How to Clean up Your Online Reputation
Messy
party photos, offensive tweets, pepper spraying student protesters ...
sometimes, you just want a do-over when it comes to your online presence. And
for a hefty price tag, you can.
The
University of California, Davis is under fire for contracting consultants for
at least $175,000 to clean up its online reputation after a November 2011
incident in which campus police pepper-sprayed peaceful protesters, according
to a report in the Sacramento Bee. If that PR campaign worked at all, it's now
backfired. Here's how this sort of reputation scrubbing is supposed to help —
and some ways in which it might have the opposite effect.
Call
the pros
Services
such as Reputationdefender.com and Naymz.com offer to clean up your name, or,
as the latter advertises, achieve your "professional and personal
aspirations." A company called ICMediaDirect advertises reputation control
for $6,300, in which the service will try to "push down" your
undesirable search results by populating Google with friendly links instead.
These companies didn't return messages seeking information about their
services.
Instead
of lawsuits, for example, the companies promise that search results will turn
up your LinkedIn profile, business website or other sites that portray you in a
more positive light. Of course, there's no guarantee any of this will work;
it's awfully hard to delete anything permanently from the Internet.
Or
just ask, if you're continental
If
you happen to be in Europe, you can also exercise your "right to be
forgotten." This entails filling out a form that asks search engines like
Google to remove certain links when people look up your name. Of course, this
means nothing if someone Googles you in the US.
Some
things just don't erase
Just
ask Justine
Sacco, the former IAC media relations representative who lost her job after
an unfortunate tweet — one widely seen as racist, although Sacco said she was
aiming for irony — raised the hackles of the Twitterverse. Three years later,
the incident still turns up first when you search for her name on Google.
You
also have to consider the possible blowback when and if your cleanup attempts
see the light of day. That's the pickle UC Davis is in now. Some California
legislators have called for the resignation of university chancellor Linda
Katehi, who approved the PR campaign.
Get
old-fashioned, if you have clout
For
companies and public figures like celebrities and politicians, putting a
positive spin on the negative can be as simple — or as complicated — as getting
a friendly story in the news. Being proactive is key.
Terry
Corbell, a business performance consultant, recommends "shameless
self-promotion" as a way to build a positive online reputation before
disasters happen. Be active on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. If you have a
strong reputation to begin with, it's easier to deal with the bad stuff if and
when it happens. And if it does?
"If
an organisation is at fault, they need to come clean," he says.
"First is admission of guilt." Katehi did apologize for the original
pepper spraying — but so far hasn't followed suit in the current controversy.
Regards
Pralhad Jadhav
Senior Manager @ Library
Khaitan & Co
Upcoming Event | National Conference on
Future Librarianship: Innovation for Excellence (NCFL 2016) during April 22-23,
2016.
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