Five Tools to Monitor and Manage Your Online Reputation

Posted: June 12, 2012

Your online reputation can be crucial to your success – whether you're selling products or yourself. Keeping track of what's going on with your Web presence is as important as tracking your banking activity. Below are 5 tools that can help you keep an eye on your brand and reputation.

Takeaway: To make sure your reputation stays clean, you have to keep an eye on what’s being said about you. These tools can help you protect your good name.

If you conduct business online, or if you have an online presence for a product, service, talent, or skill, you need to manage how the millions upon millions of online users perceive you. It takes only a few bad comments, posts, or blogs to ruin the reputation you have spent years building. Fortunately, there are tools out there to help you manage that reputation. Those tools aren’t exactly obvious — and you have use caution when selecting them (to make sure you’re not about to get caught up in a scam). But when you find a reliable tool, it’s wise to make use of it.

Here are five tools you can use to help you ensure that your online brand and reputation are where you want them. Naturally, these tools require some work to really make the most of what they offer. And most of them aren’t just one-time usage tools — you actually have to spend time with them to really help massage your reputation.

1: Google’s Me on the Web

Google has a nice tool that allows you to easily monitor search results for your name. Me on the Web (Figure A) is included in the Google Dashboard. It allows you set up search monitors for your name/brand, assists you in the removal of unwanted content, and can help you manage your online identity. I have found the search monitors to be incredibly helpful as they alert you when others (individuals, companies, etc.) mention your name or your brand.

Figure A

2: Reputation.com

Reputation.com (Figure B) is a service that allows you to see how you look online. The service is free and it doesn’t use your information for any untoward activities. All you do is create a free account. Then you can monitor your online “buzz,” search for and remove any negative information/mentions about you, and find out how you can control what people see when they search for you.

Figure B

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