Risks & Reputation Management: Action Items

You learned a lot of information when you attended “Risks & Reputation Management: Using Social Media to Protect Your Brand”. Or maybe someone you know wasn’t able to come. What are the takeaways?

Disclaimer: You will not be able to accomplish all of this in one day. I want to help manage your expectations. You will want to set aside time to accomplish these tasks on a regular basis (maybe once or twice a week) until you’ve worked your way through the list. Pace yourself. What you learn in this process about the online image of your name and your business will be worth all the effort.

• Perform a vanity search (*1)
• Respond to negative commenters in a positive and validating way (*2)
• Setup Google Alerts (*1)
• Setup Google Places (*3)
• Setup business on Directories (*3)
• Legacy Management/Process (*4)
• Assess Computer Systems security (*4)
• Create a Crisis Plan (*4)
• Setup internal Social Media Communications Policy (*4)
• Assess customer service requirements with survey (*2)
• Review website (I recommend reading it out of order to to more easily spot errors) for correct information, functionality, browser compatibility, update on a schedule to keep rankings high with Google (*4)

Blogs to show you how to do the action items:

*1 – Tools for monitoring your reputation

*2 – How to deal with negative customer feedback

*3 – Get yourself listed on the web

*4 – Legacy and process management, steps to take

 

[Image via CampaignsMD]

LinkedIn Privacy Settings You Should Know About

I spend much of my time either researching or training. I love to dive into settings for my clients. I like to quickly take care of the most nefarious and get their settings optimized right away. This is where I find many people run out of steam and give up because it’s simply too much and generally confusing. I found a few privacy settings I think you should know about on LinkedIn.

  • Log in to LinkedIn
  • Hover over your name in the upper right hand corner and Settings shows up on the drop down list, select
  • At bottom left, look for Groups, Associations, and Applications, select it
  • Under Privacy Controls, there is “Turn on/off data sharing with 3rd party applications”. Select or deselect at will.
  • Again under Privacy Controls, there is “Manage settings for LinkedIn plugins on third party sites”
  • This one is important: on the Account tab, there is “Manage Social Advertising”. This is where you select whether or not LinkedIn may use your name and photo in social advertising.

I recommend you read each of these carefully but I would bet money that you don’t know these settings are even there. Make sure you know where your data is going. I actually chose to keep the first two I mentioned but I opted out of social advertising. Be educated. Knowledge is power.

The Pseudo Social Media Experts

If someone has the audacity to call themselves “expert” or “guru”, I recommend that you avoid them. There are some out there flaunting these self appointed titles. People frequently use these words to introduce me and it makes me uncomfortable. I understand that it’s natural to use these titles when referring to someone that knows more than yourself on a specific subject (particularly social media). My view is that there is always so much more to learn and someone that knows more than I.

I don’t care whom you hire, I just want you to get what you paid for and that the solutions they provide are the right ones for your needs not a package that they want to sell you. Do your research and go with your gut.

Think Twice Before You Pass That Along

I can connect with WHOM on LinkedIn?

I was on LinkedIn and spotted this “People You May Know” box. My first thought is how did they not spot an obviously fake profile of J.R.R. Tolkein? It made me doubt the filtering capacity of this tool. Then I thought it was pretty funny. It wasn’t until I uploaded this screenshot to my blog that I even noticed the Hatter.

The reason I bring this to your attention is that our comprehension and deductive skills are often called upon when using the internet. We spend much time reading, absorbing, reflecting and digesting the information that is served to us all day long. It is our job to have a healthy sense of skepticism about what we read. Just recently there was a misquote attributed to Martin Luther King Jr. that went viral.

Think before you post. Research before sending “information” along. Snopes is still a reliable source though isn’t good at “right now”. Also check the calendar to see if it’s April Fool’s Day. It wasn’t until I told someone I saw this before I was informed it was an April Fool’s joke. Got me. I’m just really glad I didn’t post this screenshot until I found out what it was really about.

And I don’t think J.R.R. Tolkein will be answering your LinkedIn request.

Your Child is All Over the Internet!

AVG, an internet security company, did a study and it turns out that 92% of US children have a digital footprint….before they are two years old.

About once a week I say out loud that I am grateful I had my daughter before Facebook went mainstream. I was using Myspace when she was a baby but that environment wasn’t really about family. I just know that I would’ve uploaded a ridiculous amount of pictures and been an “over sharer” (that’s NOT a veiled dig at anyone I know!). The reason I joined Facebook originally was to keep up to date with a girlfriend that moved to rural Canada. I had to wait for it to leave the university system so I could join to see pictures and videos she posted. I feel like I watched her son grow up via social networking. Due to our distance, there’s no other way we could’ve shared that much. [Article about Lance Armstrong’s unborn child’s Twitter account.]

My husband is on the opposite side of the social spectrum from me and has a higher level of privacy requirements than do I. Every time I post a picture or make a comment about my really really personal life, I think to myself, “What would Dan do?” (and I think of the WWJD bracelets 🙂 ). Bottom line is I have a little girl and a family to consider. It’s not always about me. Sometimes it’s about prudence and safety. I don’t want to lose sight of the reason I use Facebook and other tools, to connect more deeply and regularly with my family and friends.

We are all looking to find a balance. Just remember…you are the guardian of your child’s reputation and name until they can screw it up for themselves.

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