Experiencing “BrandYourself”

A few weeks ago I was given a class assignment, in my Technology in Public Relations class, to make an account on BrandYourself.com. What is “BrandYourself.com” you may ask? Well, it’s this website that enables you to eventually control what people see when they search your name on Google. My eyes became as big as a kid’s eyes who had just walked into a candy store. Being a college film student, soon entering the working world, made me see this as an opportunity to help better my chances of possible future employers seeing my LinkedIn profile and my Vimeo profile when they look me up.

BrandYourself first scans and evaluates the results of your name, gives you a grade on a report card, then proceeds to give you a list of instructions to move forward with. Easy enough, right? A few simple tips and tricks to get your name higher up on this virtual “VIP” list that Google holds somewhere in its database; plus, there can’t be THAT many Lauren Holts in the world.

Let’s just say I received my first F as a student.

Holt, L. (Feb. 2). BrandYourself Report Card [Image, screen capture]. Retrieved from http://brandyourself.com/reportcard                 

 

I wasn’t too surprised by the first report card and I assumed once I did all of the suggestions that BrandYourself gave me, which are called booting your links, it would improve my results. Unfortunately, you can only evaluate your name and boost your links every two weeks, so I waited.

Once those two weeks were done, I logged back on, ignored the giant F on the homepage, boosted my links, and reevaluated my name search. Much to my surprise, I received my second  F as a student. I began to realize that this was not a one and done type of task, it is something that is going to require maintenance for many many weeks, but I will be persistent and boost my name higher up on Google’s VIP list.

Update will come after I receive a grade other than an F.