My friend and interactive media strategist Adam Broitman[225] calls Google a "reputation management system." I love it. Essentially, Google knows what's true, as far as the uneducated are concerned. How does Google come to accept you as the authority on something? Here's how:
Inbound links from other sources. If someone is linking to your web site, you must have information of value, especially if the person who's doing the linking is important.
Outbound links to quality material. This is actually more for human love, but it certainly helps prove that you're a lively presence.
Readable, searchable pages. If Google can tell what you're talking about at your web site, you are probably trying to offer something to the world.
Constantly updated content. Google values freshness over staleness. (Don't we all?)
Listed in directories. Google wants to know that you've submitted your site for inclusion in the more prominent search engines and web site directories.
Mechanical quality. Google has a lot of other things it values, like well-written web sites that follow standards, and it takes a little bit of learning to understand them all. Hubspot makes a free Website Grader tool that would help you understand a bit.
That's what Google cares about, and that's how a lot of people are searching for you. But we do this for humans, because humans make the decisions. Let's look into what counts for your strong personal brand technologically, with humans in mind.
First and foremost, build a site to call your own. I recommend a blog, because a blog has the ability to command more attention from Google, on one hand, and because you can use it to build your voice, on the other hand. I recommend buying your own name as a domain (check out the list of domain registration coupon codes[226] for GoDaddy.com). It might not be your home base or part of your largest plan, but buy it now while you can. Then, if you have another brand that you want to promote as your big number one brand, buy that domain name, too, and put up a blog.
The aesthetics of your blog and your blog design are up to you. Pretty blogs don't hurt people's opinion of your work.
But we have to start thinking outside the blog, too. It's not all about you. Or maybe it is, but it's about how you get out and travel the Web, too.
To participate on the Web these days requires that you build some accounts at various Web platforms. I call these passport accounts, because you need them to visit these virtual places. Here's a quick list of sites and why you should have an account there:
Google Accounts—so you can use several dozen free applications by Google
Yahoo! Accounts/Mail—so you can use several dozen free applications by Yahoo! and also take advantage of Yahoo's OpenID account
Digg—social news site
StumbleUpon—social news site
YouTube—video-sharing site
Flickr—video-sharing site
Del.icio.us—social bookmarking
PayPal[227] —online money transfer
This advice doesn't fit neatly into my bulleted list, but take a few pictures of your head to make avatars for accounts. Your company logo doesn't cut it with me. I want a picture of your face, so that I can identify you at conferences and the like.
There are plenty of communities online, and these all have social networks to empower them. I could list about a hundred places where you might choose to spend your time, but here are some real baseline social networks where your presence might help further develop your brand:
Twitter. If you don't "get it" right away, that's okay. The learning curve is about 30 days before you feel as though it's indispensable.
Facebook. I use Facebook as an outpost, where I build my profile, link back to my site, and give people a bit more understanding of who I am and what matters to me.
LinkedIn. This is a professional network. Don't let the "looks like a resume" appearance fool you. Write your profile as though a human will actually read it. Be interesting. Participate with the community, and you'll develop more awareness and build a stronger future.
And a specialized network. If you have a niche or genre of interest, be sure to find a vibrant community to join that surrounds it. Love photography? Get into Flickr. Huge on music? Get into Blip.fm or
Pandora.comor any of a million other cool music communities.
The change from the first Web to the new Web is that you have to be where the people are. It's not as much about your site as it is about your ability to participate where conversations are being held.