Polish your online reputation
BrandYourself
You have probably googled your own name already. You may have found that you’re mentioned in articles or on websites which you would rather see further down the list of search results, for instance because they’re about your hobby or because your name crops up in the response from a dissatisfied customer, etc. In short, information you would rather not share with your professional contacts. BrandYourself ( http://www.brandyourself.com ) can help you: this web service makes positive webpages rank higher in the search results.
How does this work?
Basic score. BrandYourself helps you through the different stages to improve your online reputation. After signing up, you will immediately see the top ten Google search results involving your name. Using the Positive , Negative or Not M e buttons, you can indicate which of these categories each hit belongs. On the basis of this feedback, BrandYourself will calculate an initial score for your reputation.
Next, you can create your own BrandYourself profile page where you can post elements such as your photo, contact details, a short biography, your training and your career details. This page is given a unique URL ( http://yourname.brandyourself.com ) and has been designed to score as high as possible on Google. Then you should provide weblinks pointing to relevant positive information about yourself. Since the free version of BrandYourself allows you to provide only three URLs, you will have to make a careful choice here. You could for instance refer to your LinkedIn and Twitter profile, although BrandYourself greatly emphasises the importance of having your own website (or blog) where you can present yourself and your activities in a professional fashion.
Tip. For each link you provide, BrandYourself gives you (after you’ve hit the Boost button) tips to improve its ranking in Google - for instance by telling you which crucial information is missing from your LinkedIn profile - but also by scanning previous posts on your Facebook page. Messages with a negative connotation and containing inappropriate words are marked. This worked surprisingly well in our tests. You are immediately given the opportunity to remove such messages.
Note. In the free version of BrandYourself you can only see a limited number of “dangerous” posts and have them removed.
How good is it?
By systematically enhancing your online reputation (and being patient), you will find that the webpages which show you in a positive light will eventually start scoring higher in the Google results. You can check this regularly by googling your own name. You can also monitor this progress on the website of BrandYourself itself via your personal score.
Note. The free formula of BrandYourself is useful to explore all the possibilities but gives too few options to polish your online reputation. The paid for option costs $99 or £80 per year (see https://goo.gl/D00h85 for all the pricing details). You should be aware that BrandYourself can only move positive links higher in the rankings but can’t make the negative comments disappear.
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