Mom’s Top 10 Steps To A Good Online Reputation

WebProNews:

1. Put Your Best Foot Forward: You have to be everywhere, treating branding in the online world the way you would in the real world.

2. Make Eye Contact: The wallflower is most likely an incredible resource – it’s just that nobody knows her because she doesn’t put herself out there. Be a participant by commenting, inviting, giving.

3. You Are a Reflection of Your Mother (Company): Maintain your public face on the social networks, shine your shoes, crease your pants, embrace your OCD.

4. Keep An Open Mind: For a long time it was search, search, search. Before that it was email, email, email. But now you need to integrate your campaign.

5. Become Necessary: Viral marketing is tricky, difficult business. But maybe it doesn’t have to be. Maybe if you realign your approach to reflect what you, as an individual enjoy, instead of being a salesperson, you can find a more intuitive connection with what the public wants to see.

6. Like the People that Like You (Even If You Think They’re Annoying): Barack Obama’s campaign people did something brilliant, and followed up with something not so brilliant. That makes it a great case study. An Obama fan set up a MySpace page and soon attracted thousands of friends. Instead of competing with his biggest fan, Obama endorsed the site as the official MySpace campaign headquarters. After the page got to be “bigger than him” for the original operator, the campaign crew staged a coup to wrest control of the page from their biggest fan.

7. Watch Your Mouth: Again with the clichés that still hold true – if you don’t have anything nice to say, then don’t say anything at all.

8. Don’t Be a Fake: Who do we dislike most in civilized society (aside from the violent)? Liars, cheats, and thieves. We don’t like them because we view them as betrayers. That principle applies online, too.

9. Mind Your Manners: Mom’s favorite Bible verse still applies: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Commonly referred to as the Golden Rule on Earth, in Cyberspace, manners and etiquette are becoming increasingly more important.

10. Stay Hip: Change online is swift, and the smart marketer keeps up with what’s hot. The last thing you want to do is look outdated.