One of the ways I monitor the online presence of clients is to use the application Google Alerts. What Google Alerts does is send you an email of recently indexed pages which include the terms of your alert. For example, I have had the following alerts set up for myself for the last few years: “Randall Gniadecki,” “Gniadecki,” and “Google Advertising Professional.”
Google Alerts provides an easy free service that keeps you from having to search for if anything new has been said about your company or one of it’s brands.
A few things to have Google Alerts for:
1. Company Name
2. Company Stock Symbol
3. Division Name
4. Product Brand Name
5. Key Employee Names
The key is not to over do it. Don’t make an alert for every employee to run everyday.
However, being aware of the online presence of key employees is important, as if they list their employment with your company anywhere on the web, or in social media sites like Linkedin, they are representing your brand whether either you or they even realize it.
One important reason to google key employees is the possibility of what is becoming known as a “googleganger.” A googleganger is another person with the same name as you who is competing with you for search results for the name you have in common. When I first heard about this I asked around the office to see who had Googled themselves, and what they had found. Sure enough, it really is a very small world. Randy Parker, Digital Developer with Movéo Integrated Branding, not only has a googleganger, but they live within a half-mile of him, in the same town. Oh yeah, and his googleganger…
…is a Digital Developer.
