A few months ago I posted a blog about Social media and your professional profile. It is important to recognize that employers will search for your name to ensure they are hiring someone who fits the company. Here are some more tips and websites that will help you improve your online profile.
Understand what results appear when searching your name
Go to Google, Bing, Yahoo or Personas to find out what the top results are when you type in variations of your first name (include country and city). If there is a page you would like to hide, try requesting Content Removal on Google’s Webmaster Tools page. More information regarding removal policies on Google can be found here and here. You can also be alerted for new search results on Google Alerts.
BrandYourself
This service helps improve your Google results and online reputation. You get points based on the type of profiles you boost through this service. Visit my page for an example!
Klout
Klout is a free service that discovers how you influence your networks. The Klout Score reveals how people respond to your social media posts. Barack Obama currently holds a Klout score of 99.
Feature the best about yourself (and hide the rest)
Additional content easily found on the web can boost (or harm) employers’ opinions of you. Update profiles as default profile pictures and information portrays laziness. Be careful when you publicize posts as it can shine a negative light. Either make your personal online profiles completely private, or ensure everything you are posting is appropriate to future employers.
Highlight interests
Employers are interested in knowing who you are. If you are passionate in something, find popular platform to highlight your work. Whether it’s a hobby or educational pursuit, you should start a portfolio. Here are a few suggestions on which service to use for what purpose.
Blogs
WordPress is allows full control of layout or provides an easy-to-use blogging service. Blogger links to your Google account, which is can feature your Google+ account. Tumblr focuses on short-form multimedia posts.
Site builders
Vizify grabs information from Social Networks like LinkedIn and Twitter and creates a graphical biography. Weebly is a powerful and simple site creator. About.me is a simple webpage featuring a large photo, biography, and contact information. Squidoo creates webpages on interests and recommendations, but can help charities.
Social media profiles
High quality profiles include LinkedIn, a social network for professionals; Facebook, a highly active social network; Twitter, a microblogging service; and Google+, a social network that is good for SEO. Meetup facilitates offline group meetings. Foursquare shares and saves the places you visit.
Video/Photo
Flickr is an online photo management application. Slideshare is a portfolio for Powerpoint presentations, Word documents and Adobe PDFs. Vimeo is a high quality video-sharing site. Youtube is a popular video-sharing site as well as Dailymotion. I hope my resources help you build a great online reputation. It’s important to have a good first impression!