I was interviewed for this WCCO-TV piece, Beware: Your Reputation is Being Googled, this week:
“If you look at your Facebook and Twitter feeds, our friends lead amazing lives…that’s not real life, that’s success theater, that’s us perfectly orchestrating that,” said Greg Swan, a digital strategist at Weber Shandwick…
“Surveys show that 70 percent of job candidates were rejected by recruiters just from a pure search engine perspective, of seeing what comes up,” Swan said…
“It used to be that you’d ask someone, ‘Have you Googled yourself lately?,’ and we’d all giggle. But now that’s a real thing,” Swan said.
Typing your name into the Google search box will show what you look like online, whether you’ve posted anything truly embarrassing, and whether you have a “digital doppelganger.”
“A digital doppelganger would be someone with the exact same name, who comes up when your name is Googled,” Swan said.
If that happens, you may want to use your middle initial to set your name apart. Other tricks include filling out a complete profile on LinkedIn, the business networking site, and making sure your Facebook settings keep your pictures as private as you want.
Swan also uses an app called Time Hop to look back at his posts from the past. It’s mostly for fun, but also serves as a gentle reminder of what’s been put up.
And if he has to send an embarrassing picture, Swan will use Snapchat or Facebook poke. Those apps make the pictures you send disappear in 10 seconds or less.
GREG SWAN 