As professionals, it can be difficult to keep track of what’s going on in the world we live in. From the vast social networks that we must keep track of to the niche sites where our businesses might be talked about without our knowledge, how can you keep your eyes on what’s being said—and how can you use that information to make your business better? 
Google Alerts
One popular way of monitoring your image is to use Google Alerts to ensure that you’re always on top of what Google sees—and we all know that Google sees just about everything. Put your name into the box, set your email to receive the alerts, and you’ll be on your way. If there’s something new that Google finds, you’ll hear about it as often as you like. That way, if something happens in one of the remote corners of the web, you’ll know about it.
Social Media
You can track your image on social media channels mostly by making sure you maintain a solid presence online. The internet is not shy about telling you exactly what it thinks, good or bad. If you give people an outlet to pour out their experiences, good or bad, you’ll hear about it. In fact, some companies have taken to proactively diagnosing and fixing the problems while engaging entirely through social media channels. Listening to social media for your name or business name can be as simple as searching through Twitter, Facebook, or your preferred network’s search function, but you might consider using a solution like Hootsuite to set up search terms on each network that it will monitor and create a dashboard for. It might make it simpler for you to be listening for what people are saying about you.
Location Websites
A big one that people don’t generally think of is to be monitoring sites like Yelp, Google+ Local, and other map-based sites where people might be tempted to leave bad reviews or say bad things. Make sure that in your search of the internet that you keep sites like these in mind. It’ll help you in the long run because not only is it good to claim your locations and keep the info up-to-date, you’ll be able to head off customers who didn’t use the proper support channels to let you know about the problem.
Overall, monitoring your online image is easy once you get the hang of it. In fact, most of it is automated thanks to tools like Alerts and Hootsuite. Don’t let it distract you from the goal of providing the best client service that you can.
