In recent years, recruiters have turned to different ways of getting information on their prospective employees. Studies show that as many as ninety percent of all recruiters surveyed indicate they do “Google” candidates prior to meeting them. Just under fifty percent of them say they rely on what they read when they are choosing an applicant. Much in the same way consumers decide what company they are going to do business with, recruiters determine who is going to be a part of their business based on their online reputation. Therefore, it is past time to be concerned with your internet reputation and what people see when they use Google to find you. Below, you will find advice you should take if you are going to be looking for a job in the near future.
Do You Have Internet Presence?
Since recruiters have a habit of looking up candidates on Google prior to meeting with them, you need to make sure they have something to look at. But what exactly are they looking for? To start, they want to see if you appear on the first page of Google. More specifically, they are looking at the top three results. These top three results are clicked on ninety percent of the time. Take a moment and Google yourself.
What do recruiters see when they type in your name? Are any of the top results you? Perhaps it is someone that shares the same name as you. If you do not have an uncommon name, you will want to try to do something about it. Sure, unique spellings can help, but as more people are occupying the planet, other people are thinking of those unique spellings as well. If you do have a unique name and are not present, that is equally as bad. When a recruiter searches your name, you want the first things they see to be all about you.
In addition to being present on the first page of Google, you want to know what others are saying about you. It is not always about what you post about yourself that matters. In fact, sometimes what others have to say about you in vastly more important than what you say about yourself. The reason is that you certainly have a bias when it comes to what you post for people to see. I suggest doing searches on yourself regularly or even setting up a Google Alert to notify you of any occasion others are mentioning you by name. When keeping track of your Google results, make sure you are not using your browser to do this. Your internet search can influence what you see. Instead, use a third-party website or application that will show you what the majority of users will see in your area.
Erasing Your Google Footprints and Controlling Your Online Reputation
I am going to be blunt here. If you don’t own the content, you are going to have a difficult time erasing negative articles written about you. Don’t stress about that too much. There are still things you can do to suppress these results or even have them deleted.
To start, you will want to contact the owner of the article. Ask them to take the information down. Nothing says they are required to under freedom of expression. However, depending on the country you live in, you may have a case for “The Right to Be Forgotten.” Currently, England is the only country to make any headway on this. With any luck, more countries will follow suit. Assuming you come up snake eyes on getting the article removed, you will need to move on to phase two – suppression.
Suppressing negative results can be done, but it does take a long time. You will need to write, or better yet, have others write articles about you. In these articles, they must mention you by name. The only way to overwrite a bad review is by putting up good reviews about yourself. As I said, it is better if someone else writes about you because, in the eyes of others, that means more than your own words. The goal of this is to fill the first page of Google with positive articles or mentions about you. Remember, this is something you are going to have to monitor regularly to make sure you stay on top.
Conclusion
The goals of the above strategy are simple. You want to run an analysis of yourself frequently. Staying on top of what is being said about you is your number one priority. The more that you know about what people are saying, the better you can combat the problem.
The next goal is to create (or have someone create) articles that are more in line with the image you want people to see. This can be virtually anything. When a recruiter types your name in Google, you want them to observe all good things. I, personally, wouldn’t limit this to just business things. The reason is that businesses want to see that you have a life outside of work. There is a reason that they commonly ask you what sort of activities you enjoy. The more passionately you talk about those things, the more they know you can be passionate about being a good employee. To get your name out there, you will have to get a lot of articles written about you. Make sure that the articles written are sincere. If your prospective employer were to contact the writer, you would want it to be someone that knows a lot about you. If they approach someone and they know very little about you, they will think you have paid for someone to write good things about you. This will lead them to believe that you have negative things to hide. That may prompt them to look beyond the first page of Google. Finally, you need to check on your results frequently. Remember, you are not going to do this from your browser. Use a third-party software to ensure you are getting the correct results.