You have to Be Visible to Get Found. We’ve been telling our clients and conference audiences this for years now. Googling people has become second nature for all of us, whether we’ve just met someone, are about to meet someone or WANT to meet someone for the first time.
Like it or not, you ARE your Google results. That’s the reality in our online, social media world.
Google your name (put it in quotes to limit irrelevant results e.g. ‘lori martinek’). Do you like what you find on page one? Do the results present the image that you want people to see? Are there negative or older items that you’d prefer would ‘go away’? Are there other people with the same name who could prove confusing to people who are trying to find and learn about YOU?
It is very difficult to make things ‘go away’ on the Internet, but you can make them harder to find. Most people only look at the first page of results; two pages at most. Focus on making sure that the hits on those first pages paint the best possible picture of you, your company and your accomplishments. Here’s how:
Six Steps To Improving Your Brand’s Google Results:
– Create a Google+ profile. Any time you create a profile, you are taking control over what people read about you. Include a photo so people have a face to go with your info. Your Google profile is very likely to appear on the first page of your results. Choose your words carefully.
– Create a LinkedIN profile. Same reason as above. LinkedIN is a highly trafficked site and your profile will rank high in your results.
– Open a Twitter account. Same reason. And: Link your Twitter account to your blog or Facebook page and you will rarely have to tweet. Every time you post, your account will tweet it to the world.
– Open a Flickr account and post professional photos of you, your company, your company logo, etc. Keep it professional and do not post anything that you wouldn’t want a client or prospect to see. Flickr is a very high volume site that will make you — and your photos — very visible.
– Ditto Facebook (be careful about ‘over-sharing’ your personal life!), Quora, Visible.me and other high-hit sites. Creating a profile will boost your visibility. It will also help you ‘knock down’ same-name folks.
– Purchase your name as a domain and create a simple website or landing page using it. Example: www.lorimartinek.com It will register very high in your results and you can link it to your company website if you prefer to redirect traffic there. Does someone already own your name? Try the .me extension. Nothing beats owning the .com domain, but every time that you tag or add your name or brand on the Internet, you are building visiblity.
And: Once is NOT enough! Check your search results regularly to see if anything new has cropped up that you need to edit or work to move down. Ongoing reputation management is very important … Lori Martinek, Branding Expert & Author, https://www.edcgrow.com