Managing Your Digital Footprint

Building your professional web presence is crucial for educators in today’s world.  It’s important not only to develop a positive digital footprint but also to maintain and manage your online reputation. There are many things you can do to help with this; here are ten tips:

Search Yourself

Periodically conduct internet searches using a variety of search engines (Google, Yahoo!, Bing, etc.) to see what results you find.  It’s important to monitor your digital presence regularly.

Google Alerts

Set up a Google alert on your name to keep track of any new content. You can choose to be notified at a certain time of day, or to receive alerts in digest format on a daily or weekly basis. There are also other similar programs available to monitor what’s being put out on the internet about you (Adams, 2013).

Manage Security Settings

Decide which of your social media accounts you’ll use for personal and which you’ll use for professional (read: public) sharing.  Then make sure your privacy settings for each account are in line with your intended use. For example, if you use Facebook for personal use to share pics of your family, your vacations, time you spend hanging out with friends, etc. - not necessarily things you’d want just anyone to access, make sure your privacy settings are high so that only friends can see your posts.  Accordingly, if you use other social media purely for professional use, make sure your privacy settings are open to allow people to see your profile. (Posner, 2011)

Update Your Profiles

You need to do more than just create accounts for social media and other professional sites and services, you need to create profiles. Examples of these include Google +, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Academia, YouTube, SlideShare, and many others. Carefully create your profiles to include information that reflects the image that you want to portray. You may also link sites, publications, or blogs that align with your ideas. (Dunlap & Lowenthal, 2013)

Interact & Engage

Building a positive digital footprint requires that you do more than just put information onto the internet; it requires you to interact with others and engage in conversation about topics related to your profession.  Remember that there are actual human beings out there with whom you are interacting, something that can get lost in the anonymity of the internet. (Price, 2015).

Buy Your Domain Name

For relatively little money, you can buy your own domain name.  Acquiring your own domain name looks professional and can guide searches for your name and help control what people see when they search for you. There are a variety of websites you can use (godaddy.com, FullName.com, etc.) to do this. (Taub, 2012).

Put all Your Content in One Place

There are a number of sites (WordPress, About.Me, Google Sites, etc.) that allow you to easily create a professional looking website.  Having a website of your own helps you look professional and gives you a place to share information about yourself, links to your blog, work you’ve published, resources you’re willing to share, etc.  Also, if you’ve purchased your domain name (see above), you can apply it to these sites for extra personalization and professional appearance (Adams, 2011, and Lowenthal, 2012).

Model Appropriate Behavior

As educators, we have a responsibility to our students not only to teach them how to create and maintain a positive digital footprint, but we need to model that ourselves and be transparent about doing so.  We need to explicitly teach and show the steps we are taking in the process. Kuehn says, “Our professional responsibility is not only to own our professional online identity and reputation, but to understand enough that we can provide advice and be an online model for our students” (2010).

Build Your Brand

Teachers don’t often think of themselves as having a “brand,” but we most definitely do!  It’s important to identify your strengths and share those strengths with others.  In fact, according to Gallagher (2015), “educators who build their brands tend to reflect on their practice and work hard to constantly improve.”

Be a Good Digital Citizen

No matter what the platform (Facebook, Twitter, blog, website), remember to always practice good Netiquette skills and digital citizenship.  Use proper spelling and grammar to help maintain a professional appearance, always cite sources when using photos or other information, and follow the rule, ‘If you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say anything at all.’ (Price, 2015)

Resources

Adams, S. (2013). 6 steps to managing your online reputation. Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2013/03/14/6-steps-to-managing-your-online-reputation/#31a69c4c1acf

Gallagher, K. (2015).  How to build your teacher brand.  EdSurge News.  Retrieved from https://www.edsurge.com/news/2015-12-23-how-to-build-your-teacher-brand

Kuehn, L. (2010). Manage your digital footprint. Teacher news magazine, 23(3). Retrieved from https://www.policyalternatives.ca/sites/default/files/uploads/publications/National%20Office/2012/02/osos106_Digital_Footprint.pdf

Lowenthal, P., & Dunlap, J. (2012). Intentional web presence: 10 SEO strategies every academic needs to know. EDUCAUSE.edu. Retrieved from http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/intentional-web-presence-10-seo-strategies-every-academic-needs-know

Posner, M.  (2011). Creating your web presence: A primer for academics. Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved from http://chronicle.com/blogs/profhacker/creating-your-web-presence-a-primer-for-academics/30458

Price, C. (2015). Netiquette: Pointers for social media users and bloggers. The Huffington Post.  Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/courtney-price/netiquette-pointers-for-social-media-users-and-bloggers_b_7786356.html

Taub, A. (2012). 5 key things needed to improve your digital identity. Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/alextaub/2012/06/07/5-key-things-needed-to-improve-your-digital-identity/#4fc09d2414ef