Watching Your Back: Online Reputation Management
I recently spoke with some awesome students at Ithaca College’s Park School of Communications who are looking to get jobs or internships in the near future. We discussed the role of social media in their searches, and also covered a topic that’s very prevalent: personal online reputation management.
As these students graduate, employers will not only be looking at their resumes and cover letters, but at their Google search results, Facebook profiles, blogs and Twitter pages. Social media is a great equalizer (where else can you talk to a Creative Director at a major agency about baseball?), which is both a good and bad thing. I gave them some advice about making sure that their online reputation matches the image they want to show to potential employers.
The One-Click Rule
As far as marketing yourself (or your product) is concerned, you want whoever is looking for information to get it via the path of least resistance. I recommended that employers be able to find a portfolio, resume and contact information in one-click whenever possible. This means linking all social networks, so that your YouTube page is listed on your LinkedIn page, your Twitter profile linked to your blog, etc. You don’t want to miss out on an opportunity just because someone couldn’t find your email address.
3 Takeaways for Online Reputation Management
- Privacy Understanding the privacy policies of any site where you have personal information is key to ensuring that your online reputation is under control. Industry trends, such as Bing making a deal with Facebook to index status updates, may threaten those who use Facebook for solely personal purposes (Beacon, anyone?) Keep up-to-date on any policy changes and take an active role in keeping whatever you want private, private. Most of all, think twice about anything you put online. Just because you have it set as private, doesn’t mean it will stay that way.
- Consistency Your message and image should be consistent across all public networks and sites. I emphasize public because you may or may not have your Facebook or MySpace page made private (see above). Aside from those private, social sites, try to use a consistent image, tagline and focus of information. Tweet about what you blog, have your LinkedIn picture reflected on your Flickr profile – make it easy and obvious that this is you on every network.
- Cohesiveness If at all possible, list your other social networks on every profile or site you develop. For your blog, add a widget (depending on your content management system) that lists your other social networks. On sites like Flickr, YouTube and LinkedIn, add links to each site that you’d like employers to see.
And, most importantly: Google yourself. Every couple of months, take a look and see if something’s showing up on there that you don’t want public or if your name has been mentioned on any sites you don’t want it associated with. Knoweldge is power, and knowing what’s out there with your name on it can be the difference between hired and fired.
