Knowledge will forever Govern Ignorance. - James Madison

Dan Schawbel

Dan Schawbel is the leading personal branding expert for young professionals. Read full profile

People you lot know or take never met yet are googl'ing you. Allow's face it, you're even google'ing yourself! At the end of 2007, the Pew Internet Research Team found that 47% of people search for data about themselves online (Self-Googling), which was more than double 5 years ago. It'southward a pretty rubber bet that per centum has climbed to over 50 or 60% by this twelvemonth.

Some people might tin information technology ego-surfing, but information technology's actually a good do to run into what results come for your name. Your teachers, friends, family, boyfriends and girlfriends and coworkers are google'ing yous either for fun or because they want to learn more about you. Hiring managers desire to run into if you have a clean record in Google, which is your permanent record considering every move yous make (yeah even a blog comment) is stored at that place forever. Before I went on a second date once, the girl Google'ed me. If she hadn't liked what she saw, the 2nd date wouldn't have happened. Try doing it right now and run across what you get.

There is no hiding from Google!

Google keeps track of just about everything you exercise on the internet. It patrols and captures your online behavior, such as when y'all post on your blog, tweet using Twitter, join social networks, annotate on other blogs, write articles for online news sources and more. Aside from the content you create and distribute over the internet, other people are talking nigh you lot, which means that Google has a complete movie (almost similar an autobiography) of your life. In the digital age, Google is your resume, your permanent record and a periodical of your life. Your children and children's children will be able to discover out everything well-nigh you when they abound older. "Mom, expect what I just institute out near Dad in Google." Your personal brand can't hibernate from Google. In that location is one major exception to this though.

Common names

If your name is common, such equally Mike Smith, then it will be very hard to own your Google results. There are over 54 million results for "Mike Smith" in Google. You won't be able to compete with the athletes and musicians on the first few pages. If your life goal is to rank in the top ten results, that may be achievable, if yous either become very famous or work extremely hard at building content each and every solar day for your entire life. At the age of 60 you might detect out that Google changed their algorithm and y'all'll lose all that hard work. The betoken existence is that yous'll have to differentiate your proper noun in order to rank high. I typically recommend you use your middle name or a nickname in this case. The worst case scenario is that you alter your name completely ;).

Glory names

Celebrities are very fortunate because they get mass media attention, which means traditional media sources (NY Times, ABC News) write articles about them. These sources rank extremely high in Google. We're talking Google PageRank's of 8 and higher! Your blog posts about these celebrities will never end upwards on the top twenty results for their name unless you are Perez Hilton. If your proper noun is the same as a celebrities, yous are in big trouble. Endeavor searching for Christina Aquilera (21 million results), Britney Spears (88 meg), Lil Wayne (twoscore meg) and other major celebrities. Personally, I don't take whatsoever friends with these names, but even with C-level celebrities, you don't stand a chance. If you are stuck with a celebrity proper name, I suggest that yous build your brand around an expanse of your expertise or interest and connect it to your brand proper noun.

Unique names

While growing up, you might have been made fun of people of your unique name considering information technology was "different." Although you were ostracized and fabricated fun of, right now you get to laugh at everyone else! With a distinct name, you are able to hands manipulate the results for your name on search engines. When you become to your loftier schoolhouse reunion and see your friends, you'll get the last laugh because you can be visible and control perceptions, while they just cannot. When you Google your name, whether you have results that reflect your brand, you'll run across how hard it will be to rank high for it or non. Depending on the competition, it may accept y'all a few days or a few months. Over time, if you work very hard, you'll ain the tiptop ten results for your proper name.

In my next mail service, I'll talk about what you can do to gain control over your Google results and permit your personal brand polish through.

Featured photo credit: Adam Winger via unsplash.com

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Source: https://www.lifehack.org/articles/work/knowledge-will-forever-govern-ignorance-james-madison.html