embarrassing, talk to the source. Even better, create positive content (write a blog or an article) that will appear on search results.