Online Reputation Management

When we want to learn more about another person, the first place we turn is the Internet and Google is the top search engine to do so. Every day, over one billion names are searched on Google and 77% of job recruiters are required to Google potential employees during the hiring process. While you may not have Googled yourself, it's certain that someone else has and they are making judgments about you based on what they find. 45% of people have found something in a Google search that made them decide NOT to do business with someone.

Ultimately, it's your responsibility to ensure you make a good impression when someone Googles you and this guide is here to help. We'll take you through the steps involved in assessing your current online reputation and what you can do to manage it.

What is Online Reputation Management?

Basically, online reputation management is the process of controlling what shows up when someone Googles your name. We'll show you how to promote positive content to the top of your search results and push unwanted content (negative, irrelevant or competition) farther down to ensure that when someone Googles you, their results are populated with positive, relevant content about you.

Part 1: Diagnose Your Google Ranking & Online Reputation
The first step to controlling any situation is determining whether or not you have a problem and, if so, how bad the problem really is. In the first part of this guide, we'll help you diagnose your Google ranking, or, what shows up in the search results for your name and Online reputation management (ORM) is about improving or restoring your name or your brand's good standing. This is by countering, weakening or eliminating the negative material found in

the Internet defeating it with more positive material for improving your credibility and customers' trust in you. in what order they appear. Based on how your name ranks, we'll help you determine what corrective action you need to take.

Step 1: Google Yourself

The very first thing you need to do is go to Google and type your name into the search bar. Make sure to:

Sign out of your Google Account. Google employs personalized and local searches when you are signed into your account. In other words, Google will slightly alter your results to make them more relevant to you based on your location and what they know about you through your Google account. The person searching you won't have the same customizations for your name, so make sure you sign out before searching to get a true snapshot of how your results look to others.

Search for the name people will actually use to search
you: Do you use your middle name or initial on your resume? Do you go by a nickname that most people call you? Did you recently acquire a hyphenated last name? When you search for yourself online, make sure you use the name that people are going to be searching for you with. Also, search for any variations of your name or common misspellings. In the same vein, make sure you are consistent with your name. Be sure you are using the same name on your resume, social media profiles, website, etc. (and make sure that it's the one that you want to show up in Google results.)

Step 2: Diagnosis - Which Google Ranking Category Are You?

Once you have your search results in front of you, it's time to figure out which category your Google rank and overall online reputation fall under. Decide which of these categories best represents your first page of search results for your name (it may even be a combination of them all!)

Tip: Concentrate on the first page of your Google results - 93% of searchers never go past the first page and use the first 10 search results to form their impression.

Negative: This is the worst category to be in because it means you have one or more negative search results representing you. However, this category is not just reserved for criminals and bad people. In today's world of social networking and anonymous sharing, it is disturbingly easy to have your reputation tarnished. It takes only one status update, tagged photo or blog post from an angry ex, rant by a former employee, false accusation or wild friend to put you in this negative online reputation category.

Irrelevant: The results are about you, but they don't really help or hurt you. These results are completely outdated or irrelevant. Instead of finding out you are one of the most well-respected doctors in Boston, the person finds out you finished 120th in a 5k you ran three years ago.

"Hey, That's Not Me!": In this case, your results are dominated by somebody or even multiple people with your name. This person's results are forming your first impression for you - for better or worse. In a best-case scenario, they simply prevent the searcher from finding anything meaningful about you. In a worst-case scenario, they might actually mistake you for someone else, who has a negative online reputation.

Positive & Relevant: This means your search results are full of positive, well-branded content that is actually about you.

Step 3: Figure Out How Much Work You Have Ahead and Make a Plan

Once you know where you stand, it's time to be proactive and start improving your search results. Your goal is to fill your first page with as many positive results as possible. Depending on your web presence, you can figure out how much work lays ahead and plan accordingly.

• I Have No Web Presence, and No Content: The first thing you need to do is build your online presence for Google. Quite simply, if you don't have any positive content, there is no way for it to show up on your first page.
  

• I Have Specific Content I Want to BURY: Perhaps you have something unflattering out there about you, or you're being mistaken for an ex-con of the same name. You'll want to create content to bury the negative result(s) down.

• I Have Specific Content I Want to Push Higher: You might already have a personal website, a LinkedIn profile, an article written about you or other content you want people to find, but they just aren't showing up high in search results. There are specific steps you can take to boost them higher in Google search results for your name.


Part 2: Intro to Personal Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

What is Search Engine Optimization?

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of creating or improving content to make sure it shows up as high as possible in web search results for the right keywords (in the case of personal SEO, Your Name).

1. Why Is Personal SEO Important?

Every time someone conducts an online search, search engines like, Google and Bing, use complex algorithms with hundreds of factors to make sure the most relevant results show up highest but sometimes they make mistakes.
You probably know somebody who has made an entire personal website, yet it may not show up on the first page of search results for their name. There are a number of factors that could result in poor results, such as a poorly structured page, which makes it difficult for the search engine to understand. Other times, the site does not seem as credible as it actually is. Worst of all, sometimes the search engine isn't even aware the content exists.

2. How Does SEO Help?

By employing general SEO tactics, or using a tool like Brand Yourself's online reputation management tool, you can make sure all of your best content is as search engine friendly as possible. This means your best content will be:

• Quickly found by Google
  
• Structured so search engines can quickly tell it's about you
• Linked to and stored in-credible databases and directories across the web so search engines know it's trustworthy
  What Factors Do Search Engines Use to Rank Content?
  Search engines employ algorithms with hundreds of factors to determine how to rank results. However, there are a few main factors you should always keep in mind:
  1. On Page SEO Factors:
  These are factors within the actual page. The good news is, if you own the content, you have direct control over these:

• Frontend & Backend Structure/Architecture: Any content on the web is supported by a number of frontend and backend computer languages or code things like HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP, and so on which communicate information to the search engine and your computer. However, problems arise when people create great content, but it is so poorly structured that search engines are unable to properly communicate with the website and therefore have no idea what the page is really about. There are many things you need to be mindful of as you structure your code the sitemap or navigation of the page, the history of the domain, the placement of headings and dozens of other things. It can seem daunting, which is why we wrote this guide to walk you through the most important parts. Brand Yourself's online reputation management tool can also help take you through the steps of this process.

• Relevancy: This one is simple—keep your content updated. If your content hasn't been updated in a long time, search engines start to view it as irrelevant.
  

• Keyword/content: When a search engine visits your page, you want to make sure it quickly understands which words and phrases are the most important— what we call keywords. For example, if you want to rank for "Your Name" (i.e. John Smith), but "Your Name" isn't written anywhere on the page, a search engine would have no idea to rank it for that. There are two important elements to keep in mind:
  

o Placement: There are certain places on the page that search engines consider more important than others, so that's where you want to include Your Name. These include outwardly visible areas (the URL, page headings, bolded words and anchor text) as well as areas in the backend (title tags, heading tags, meta-tags, and descriptions). You want to include Your Name in

all of these places.

o Density: Search Engines also take into account the density of these keywords throughout the site, to make sure any content on the page lines up with those words. This way, you can't simply stuff keywords, like Your Name, in those important places if the page is about something entirely different.

2. Off Page SEO Factors:

These factors aren't directly tied to the content on your page and are meant to gauge the page's outside credibility. Since you can't directly control these factors, it's important you dedicate time to the most important ones:

• Incoming Links: Search engines consider each link to a site as a "vote" for that site to show up higher. The more places that link to your site, the higher search engines will rank it. However, the credibility of the link is also important.
  

• Social Sharing: Sharing a page across social networks is one of the easiest ways to build credible links. If you share a relevant, valuable page, people will pass it around, signaling a great deal of credibility to search engines.
  Avoid Black-Hat Techniques That Get Your Content Banned
  OOP (Over-Optimization Penalty): Many search engine marketers are tempted to try to "game" search engines and create an artificial edge by abusing the above factors. Fortunately, search engines are smart, and these "black hat" methods are quickly caught and harshly penalized (banned from results).

Part 3: Building the Foundation of Your Online Presence for Google Search Results

You've diagnosed your Google presence and learned the basics behind Personal Search Engine Optimization. Now it's time to actually start building the foundation of your Google presence with these basic steps everybody should follow to get started. The idea behind this part is simple: you can't make your Google results look better if you don't have any good content in the first place. So let's get the basics in place.

Step 1: Purchase Your Domain (yourname.com)

Purchasing your domain name is quite possibly the most important step you can take if you want to show up on the first page of Google. It's roughly a $10/year investment and incredibly easy.

Not all domains are created equal: While this isn't quite as important as it used to be, there are certain domain types that search engines tend to rank higher. For example, .edu and .gov domains are considered the most credible since you need to be a legitimate educational or government institution to get one. For a personal domain, try to stick to a .com or a .net. Avoid some of the newly popular domain-types like .me or .tv since they don't usually rank as well.

• Make sure your name is included exactly as is:
  
• Register it for as long as possible: There are two reasons
  for this. First, the longer a domain is registered, the more credible search engines consider it, and two, you want to protect your own domain name. Even if you aren't using it, you don't want somebody else with your name to buy it themselves.
  

Step 2: Build a Personal Website

Now that you have your domain, it's time to build a personal hub on the web where you can display everything from your work history to your personal interests. Today, anybody can create their own personal website, without having any technical knowledge. There are a lot of options out there but we usually recommend WordPress. It's easy to get set up, but also allows for a lot of customizing as you develop your personal identity online and get more comfortable.

Step 3: Get on Social Networks:

Search engines tend to rank social media profiles
like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+ high, and for good reason: They require some sort of authentication to create, so search engines view them as more credible. Also important, they are constantly updating, making them extremely relevant due to their "timely" content (which we covered in SEO basics). In short, if you're trying to show up higher in Google, creating professional social media profiles is essential.

Step 4: Full Out Your Profiles:

Joining social networks is a good first step by itself, but the true power of these services doesn't come through until you completely fill out your profile. You want Google to find your profile, so give it as much relevant info as you can. Be sure to add links to your other social profiles as well.

Part 4: Advanced Tactics to Boost your Google Ranking & Online Reputation

Once you've built a foundation for Google, it's time to apply all the basic SEO Rules to your content. This section of the guide will cover how to make sure the different content you're building is as search engine friendly as possible.

Building Your Personal Website:

So it's important to fill it with as much information as you can. Here are some important things to keep in mind when creating your site to ensure it is as search engine friendly as possible:

1. Create Relevant Pages: If you want your site to show up high, you want to make sure it's filled with as much relevant, updated content as possible. Here are the pages you need to include:

• About Me: This is your chance to fill your site with all the information you'd want someone to know about you. Include your personal bio, education, your work experience, and your personal interests. If you have any examples of your work, upload them here. This is the page that lets search engines know there is a lot of relevant information about Your Name.
  

• My Links: This is where you should link to all the other places someone can find you online. This includes your social media profiles, online directories, and everything else. This sends to search engines to even more content about you, making your site that much more credible. Links are an important factor in search engine rankings. The more credible pages about you that your site links to (and vice versa), the higher it will rank for your name.
  

• Social Stream: Add a feed of your most recent updates from networks like LinkedIn and Facebook so visitors see all of your social activity in one place. More importantly, this also keeps your website constantly updated and relevant, which is a very important part of its search engine ranking. 
  

2. Create a Blog: Blogging serves two functions that help your site show up higher. First, it's another easy way to keep your site updated and relevant. Second, every post you write is a potential result that can show up on your first page. The more content you create and share, the more chances you have to be indexed, linked to, and of course, ranked by search engines. Here are some things to keep in mind to get the most out of blogging:

• 1 hour a month: You don't need to be a professional blogger to blog. Write one post a month. It's as simple as reading an industry article or op-ed and writing a brief summary and reaction to it.

3. Keyword Placement: There are certain places on a page search engines consider more important than others. Once you've finished building all of your pages, you want to make sure you include "Your Name" in each of these places:

• Navigation: By including your name in the navigation you let search engines know Your Name is one of the most important elements on the page.
  

• Headings: Make sure you include Your Name in the heading whenever you start a new section.
  

• Anchor Text: Anchor text refers to the underlined text that indicates that text is a link Since links are such an important part of the algorithm, you want to make sure search engines know what the links are about. ***There are many other places you can include your name within the HTML, like your page Title Tag. By using a service like Brand Yourself, you can ensure your site is automatically as search engine friendly as possible.
  

Social Media Profiles

The "big four" of social media sites are Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+. These sites rank high in search results, so if you haven't done so already, make sure to create profiles for these sites. The following tips will help you ensure they are as SEO friendly as possible:

• Keep it clean or keep it private: Before you start promoting a social network, it's important to remember that everything you post is public and can be seen by everyone. For example, if you use your Facebook profile to post wild photos or political comments, you might not be putting your best foot forward. Some people opt to keep their profiles private, but keep in mind, nothing is really private. Updates can still find their way into search results and into the wrong hands. Keep your profiles professional.
  

• Make sure you use your actual name: If you want your Twitter profile or any other social profile for that matter.
  

• Link to all your other content: Make sure you include a link back to your website and as many other profiles as they'll let you include, as we mentioned before links are a very important factor in search engine rankings. The more credible pages your site links to about you (and vice versa), the higher it will rank for your name.
  Part 5: Emergency Tactics For Fixing a Negative Google Search Result
  Even if you've gotten your Google diagnosis, setup your basic presence for Google and used our advanced SEO techniques to raise them to the top, sometimes it's just not enough.

Bad Results Can Happen to Good People:

While this section may seem like it's only relevant to politicians or criminals, negative content is something that can happen to anyone. All it takes is one bad blog post or status update from a pissed off ex, one disgruntled former client or employee, or one photo tagged in bad judgment after a night out with a friend. The point is, bad results can happen to good people, and this guide is meant to walk you through the emergency tactics you can use to salvage your reputation.

Here's what to do when negative results show up when you Google yourself:

Option 1: Get it Taken Down

This option is often the first step people take. In some cases, it's worth it to try and have the content removed (although there are a few issues with this route which we'll discuss later on). If you choose this route, there are a few steps you can take:

• Ask to have it removed: Find the source of the person who posted the content (article author, social media account owner, website owner, etc.) and approaches them about having it taken down. If you approach the owner professionally and explain why you need the content to be taken down, they may oblige. If politeness doesn't work, go the hardball approach and explain that the content is defamatory and will take any necessary actions, if need be. And cue the necessary actions.
  

• Submit a legal complaint to Google It is very difficult to have Google remove content from its search results, but it can be done. If the content is defamatory or contains personal information such as your social security number or credit card information, you can file the legal complaint.
  

• Have the website removed: Find out the company who hosts the site (try whois.net) and look up their Terms of Service Agreement. If the site is in violation of the agreement, you can file a formal complaint to the company.
These methods can frequently prove time-consuming, frustrating and, at times, expensive. And what's worse, at the end of the day, they may not even work:

• The person who posted it doesn't have to take it down: Even if you ask nicely, the person doesn't have to take it down. Chances are there's a reason the other person put it up in the first place, and they have no intention of removing it. If you do decide to take legal action, it can prove to be a long, drawn-out process that is difficult to undertake - The Internet is like the Wild West when it comes to content.
  

• The result is always archived: Secondly, even if the persona does remove the content, that doesn't necessarily remove it from search engines. Search engines archive (or cache) search results. This means the result still frequently shows up and people can read about the content right from the result page in Google.
  Option 2: Bury It
  This exemplifies the main concept of this guide: raise positive content higher in search engines, essentially burying content farther down the page. While this doesn't technically remove it from search engines, it does drastically decrease the chances someone searching for you finds it. In fact, 93% of people don't even go past the first page, and even if they do, they've just gone through an entire page of positive content that lets them know who you really are. This means, you don't only need one or two results on the first page, you need enough to bury the other content. Here are the best ways to create high ranking content that will bury the negative result:
  

1. Basic Tactics
Make sure you have the basics covered that we discussed earlier in the guide before jumping to the more advanced tactics:

• Create a basic online presence: This includes buying your domain name, building a personal website, creating social media profiles and joining online directories.
  

• Make sure that content is search engine
  optimized: There are certain things you SEO tactics you can implement with your content to make sure they are as search engine friendly as possible.
  2. Additional Content That Shows Up High
  Sometimes, a well-optimized, basic online presence (as outlined above) is not enough to bury something off the first page. Depending on how high the unwanted results show up and how credible it is, you may need to get as much high- ranking content on the first page as possible. Here are a few other creative ways you can quickly get content on the first page:
  

• Throw a party and put the event on MeetUp: 

Yes, we're serious! As we mentioned earlier in the series, you should create a personal profile on MeetUp a place where people create and attend events because Google ranks these profiles very high. Most people don't realize Google often ranks events on meetups even higher than your profile there. Throw a party and make sure you:

o Use your name in the event title.

o Take the time to actually create a party, people will want to attend and invite all your friends to RSVP on the event page. It might be a little investment, but the more people who are attending and linking to the page, the higher it will show up, so it's well worth it (plus, it's a great excuse to throw a party.)

• Write a Press Release and release it on PR Newswires: Most people don't realize they can use the same tools PR agencies use to automatically distribute press releases across the web. There are a handful of free newswires on the web.

o You can write a press release about any life event–you graduated college, you started a new job, you just created a new website, anything. The point is, you want any positive content to show up higher than those negative results. Tip: Remember to include links to other places the person can find you online.

• Comment on news articles: As you can imagine, any results coming from a domain. Commenting on articles in places like these is an effective way to get a high- ranking result. While they aren't the best possible results about you, at least they aren't negative. Make sure you link to your personal website, this way when someone finds it, you can direct them to more positive

information.

• Create profiles on your school's website, or local gov't website (like the library): As we mentioned earlier, search engines consider .gov and .edu the most credible on the web, and rank them accordingly. If you want to get content on the first page quickly you should create as many profiles on .gov or .edu sites as possible. Here are some places that you can create .gov or .edu content:

o Check Your Local Government: Browse every single website your local government offers, from town hall to the local library). There is a good chance there is some place that will allow you to create a profile, or comment on an article.

o Contact your alma mater: Check your college's website to see if there is anywhere you can create a profile. Be creative. It might be in the intramurals section, or in some small on-campus group. You're just looking for anywhere you can create a profile or result.

o Write a guest blog post for your local government or local college: If all else fails, most government sites and college programs have blogs. Figure out an article you could write that would be relevant and reach out and offer to write it.

• Write an article for a major blog or news site: This is an easy way to get a result on the first page. Contact your local newspaper and offer to write a piece on your expertise.

Option 3: Bump It Off

While entirely possible, it's obvious that burying something off the first page requires a lot of time. There is a little known, but very valuable piece of information when you find yourself in this situation that could save you a lot of time: Google only likes to rank one result on the first page per domain.
While this may seem like a tall order, you'd be surprised how easy it is to create a well-optimized result on almost any domain. You just need to figure out how you can publish something on the site. All you need to do is create a profile that is more relevant to your name than the bad article. A few things to remember when making your profile:

• Include your full name: Make sure you use Your Name in the profile. This will be included in the URL and the title-tags, which is must if you want to beat the article
  

• Fill it out with as much information as they let you: The more information you can include about yourself, the more relevant it will seem to Google. Remember, talk in the third person. You want Your Name to appear several times throughout the profile.
  

• Link to as many other profiles as possible: As you've read in our SEO basics section, the more places that a profile links to about a certain keyword the higher it will rank. Link to other definitive sources about you–your website, your facebook, etc. and google will value it more. Remember; use Your Name in the link text.
  

• Keep that profile Active: Eventually, the article will get old,
  which give your profile an edge. Keep commenting on the article and doing anything else that keeps your profile updated
  

• Link to it and share it everywhere: If you've built a basic online presence, make sure you link to your profile from everywhere–personal website, social media, etc. The more links this profile has, the better chance it will outrank the negative article.

Part 6: Improving your Google Image Results

A picture says a thousand words. Whether it's a mugshot or an unsavory party picture with friends, if you have a negative photo showing up online, Google image results for your name may not be saying what you want (especially with Google displaying the top image results for a corresponding web search right on the first page). The good news is that you can take similar tactics with your Google image results. While the concept of "burying" bad content with good content is the same, we'll tackle specific steps you can take to improve your Google image results in this last section of the guide. Frequently, negative images rise to the top of image searches simply because of a lack of content.

Step 1: Leverage photo-oriented social networks and websites
The first thing you should do is join a few sites that will enable you to post some images online. There are plenty of services available, but we recommend signing up for at least three of the following accounts (remember to file out the profiles completely, with your name and relevant info).

• Google+
  
• Flickr
  
• Twitter
  
• Tumblr
  
• Pinterest
  
• WordPress
  

• Photobucket
  
• Facebook
  
• Instagram
  Step 2: Post positive photos to your accounts
  Now that you have methods to post the pictures, you'll need to collect a few photos of yourself that you don't mind having online (we're talking professional photos and G-rated activities). If you don't have any, start snapping some. The more photos you have the better there are many more image results generated than a basic web search. To be safe, you should have a few dozen on hand to post.
  Step 3: Let Google know the image is about you
  When you upload a photo or image to any of your sites or profiles, you want to make sure Google knows the image is of you. That means you'll need to add some descriptive info to the photo:
  

• Add a photo description: if you can add a photo description, don't skip this step. Instead, make sure you include your full name or whatever it is the photo is about. The important thing is that we're letting search engines know that the photo is about.
  
• Captions: Same as above. Make sure you fill this out.
  
• Tag yourself: Some sites allow you to "tag" people in the
  photo. This just means you're able to quickly add a visual link to a person's profile from a photo. If it's available, make sure you tag yourself in the photo. It's yet another way for search engines to recognize the photo is of you if that photo and profile are set to public.
  Step 4: Use your profiles to push the image out there
  

Now it's time to get your image out there. Create a new post with the image on the (if available) or share the image with your social networks. This will help to create more links to the positive photo and make it search engine friendly so that it can rise above your negative images. You'll want to do this for all of your images. As with most content, you should begin to see results in 2-6 weeks and your negative image(s) will become just a bad memory.

What is ORM in digital marketing?

Online Reputation Management (ORM) is the act of monitoring, addressing or mitigating SERPs (search engine result pages) or mentions in online media and Web content. It is of great importance to companies to monitor how someone or something is perceived based on an Internet search.