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Crowdsourcing II :: DOs and DONTs of Online Reputation Managment

Christi Eubanks, of my PRception, asks me and dozens of PR educators and practitioners to share our “top 3 DOs and DON’Ts for personal online reputation management.”

That’s a good question. We talk about it in class from time to time.  Jeremy Pepper just wrote an interesting post on this very topic – Reputation – Both Corporate and Personal -  at Pop PR!

That’s also a tough question. Only three? I’m going for three of each. :) I’ve seen some of the other answers, so I’ll try to hit some areas maybe not covered there, yet key beginner first steps to online reputation management. You may post your comments here, but really … the best thing (I believe) would be to post in your blog and ping Christi of my PRception.

Do’s

  1. Do be true to yourself, your friends, your colleagues, your stakeholders, your organization/business and to whatever dogma (the good ones, of course) that you may follow. Track the reputation you’ve already developed, and will enhance with future deeds, online in every search engine known to humankind to be certain you remain true to those people and institutions you cherish, as well as your own beliefs.
  2. Do be confident in your opinions and stick to your principles. Still, be willing to concede when you are wrong. Humbly confess your wrongs and be willing to accept the consequences of those wrongs. People forgive. They really do. And, be willing to tell your boss, “No, I won’t post that” and be willing to walk away. (That’s a tough one, I’ll admit.) Finally, all problems can likely be avoided if you’ll just follow number three…
  3. Do pay heed to the ultimate online rule: Think before you hit Publish – always. Walk away for a day, if you need to. There is no need to rush when it could come back to haunt you. Remember, patience is a virtue.

Don’ts

  1. Don’t write anything online that you wouldn’t be proud to show to your parents. Exception? If your last name is Manson and your parents’ first names are either Marilyn or Charles.
  2. Don’t post any compromising photos or videos of yourself online. Check that, don’t even make those things, or allow anyone else to, either. Once they are out there, they spread like a virus and can be found everywhere, by anyone – even in supposedly private and safe sites. If you doubt this, and go ahead anyway, you likely deserve to be caught.
  3. Don’t, for a client, post anonymously, create flogs, create aggregator blogs or use any other black hat tactic to make your main site look better (or busy). In fact, don’t even attempt any transgression that creates a false appearance or impression. It is likely inevitable that it will be found out, and then you got some ’splainin to do (before you pack up your desk with security hovering nearby).

As an addendum to all of those, I would remind you that any transgressions (especially those outed by others, not you) – once online – make the half life of plutonium (roughly 24,000 years) look like a coffee break. It will be out there, and following you, where ever you may go.

So, I’m going to ping the same people Christi did in her post – then ping a few more. As Christi asks, what do you good people think about a “Best Rules of Online Repuation Management?” Some of them have written on the topic for this very meme, and others have addressed it before. But, have their ideas changed?

Richard Bailey, Philip Young, Karen Russell, Bill Sledzik, Kaye Sweetser, Heather Yaxley, Les Potter, David Phillips, Christine Smith, Kelli Matthews, Ross Monaghan, Greg Smith, Tom Watson, Gary Schlee, Derek Hodge, Tim Penning, Walter Carl, Bob Batchelor, and the folks at Cac.ophony and anyone else reading (you don’t have to be an educator) discuss. Go.

Next, I’ll ping two of our newest student PR bloggers … from the U.K., of all places. They study with the very kind and smart Richard Bailey, a good guy if ever there was one.

The first new “Officially a blogger” student is Rebecca Armstrong, and she is “studying Public Relations at Leeds Metropolitan University” as well as blogging at PRblogs.org – PR here, to all the way over there…. Next up, meet Paddy Doyle, also a student at Leeds Metropolitan. His blog has a great title, too. Check out Spoof or Truth. It is over at blogger.com.

So, my question to Rebecca and Paddy is, what are your “top 3 DOs and DON’Ts for personal online reputation management?” Please share and meet all of these other PR bloggers, too. I want to bring you into the conversations.

I’ll even ping all of my students, with the same question, to see if they find the post, too. If so, they can throw in their top three ideas.