Maybe the rebel in you says “Who cares what Google has on me?” Maybe you really don’t care, but if that’s the case, let us consider reasons why you really should care. Maybe you just gave up trying to have a “clean” representation on Google. Too many people view it as a futile effort and throw in the towel, give up, and just live with it.
It may shock you how many websites collect information about you, and what they are presenting to anybody looking. What Google is telling people about you matters more than ever before. Just one ugly social media rant on a bad day – or worse, one politically incorrect slip on your part may cost you, big. Add in some faulty information or somebody with the same or similar name, and it can be a big problem – but avoidable.
It recently struck me, as I decided to re-publish this old blog after taking it down five years ago. I want my own words to be there when they Google Mark Murnahan.
Even if you don’t care, somebody probably does care what the Internet says about you. It isn’t just about looking good among friends. It can cost you a future job – or even a current job. It could keep you (or your kid) from getting that college acceptance letter (true story). It could mean you don’t get a second date. It could even hurt somebody near you. As a father, you can bet I’m Googling the kids that my kids hang out with, along with their parents.
The reasons to be aware and manage what’s out there are numerous. An estimated seventy-five percent of companies will Google your name to make hiring decisions. I suspect that’s a low estimate. What if you are not looking for a job? Maybe the threat doesn’t feel as grave, but bosses eventually retire, quit, or move on. What if the new boss wants to know you a little better?
What will they find?
What about a date? It may seem all magical at first, but when they stop responding to your messages, it may be time to see what they found online, and freshen it up a bit.
There are many reasons to consider what’s out there in the wild, with your name on it. Information doesn’t even have to be true to cause damage. It’s really worth the minutes it takes to find out, and begin to address it.
Being proactive and building positive information in search results is the best answer. That makes it much harder for the ugly stuff to build up later. If it’s already a bit messy, it is time to give Google something positive to show people.
I want to share a tool I found useful, and unlike others I have seen. Note that this is unsolicited. I am not paid to write this. If I seem excited about it, that’s because I found it to be a very useful and informative site. I am highly impressed.
BrandYourself offers a free tool to help you discover things that may be holding you back or harming your good name, online. It will find things you may not realize are out there in the wild, including a thorough look at search and social media sites. The results may surprise you.
A free BrandYourself profile will give you another page that will climb the search rankings and help knock down another of the things you don’t want in the top listings. It will also help the good information that you list on your profile, such as your LinkedIn, Twitter, your blog, or other pages, to rank better and hold their position. This makes it a great tool, both proactively and reactively, to improve your online reputation.
The tools of BrandYourself are robust, well-researched, and include useful tips to help you do it yourself. You can also set up notifications to keep an eye on your progress. They have service upgrades available, and even a Concierge Service in case you need their professional help.
Rather than explain it all to you, here’s their “Shark Tank” pitch from 2015. Notice that they turned down millions of dollars from the Sharks, but went on to do far better elsewhere. Since that time, they have grown the tools on an impressive scale. The social media tools are very robust, and the search value is excellent.
Here is an example of a BrandYourself profile: Mark Murnahan
It has been a long five year break from this blog.
In the five years since my most recent post here (in 2012), I have learned a lot, and I have a lot to share. I also see that I have a lot of sprucing up to do. This old blog is a mess. The code is ancient, the design is a throwback, and it is about as mobile friendly as a dunk in the toilet. I will get to it soon.
While I was away, I have owned and operated the most charming bakery I ever imagined. I was fortunate to find many of you, dear readers from all over the world, walking through the door for a fantastic cup of coffee, an amazing pastry, and a fun chat. I thank you kindly for that patronage.
While I enjoyed the endeavors of these past five years very much, I have freed my body from those 90 hours per week on my feet in the bakery in exchange for a leisurely 90 hours per week on my rump at a computer.
For everybody I have missed, I have some awesome tales to tell about how social media meets brick and mortar. I look forward to catching up.
If you’ll still have me, this could be like one of those sweet movie scenes where they reconnect and have a great moment.
Who is vetting this Internet and deleting all the misinformation?
Yes, that is a nice idea, but let’s face it – there is a lot of information online, and it cannot all be true. Let’s consider how false information is often deemed true, true information is deemed false, and how people decide for themselves what is “true” or “false”.
Like it or not, the things people believe are often based on what they want to believe – and what others around them believe. We are each influenced very uniquely, and whether marketing an agenda or defending ourselves, it is important to recognize those influences.
Facts are commonly disregarded, in favor of more subjective means of decision making such as societal perception and emotion. Allow me to give you examples.
I recently read an article produced by ABC News about “Pink Slime” being added to ground beef products. It has been in the news a lot, recently. What they call “Pink Slime” is made up of scraps of meat that would be otherwise wasted, but instead are finely ground and processed to be mixed with other ground beef. The beef industry calls it “Lean, Finely Textured Beef” or “LFTB”. It has been used for over 20 years in America’s food supply, but news agencies recently uncovered a great opportunity to make a sensational story.
Questioning Pink Slime and Industry Agendas
Maybe Pink Slime is horrible stuff, and maybe it is not. That’s not the point I am after. Regardless of whether it is good or bad, it brought up some thoughts about people’s system of beliefs and reactions to things they read. On either side of the topic, there are people who will strongly believe in their viewpoint, but the side that many people will believe is the one which creates the stronger emotional draw.
The article was produced by a large news agency, and pretended to be journalistic, but there was a strong slant against the use of beef additives. As I read through the comments, it was obvious how it influenced others. In fact, there were only a few who questioned the source reliability and bias. It emphasized how people react to fact or fiction based on emotion, and in this case the emotion was influenced by presentation.
When something affects people emotionally, and they can personally identify with the topic, they are far more likely to find something believable. If they have a connection of trust with the source, it becomes even more believable. For example, I could probably write a convincing story about green pixie dust, and it would seem a lot more “true” to long-time readers and friends than to people who do not know, like, or respect me. It would be even more believable if I created an emotional attachment and led people to believe there is something important at stake for them.
The topic of Pink Slime has a lot of people up in arms, demanding tighter government regulation of “Lean, Finely Textured Beef”. The comments on the ABC News article expressed anger toward the evil companies using it, and the evil government that had surely been paid off to allow its use. I was a bit surprised nobody claimed it had killed their pet unicorn or had spawned a new sub-species of humans that can only eat through a straw.
The readers responded very emotionally, but only a few pointed out unbiased and unemotional facts about pink slime. That ability to move people away from facts or toward the facts to support a particular viewpoint is how marketing works at its best – and its worst.
In another article on Discovery.com, the concerns of Pink Slime were addressed quite differently – based on the “Ick Factor”. Here is a quote from the article titled “PINK SLIME: PSYCHOLOGY OF THE ICK FACTOR“.
The real problem with pink slime is the “Ick Factor” — it looks and sounds gross.
Part of the psychology behind the Ick Factor is labeling. The language we use when we identify things influences how we interpret them. We can call an old car “used” or “pre-owned;” we can call civilians killed in wartime “men, women, and children” or “regrettable collateral damage.” And we can call processed beef parts “pink slime” or we can call it “boneless lean beef trimmings.”
The article also considered Jell-O, but it seems far fewer people complain about gelatin products. I will give you another quote to consider.
And let’s not forget Jell-O brand gelatin, a favorite dessert since 1897. You can call it Jell-O, or you can call it flavored and colored powdered cow bones, cartilage, and intestines.
The beef industry may point out that meat prices will skyrocket without pink slime. Maybe it is true. Maybe this USDA regulated meat product is safe and nutritious. Maybe it is not. What we can be certain of is that there are multiple agendas involved in its discussion, and the facts will “bend” based on who is presenting them, how they are presented, and to whom.
Once something of this emotionally-charged level of interest is presented, society and its inherent emotion-based process will prevail – one way or the other, and for better or worse.
Do You Ever Question Politics? Let’s Have Some Fun!
Another very easy way to explore this type of emotional “fact-checking” (gut checking) is to look at politics. It is a presidential election year in USA, so politics is on a lot of minds. Let’s consider how we make things feel more believable and “true” based on personal experience, influence from the people around us, and emotional attachments. Make no mistakes about this, because none of us are fully immune.
Many people identify with a given political party based on how they were raised, where they work, where they live, or other societal input. It is very unreliable, but most people have a hard time accepting that they may be getting the wrong story – or at least a story very tainted with emotion.
With regard to politics, once people choose their political party, they will often remain influenced by that group and will base their views on the group’s influence.
Let’s have some fun examining the two popular political parties in America, and how people of one political party may view the other. Let’s also consider how rigid people are in their beliefs and unlikely – or even incapable – to acknowledge varying viewpoints with flexibility and fairness.
Democrats Defined:
Tree-hugging fanatics who hate companies, love abortion, don’t work or work very little, and complain about economy but think the government economy-fairy should keep producing more money. Democrats commonly believe that if the government grows large enough, it will protect us from ourselves, and we can all have public-sector jobs while we let pixies, gnomes, unicorns, and other fantasy taxpayers produce the tax dollars needed to cover our salaries. Democrats are generally poor, because earning money is considered evil and corrupt. They have too many children, and they only vote when republicans are trying to take away their free government cheese. Democrats are likely to be seen protesting against the organization that writes their paycheck (unless it’s the government). They love to protest things whenever they are not busy cleaning up an environmental disaster and wiping the crude oil from little a kitten’s eyes after some idiot republicans decided to drill for oil instead of thinking globally and buying it from those nations we should work harder to get along with. A hug is always the best answer to political or religious unrest, and our enemies would stop plotting to attack America if we just gave more hugs. Oh, and let’s not forget that most democrats are either gay, bisexual, or have some sort of sexual perversion.
Republicans Defined:
Wealthy religious zealots who think women should make babies and stay in the kitchen. They despise the working class, unless it is to manufacture weapons or go fight in the latest war. They pray before they make any policy decisions, and if they pray extra hard, God will make them wealthy enough to control more industries, and countries. They are generally rich, rude, self-centered, and want to control the universe while making slaves of democrats. Republicans enjoy destroying our planet and are likely to be seen driving a Hummer while eating an endangered spotted owl sandwich on their way to the whale hunting expedition where they will crash into an oil tanker and set a glacier on fire, thus producing more global warming and sea level rise. Then they can enslave more democrats to clean it up … they always have a sneaky agenda like that. In fact, it is undoubtedly republicans who came up with the idea for Pink Slime – probably as a way to sneak brain-numbing drugs into our food supply and make us agree with whatever they say. They lie, too … almost always. Regarding their sexuality, it is amazing there are still any republicans left, because according to them, sex is taboo. If they do have sex, there will surely be another republican voter on the way, because they don’t believe in birth control.
I know you nodded your head or identified with something in those stereotypes. I hope you did not identify too perfectly either way, but I’m trying to make a point.
The point is that people think in packs. It is generally true that people make decisions about what they accept as fact, based on the people around them, combined with their own experiences, and their own desire to believe it. The presentation is critical, both in how it is presented and to whom.
Getting these principles right can create a lot of great business opportunities, but I must caution you to be very careful, too. The knife cuts in both directions. If you are falling prey to the emotional pull of the Internet’s popular notions of getting rich quick and easy with low efforts, it’s time to get a checkup from the neck up. That idea is popular and has a lot of emotional draw, but does it really settle right with you?
I guess you could say I am a bit of a whistle-blower about bad information online. I have explained the common SEO lies and publicly called out social media frauds. I try to encourage critical thinking, but perhaps understanding what leads people to believe something that is otherwise irrational or unbelievable is the best way to keep you safe from misinformation.
Now, please consider how believable something can become if you really want to believe it, and if others around you believe it, too. Then, perhaps the next time somebody tries to sell you their new variety of success in a box or easy-money green pixie dust, you will better understand how they make it so appealing.
Go ahead and tell me what you think about Pink Slime, democrats, republicans, marketing, or whatever this brings to mind for you.
Postscript:
I want to add a timely personal and professional observation.
Even in my present seemingly fact-based search for a new company to work for, these factors I pointed out here play a huge role with both parties. While I search for the perfect company with all the right “facts”, something that means even more is that I will fit well with the team and feel good about my work.
Wise companies understand this, and when they look at my résumé, it is merely a guideline. While my background is in operating and providing consulting services to successful businesses for over twenty years, my decision making comes from understanding people, business, where they intersect, and how the pieces all work together. My salary requirements depend on who I like, and their salary offerings will depend on their like and belief of my ideology, personality, and my specific fit with their people, and their business agenda.
This does not fit into a single sales pitch, and neither do many of the decisions the public will make about your brand, or your products.
These intricacies of people are what creates success at every scale of a business. That is why I expect the right company to invite me for an interview to learn more before making me an offer. Otherwise, they would just blindly email me the job offer based on simple facts. I’m not counting on that, and I don’t believe you should, either.
Build your brand, know who you are addressing, and give them the facts – but never neglect how the real decision making unfolds across a group, and how that group is influenced.
If you pick a fight with time, time will always win. When it comes to your marketing and business strategy, time is not a good excuse for failure, but it is a popular scapegoat.
I often hear people say they just don’t have enough time. I want to inspire you to question how you are using your time, and how you could be doing it better.
You can scale this however you like – from an individual to the largest corporations – time is a very precious business resource. I want you to take this personally, so I’m scaling this down to just you. That’s because you are responsible to yourself, first. It’s easy to scale this up and see how it can affect any company of any size.
If you are wasting time doing the wrong things, you can stop complaining right now, because you are getting exactly what you asked for. You must defend your time, and treat it like the valuable asset it truly represents to your business.
Why Do Competitors Always Have More Time?
Lack of time is one of the most common excuses I hear from people about why their marketing is in shambles. It is an especially popular excuse that people will use for neglecting their online market. They will say “I don’t have time to understand and use social media” or “I don’t have time to write a blog.”
People who are using the excuse of time will seldom like to accept that although they “don’t have the time”, their competition does have the time, and they are using it to win market share. Let me tell you, it’s not about the amount of available time – it’s how they prioritize the resource.
Time and Money Are Friends on Facebook
It’s tragic but expected that I hear the excuse of time-shortage from the same people who say they don’t have enough money. That’s more than just coincidence. Using time poorly will usually have a pretty devastating affect on finances, while using money badly creates a huge drain on time.
Just imagine how much more you could afford to delegate to others if you just started using your time better. Then you could surely get a lot more done. Yes, indeed, time and money are deeply connected.
The challenges of time and money cause an ugly and wasteful dilemma, and until priorities are sorted out, the cycle of waste will continue. Here’s the kicker though – you have exactly the same amount of time as everybody else.
Don’t Let Yourself Off the Hook!
I’m not going to criticize others about their poor use of time without accepting my own guilt. I shudder to look at how many useful or interesting things I see on the Internet, but only make minimal use of. I have a huge stockpile of links to articles I mean to finish reading – but I’ll have to get back to them after I follow up on some email. It all gets pretty messy without a solid routine – and a whole lot of discipline.
Discipline is especially important once you click open a web browser. There is always something shiny, blinky, and time-robbing just a click away. Controlling those urges to try and see and do everything is a big step toward productivity. You simply have to shut some of it off, and if you miss a few things, it is likely for the best. You cannot do and see it all, and you should stop trying. Focused and highly disciplined use of your time at a that computer can make a huge difference in the outcome of your goals.
I don’t have it perfect, and neither do you. What I can claim is that I’m trying, and I hope you are trying, too.
Stop Being Defensive and Delusional
People are often reluctant to accept that when they use the “not enough time” excuse it is largely because they are using their time poorly. Many people are quite defensive about their inefficient use of time. After all, who likes to accept the reality that they are messing things up, and it’s all their own fault? Denial is a wicked thing, so it’s best to just accept it – you can do a better job of time management.
Accept this fact: Time levels the playing field, and it is one way that we really are equal. It is 168 hours since this time last week, and 168 hours until this time next week. Spending those hours wisely is a huge factor in success and failure.
If you don’t have time to do things you know you should be doing, it is time to take a closer look at what you are doing that wastes your time. Since we each have exactly the same number of hours in a day, days in a week, and weeks in a year, time is not the problem. Priorities … now there’s the real challenge!
How Was Your 168 Hours?
It’s another Friday, and I’m gazing back through my week at what I have done – and also what I have not done. This week was not any longer than last week, nor shorter than next week. As expected, 168 hours have passed since this time last Friday, and I have 168 hours until this time next Friday.
I didn’t complete my recent objective of finding the job of my dreams this week. I’m willing to accept that it is largely my own fault. I made a lot of progress, but I took my eyes off the prize at times. I can make plenty of excuses, but I know that each excuse really comes down to priorities.
So now I wonder, how was your week, and what have you done to prioritize the next one even better? If you have any ideas for the rest of us, please share your comments. If you have a helpful tip, or a link to a helpful tip, please share your comments with the rest of us guilty time-wasters.
Thank you for granting me your time today. I know how precious it is. I’m glad you spent this moment to consider how easy it is to waste.
I’ve been thinking about this topic a lot lately, and I want to share a link that helped push me to share my thoughts with you. It is an article by my crusty, foul-mouthed, and respected peer, Erika Napoletano titled “The Part Where I Kick Your Ass“. Maybe you need your ass kicked, too. 😉
The next time you catch yourself in a loss for time, consider how you are using it. Are you making a list of priorities? Are you following a defined plan? Are you doing what it takes to use your time efficiently, or are you just making flimsy excuses like most people?
You may think I should give you a bunch of resources to free up your time. There are many good ideas in my blog archive, but most importantly, you must first recognize that there is a flaw before you can fix it.
What will it take to make your brand more durable? It is an important question for any business, and it’s worth some careful consideration.
Branding can be described as the “feel” that develops around a company or a person. Once a brand is forged in a person’s mind, it can be a time-consuming challenge to change that feel. Just consider the correlative affects of branding to understand why it is important to get it right.
Pick a brand – any brand – and consider what it brings to mind. For me, if you mention K-Mart, I think of grade school in the 1970’s when saying “Your mom buys your clothes at K-Mart” was an insult of the highest degree. That was memorable for me.
If you mention Applebee’s restaurant, I get a knot in my stomach, along with an ugly flashback of the last time I ate at Applebee’s. On the other hand, if you mention McDonald’s, I may nod my head and think to myself “yeah, I really do deserve a break today.”
You can apply the same principle to many of the people you know. During your use of social media, you have probably developed a view of certain people. As an example, there’s probably a lady who loves her cats – a lot, and maybe a guy that brings to mind the smell of dirty socks. In my case, there is a sizable crowd of people who post funny bacon-related content on my personal Facebook profile. If they think of me when they see bacon, I’m calling that a huge win! Go ahead, show me your bacon.
The “feel” you get about a brand can often extend far beyond the basic facts you know about the person or company. The stronger the brand message becomes, the more it creates a subconscious overall picture in your mind. You’ve surely experienced this, right?
Strategic Pause:
Before we get too far, I just want to point out that I’m actually going to offer you 100 pounds of free bacon, and a new freezer to keep it in – just to help me find the job of my dreams. Now back to the point of the article. Ahh yes, we were addressing branding. 🙂
Preemptive Branding and Brand Defense
A brand will not always have a positive correlation affect on us. Creating a strong positive brand message early, and consistently working to build upon it can help minimize a need for defense. It can also minimize long term damage. Make no mistake – every brand is subject to damage.
Strong brands can overcome adversity. For example, when you think of Ford Motor Company, you probably don’t think of their disaster with the Ford Pinto that was known for blowing up if it was hit in the rear.
Additionally, you probably don’t give a lot of thought to cyanide when you take a Tylenol – but that was a different matter in 1982.
Time and continued brand-building has healed those brands. Their previously favorable brand-status was a huge asset to pull them through.
Of course, many companies don’t have time on their side. This is especially true of smaller or newer brands. NetFlix may or may not have enough time to recover from the huge 2011 media blows to their brand. Their stock dropped to less than half its previous value. It happened quickly and with a lot of attention. They have recently reported big gains, but you can bet those gains would come a lot slower if they didn’t already have a positive and widely recognized brand.
Brands Evolve, But Should Never Be Left to Luck
Many companies are apprehensive about carving their brand in stone. The stronger you build your brand, the slower it will change – for better or worse. This makes it important to get it right, but what should be even scarier than getting it wrong is to leave it up to the luck of the marketplace. Even if you only get it 90 percent right, it is better than neglecting it.
The wrong brand message can be polarizing. The good news is that the right brand message can be polarizing, too. Just look at Facebook, Google, and Microsoft for examples of companies unafraid to polarize their audience.
I often harp on this fact, and I’ll say it again: “Everybody” is not your target market! If your marketing is focused properly, you must be willing to exclude some people. It doesn’t mean you should insult them, but you also don’t want to waste your resources trying to reach them.
Branding Identifies You, And That’s Okay!
We don’t all think alike, and we don’t all respond to the same things. In my brand instance, I’ve stated that my job is to help brands become more exciting … somewhere along the lines of sex, bacon, and fast cars. Thus, my personal brand is often identified with bacon, sex, and race cars. That works for me, and my audience can appreciate these things.
Note: A brand does not have to be outrageous to be memorable and effective. It is just fine if you want to remember me as a darn nice guy who loves his family and really wants to help you.
Sex, bacon, and fast cars may not work for you, but you have your own brand to work with. Your brand grows all around you, even when you’re not looking. It is best to have a good understanding of that brand picture you’re building – and embrace it. You should never be too passive about your brand, or it will tend to fade and lose value – and suffer the wrath of the market.
This may give you a nauseous feeling as you hear the sound of the whole world as you know it collapsing around you, but I’ve got to share a bit of truth. There is almost certainly a person sitting at their computer right this moment who does not like bacon, nor sex, nor fast cars. In fact, those bits of my brand message may completely turn them away. Some people will be less than enamored by your brand, too. But that’s OK!
On the other hand, if you just threw something heavy across the room and screamed about how crazy this ball of rock and water called Earth has become, you’re my kind of person – passionate, wise, and perhaps a just bit nuts. Bacon, sex, and fast cars are staples. Some things are just better than others, and we realize that fact.
Some people are better, too! That whole notion of people all being equal sounds fantastic in theory. Sure, I guess you can say that we’re all equal in some ways, but some will just never be a good singer. I’ll demonstrate if I really must, but you’ll want to turn down your speakers. Better yet, you may want to unplug them. I’m really terrible at singing, but like anything else, mastering a talent takes practice.
Some people will be great at making a brand stand out against the backdrop of a squillion others. That’s my gig. It’s what I studied while the rest of the world was apparently taking vocal lessons to embarrass me. Now, the next time you’re thinking about bacon, race cars, or sex, I want you to remember what I said about branding. Practice can help a lot. Embrace your brand – and practice it!
Oh heck, I just hijacked your favorite food, your transportation, and your sex life. You can hate me later, but at least you’ll have a leg up on the competition!
100 Pounds of Free Bacon!
Just to be sure we’re clear on this, I want to offer you 100 pounds of free bacon!
I’m currently in the hunt for a new job. I’m seeking a company that wants a stronger brand, and a better marketing return on investment. They can’t have my brand, but I will work hard to understand and create their best brand message.
If you introduce me to that company, I will reward you with 100 pounds of free bacon. In fact, I’ll even buy you a new freezer to keep it in. That way, every time you enjoy that amazing bacon smell filling your kitchen, you can think of me.
How’s that for a way to build a brand picture? I’m happy with it!
Now let’s get you some free bacon. Here are links to my résumé and a little more about me. Use them wisely, my bacon-loving friend.
