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Blog: Fresh Tilled Ideas

Online Reputation Management for Beginners #1: Business Networking Sites

Posted On: June 17th 2008
By: Dave Pye

Chances are that if you're a self-respecting businessperson in 2008 you have an account on Plaxo, LinkedIn, Xing - or maybe even all three. What you may not know is that these behemoths of the social business networking space have a considerable amount of red-headed stepchildren nipping at their heels. Although these lesser, 2nd tier sites may seem like overkill at first glance, don't be so hasty to discount them. Now I'll tell you why.

Tip the Social Scales in Your Favor.
Forget about networking, finding old school chums and job searching for a moment. Creating multiple profiles for yourself on a variety of professional business networking sites may be time consuming but is well worth the effort in terms of the ORM (Online Reputation Management) benefits. Simply put, ORM is the practice of positively influencing the search results that rank highly for your name or that of your company/products. Filling Google's top 10 with positive references (like profiles on a variety of social business networks,) while pushing down existing or potential blog posts, forum messages or other content which may be negative in nature.

A Practical, Real World Example Would be Helpful.
On many of the sites I use for both clients and myself it's possible to get your company or personal name into the URL, header tag, title tag or a combination. As these three elements are held in very high regard by search engine algorithms, business networking sites can be tremendously helpful for online brand reputation management. Simple. If someone "Googles" the name of your company, for example, and finds your dedicated page on Spoke - that could mean a negative blog post from a critical customer being pushed down to the second page of the search results for a potential one. Web 2.0 gives anyone the opportunity to become an evangelist or a skeptic - be they an objective reviewer out to help their fellow mankind or a drooling wingnut. It will be tough for potential customers to tell the difference.

You Have my Attention, Dave. Where do I Start?

My Cubicle Space: Their stated mission is to provide a search engine platform where any business can promote their product or service in a creative way to the fore front for millions of people. Free to use and includes press release submission, blog and keyword targeting capabilities. HQ: Watertown, MA.
Ryze: Members get a free networking-oriented home page and can send messages to other members. They can also join special networks related to their industry, interests or location. The local features are particularly impressive and should be perfect for businesses with physical store locations or service areas. Both free and paid options exist. HQ: San Francisco, CA.
Ziggs: A definite fore-runner of the emerging LinkedIn competition, Ziggs allows you to build a profile, network, post jobs and other classifieds and is strongly marketed as an online brand management resource. HQ: Boston, MA.

Act. Don't React.
ORM is a dish best served... in advance. Why wait until the #1 spot in Google and Yahoo for "Your Name" is the profile off a semi-retired Austrian adult film star? If I had a nickel. Listen to me very carefully: Start tailoring your own set of search results today. Here is a full list I recently compiled of lesser-known business networking sites and check back as my ORM for beginners series will continue next week with part 2: Domains and Blogs.