Entries Tagged 'Social Media' ↓

I’ve received a couple of invitations lately from folks inviting me to connect with them at Reunion.com.  I briefly joined and immediately deleted my account.  Here’s why:

• They require you to provide your date of birth in your profile.  Hey, Reunion, I just met you.  I don’t go giving that kind of info to just anyone.  Granted, they probably have it in their database already, since they are very up-front about their use of publicly available info, but they could at least give me a choice.   Yes, it might help people find me and connect with the right “Larry Swanson,” but I much prefer having the option of controlling how much info to divulge about myself, especially on a new site with an unproven track record and a clearly stated intention to dig and pry into my personal history.
• They charge $5 a month for “advanced” features. Maybe it’s worth it, but I have no idea.  How about a free trial so that I can see how it works?
• They randomly assign your user ID and password.  What the. . .?  How about giving the user some control.  The first thing I do at any social networking or similar site is to try to find a meaningful and memorable user name.  “larry5z6yh” doesn’t meet that criterion.

I trust my internet fu, and this place just smells fishy.  So I’ll stick with LinkedIn and Facebook (which is by no means a saint in the privacy-protection department, but they do at least let you control your profile) as my main social networking sites for now.

It occurred to me on my way home from Mashable’s networking party (thanks for the comp ticket, Don) after SocialMediaCamp tonight that much of internet marketing now revolves around reputation management.

• Your ranking in the search results is based in large part on what other web sites think of you, as measured by Google’s PageRank algorithm and similar measurements at other search engines.
• Your ranking at Google and other search engines is increasingly based on whether you are listed in local directories like Yelp and CitySearch and what your customers say about you there.
• Your ability to land clients increasingly depends on your profile at professional networking sites like LinkedIn and what people say about you there.
• If you write a blog or post comments to other blogs, your readers will quickly develop an impression of you based on what you write and how you deal with comments and criticism.
• Similarly, your postings to discussion forums and how you comport yourself there feed your online reputation.

And the list could go on. The point is, For better or for worse, and whether you like it or not, the web is where many people go these days to assess your professional reputation. There are many implications that arise from this, perhaps the most germane of which is that you should take a proactive approach to developing and maintaining your web presence. Here are a couple of good articles on how to do this:

Reputation Management Emancipation Proclamation - 10 Ways to “Own Yourself” Online

Ten Ways to Fix Your Google Reputation & Remove Negative Results (this one is mostly how to clean up your online profile if it has been sullied)