I’m working with a group of business professionals to help each of them establish his and her brand online. It seemed natural to me to begin the process by doing a simple search on the search engines to see what sites, if any, I hasten to add, appeared prominently. But what seems natural to me seemed almost surreal to my clients. Yet their response to the results ranged from engaged to alarmed. Had they never done this before? Really? Well, that’s why I’m writing this.
One professional was prominently listed as a partner in a firm – except not the one she is currently with. Another found his status rating in an unfamiliar directory inadequate and his listing inaccurate. And for most there was no particular problem except one: they had almost no presence on the Internet except in their firm bio and LinkedIn. And often the LinkedIn bio linked to a list of the other 12 people having the same name.
So you’re going to search for your name now, right?
Some tips to help you in this search would be to search your name with quotes around it and search variations of your name with quotes such as adding your middle name or initial, etc. Satisfy your paranoia and add unfriendly suffixes to your name search like “sucks”, “arrested” and other bad deeds of your choice. You might as well find what is obvious.
And if Google is your search tool of choice, make it a point to repeat your search with Bing. I won’t share any spoilers so you can enjoy the hunt on your own. But Bing is different, has its own search algorithm and displays its search results in a creative manner.
Based on what you discover, there are a lot of options for you to take to help you shape your digital brand. That’s a post or three for another day. But take the first step and do your own assessment. Go ahead. Google yourself. You won’t go blind.