Tag Archives: Huffington Post

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Huffington Post has published an interview with Reputation Communications CEO Shannon Wilkinson about personal branding online. These are highlights from Stacey Cohen’s article:

“Personal brands are complex, shaped by our skills, our interests and the content we create, from our tweets to our blog posts.

But at the foundation of any personal brand is a singular – and paramount – trait: our reputations.

Without a positive reputation, no personal brand can flourish. If you’re not viewed as a dependable and trustworthy professional, your skillset, interests and output – no matter how impressive – won’t matter much.

And in today’s digital world, where photos, social media profiles and news stories are immortal, upholding a sterling reputation is more important than ever. One hiccup, whether an awkward photograph, or unforgiving article, can haunt a professional for years.

Few people know the nuances and importance of modern reputation care better than Shannon Wilkinson, a leading expert on online reputation management, or ORM. Wilkinson’s NYC-based firm Reputation Communications serves a suite of international clients and offers services ranging from reputation-building and reputation research to reputation repair. Wilkinson is a familiar byline in the Wall Street Journal’s “Crisis of the Week” column,” a seasoned speaker and regular blogger at her website, You(Online).

I recently caught up with Wilkinson about ORM and polishing and protecting reputations in the age of the Internet.

Wilkinson paints a vivid picture of just how important ORM is in today’s world and shares guidance on how to best navigate this new realm.

First, assess what’s already out there – and resist the belief that you can be invisible online. “The digital age ensures that each of us have an online reputation, whether we want one or not,” Wilkinson explains. If we throw up our hands and surrender, our reputations will be determined by “bots that scrape, index and republish the publicly available information about you,” Wilkinson warns.

Next up: Start creating content that accurately represents, and enhances, your reputation. “Counter-balance third-party content and replace it with new, positive and authentic material,” Wilkinson says. “This is a key ORM strategy.” Ensure the items you do have control over – your LinkedIn profile, your company bio, your blog and your Twitter – carry the right messaging.

There’s lots more to ORM than just this, and mercifully Wilkinson is quick to share her agency’s most popular blog post, “The Essentials: Online Reputation Management FAQs.” It’s a useful inventory of strategies and tactics you can use to start burnishing your online reputation today. If you have a presence online (and remember, everybody does), it’s worth the read.”

Read the article: Online, Your Reputation is Everything.

 
 
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Authenticity has emerged as an important online trait.

“We live in an age when people are moved less by spectacle and more by what they consider to be actuality—what feels real,” Michael Drew writes on the Huffington Post. Andrew Potter, author of The Authenticity Hoax, takes it one step further, attributing our quest for authenticity to “a world increasingly dominated by the fake.”

While the new emphasis on it may be a reaction to factors like the ambiguity of reality television and the ubiquity of plastic surgery life, concern for it can be found in all areas of contemporary life. It could have been a factor in the selection of the new pope, who’s been called “humble, authentic and credible.”

The Struggle for Truth

Authenticity is certainly a desired trait, but it is also an elusive one. As described by Muhlenberg College professor Jeff Pooley: “The best way to sell yourself is to not appear to be selling yourself.” Meghan Daum explores this issue further in an LA Times opinion piece on authenticity in politics, distinguishing the dictionary definition from what she calls “aw, shucks authenticity.” The key takeaway? Trying to be authentic, strictly speaking, isn’t really authentic at all.

Entrepreneur and author Seth Godin offers a more useful definition. “Authenticity, for me, is doing what you promise, not ‘being who you are,’” he says. “As the Internet and a connected culture places a higher premium on authenticity (because if you’re inconsistent, you’re going to get caught) it’s easy to confuse authentic behavior with an existential crisis,” he adds.

 
 
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Anderson Cooper’s Deft Reputation Management

Earlier this month CNN’s Anderson Cooper revealed that he is gay in a letter to The Daily Beast’s Andrew Sullivan.

According to the Huffington Post, Cooper’s decision to officially come out followed “a long discussion with his team making sure he wasn’t committing career suicide.” With rumors that Cooper may soon marry, that letter could be part of a larger plan to open up about his personal life while closely managing the tone and context of that revelation.

A Good Choice

The decision to make the announcement was a good choice. “I’ve always believed that who a reporter votes for, what religion they are, who they love, should not be something they have to discuss publicly,” Cooper states in his letter to Sullivan. But he also acknowledges that keeping his sexual orientation private had the potential to harm his reputation for honest and accurate journalism. “It’s become clear to me that by remaining silent on certain aspects of my personal life for so long, I have given some the mistaken impression that I am trying to hide something –something that makes me uncomfortable, ashamed or even afraid. This is distressing because it is simply not true.”

Taking Control of His Message

By choosing to share the news in a thoughtful and eloquent letter to Sullivan, a friend and himself an openly gay journalist, Cooper took control of his message and preempted any threat to his reputation that his previous secrecy had posed. By doing so he was also able to frame the announcement in a way that underscores his values and reputation, both personally and professionally. “I have always been very open and honest about this part of my life with my friends, my family, and my colleagues,” Cooper wrote, adding that he has always tried to keep his private affairs and identity out of his journalism. “I’ve never wanted to be any kind of reporter other than a good one, and I do not desire to promote any cause other than the truth.”

Cooper also minimized the story’s ability to expand by making the announcement while he was in Botswana, out of the reach of the media.

The way Anderson Cooper has handled this is a model of how to get in front of potentially controversial personal issues.  On a broader level, Cooper has set an important example by treating sexual orientation as a subject that is not relevant to public or professional reputation.