In today's new world of work and business, your online identity is important. Think about it. 83% of recruiters use google results to assess candidates. 23% of professionals google their peers before meetings. How many businesses would you hire before looking at what google had to say about them first?
When you google yourself, what you do you find? Do you know how strong your online identity is? If not, then visit the Career Distinction online identity calculator to find out!
Here is my score:
Congratulations. Your online identity score is 10 out of 10. You are digitally distinct. This is the nirvana of online identity. Keep up the good work and remember that your google results can change as fast as the weather in New England. So regularly monitor your online identity.
My online identity score was not always that high. The very first time I googled my name I found quite a few listings - but none were about me. There were university students with my name who were posting about their adventures over the weekend on an social networking site, expressing their opinions about free speech, or sharing resources on their website related to a class project. There was an executive of a global firm with my name who still comes up quite often, as well as a 1998 wedding announcement in the New York Times that is still a top result to this day. Who knew wedding announcements were still being read 9 years after the fact? (Note to self: add NYT wedding announcements to the online identity development strategy list)
Although I have not done the calculations, that first time I googled myself I am sure that my online identity would have rendered me "digitally distastrous". An employer would have hopefully come to the conclusion that I was not any of these people, but may have wondered why they could not find anything about me in those first few pages of results. If I were in business for myself at that time, a prospective client may have decided they were looking to work with someone who had more of a global, online presence or just gave up after being unable to find out more about me.
As a professional who works with people to develop their online identity, I would not be worth my fees if I did not have a top score. As a job seeker who wants to be taken seriously by employers, or a business who wants to be taken seriously by prospective clients, you have the same responsibility if you want to secure the job or business you want and get paid what you are worth.
Your Expat Success Tip: Use the online identity calculator to find out if you are you digitally distinct, digitally dabbling, or digitally disastrous. If you are digitally disastrous - start taking action to improve your online identity today!
Nice post -- I tried out the calculator and scored a 10 -- so am pleased overall. But, it does make you think about the proportion of "irrelevant" search results that come up in the first three pages -- which is interesting, and about what the "relevant" search results say about what you want to be "found" and represented as...
Posted by: nightingaleshiraz | October 2007 at 16:06