With circulating news articles about losing jobs and missed opportunities due to social media posts and more, society is becoming increasingly aware that what gets posted inline really isn’t private, reputation management is key to preserving your business’s online persona. There are an increased number of ways to do this, and most require hiring an online reputation management team to help keep your virtual nose clean. But there are five major steps you can take towards doing that yourself.
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1. Judiciously Post Content
Before you post any picture, status update, blog post, or share any content, consider that this content will be live for others to see in some capacity and will be on a server file forever. Even if you think the post, picture, or status is private or somehow only posting to your immediate friends, family, or only you, someone, somewhere can access the data and breaches of security are all too common
2. Be Aware and Wary of Others
Even if you are monitoring every bit of data you post, there is an equally good chance that other people are posting statuses and photos of you that will be online forever. What we do in public can and will very likely be published online by someone at some point. So keep your private life private and be careful with whom you associate with, party with, and do other activities with if you are concerned at all with your future reputation and possible employability.
3. Search for Yourself
Regularly perform searches using your name to find any and all content about you to make sure published content that shows up within the first 3 to 5 pages of search results represents the persona you want online. You can set up a search notification feature on Google to have this emailed to you once per day.
4. Buy a Website
Utilize a website in your own name, where you keep track of all your online data such as social media accounts, pictures, posts, and other non-private data that can’t be stolen by identity thieves. Use this as a home base to keep any future searches about you all leading to one place.
5. Utilize Social Media
Using the same concepts above and linking to your branded domain name, utilize social media to manage your online reputation. Remember to only post and share things which represent the best of who you are. This content will be around for a while and all of it will tack back to you in some way at some point in time. Remember to remove the tags when others tag you in their content to help stem the tide of unwanted connections and trackback stalkers.
Keep Things Private
Online reputation management means keeping tabs on all your virtual data while remembering that nothing posted in the virtual world is ever truly private. If you also represent a business, consider setting up two accounts on everything, one that represents you and one that represents you and your field of expertise or business. By keeping the personal online media private and the business online media representing your professional persona, you can help ensure that your personal online life stays personal.