Personal Brand Security: How to Protect Your Identity on the Web

Why do I need personal brand security?

Most people tend to think that because they are not businesses or corporations, they have no need to monitor what the internet says about them.

Story is told of a CEO who when she was young had said some caustic words about a brand but as at then she had not yet started her business so when a blogger put the information online, she was not concerned. The sad thing about this was that they story was false, she actually did not make those remarks, what she had been said had been misconstrued by the blogger. Years after, she started her own business and that piece of web content began to haunt her.

People would reach out to her berating her for saying such words and threatening to leave her brand. It was negative news that began to affect her brand. At the time the story first went up, she was absolutely unconcerned as she never had plans to own her own business so she did not protect her brand. Brand security was something she had to focus on when she saw how it was affecting her brand

If you think that at any point in time, someone is going to look you up on the internet, it could be a potential employer, a potential boyfriend or girlfriend, a landlord, any one at all, you need to be sure your brand is saying exactly what you want it to say. They should go online and see what you want represented about you and nothing asides that. It is not until you own a business or are connected to a corporation that you need to protect your identity on the web.

Truly, it used to be only company and organisation that used to be concerned about brand security but now with increased access to information, everyone needs brand security. Your digital identify and online reputation must be protected.

Why exactly is brand security so important?

If you build a personal brand online, you have to keep working to protect it to ensure it says only what you want it to say. On the flip side, even if you do not build a personal brand, you could end up like the CEO in our story whose personal brand was built for her a couple for years before she began to build it herself. To ensure that your online reputation remains authentic and secure and does not deviate from what you want it to be, you have to constantly stay on top of brand security.

Moreover, the rate at which information is growing and travelling these days is super swift. There are more ways of spreading information and much more people online that anything can become viral much easier than before. It is therefore harder now to protect your online reputation which is the reason why you have to be deliberate about it and to consciously stay ahead of the game. In an instant, a simple joke perceived wrongly can reach millions pf people and become the hallmark of your identity.

 So how do you go about brand security?

  1. Claim domains and social media handles early

People when they have business ideas tend to go buy the domain names for the websites that will house those ideas even if they do not plan to run with the ideas for years. No one has a monopoly on ideas and anyone could have the same idea you just had, so it is safe to grab that domain before anyone else.

This can be applied to brand security as well. Grab a domain name for your name and grab social media handles for your personal brand as early as you can. To get a domain name, you should seek the services of reliable domain name and hosting providers such as Umbrellar. You can go here to get started with them http://www.umbrellar.nz/our-solutions/domain-names/.For social media platforms it is advisable that you use the same username across them all as much as possible, it helps bring homogeneity into your personal brand. You do not want to be Jane Alice on Twitter and then Jhane Mystique Alice Jerry on Facebook.

  1. Post regularly, strategically and positively

If you are regular user of your social media platforms or have a blog, ensure that post regularly on these platforms and that your posts are positive, engaging and relevant to people. Let people have the impression that you are worth paying attention to.

To do this optimally, you need to decide on what kinds of people you want to connect with. Based on your people niche, you should than go ahead to craft your posts with content that will connect with your target audience.

Aides posting regular, positive and relevant information online, you also need to ensure that your posts are of high quality. Your grammar, image and video quality all matter. Your presentation should be top notch.

  1. Google yourself regularly

You need to be vigilant to be sure no one has added something to your personal brand that you do not want therefore you should monitor your brand identity. Google yourself to see what the internet is saying about you, if you see anything you do not like, work on getting it off the web immediately. You could even go ahead to set up Google alerts so that you are notified anytime there is news about you.

  1. Call in the experts

Sometimes the work to be done to protect or repair your personal brand might to extensive for you to handle or you just might not have the time. You need to call it those who have expertise at reputation management to handle your personal branding. You do not want to start out yourself and end up makings things worse than they already were.