Your Reputation

Your reputation is all about perceptions. It's what you are known for and it's what other people perceive about you. It's all about your character, values, personality and skills that people base their opinions on and what they experienced and see.

When it comes to reputation it can takes years to build it and it can take just seconds to ruin it. Many doors can open if you have a good reputation but a poor reputation despite great skills can close and alienate your customers.

There are many people out there that are very good at being negative. You know the ones who let us know how bad their day has been or how bad a product is, etc. Although it may be very therapeutic for them, and others may respond and be supportive, it's not what their business should be about. Negative issues will typically result in negative responses. So you must stay positive and give positive feedback.

You need to be viewed as someone that people look to as a contributor. Involvement in a conversation means giving as much constructive feedback as possible. Giving people your input and helping them be better at what they do will build your relationships and make your reputation shine over your competition and have loyal followers and in turn loyal buyers.

Oh and don't forget to manage your reputation. Know who is talking about you, who's ranking you and why. There are many sites to help you with this but I find Google Alerts a great way to monitor and keep tabs. Google Alerts are emails which are automatically sent to you when there are new Google results on search terms. Give it a try and see if your reputation measures up. - CT