Do you own your name's search results?

[Craig Key]

Hey friends, in light of Mykl's "Supercharged Personal Branding" post, and the awesome presentation that Greg and Christopher gave on Reputation Management, I've been thinking about one little narcissistic thing lately: do you rank for your name? And if so...how many times?

I've been trying to grab more search real estate on my name craig key (did I mention I'm a narcissist?), but I'm having a hard time because there happens to be an island in the Florida Keys which is bold enough to go by that same moniker (and a judge in Oklahoma that wrote a book called "A Deadly Game of Tug o War").

But I wanted to throw out a challenge: Own your name in the search results - so that others can't.

For me, I rank for my facebook, twitter, blog and linkedin profiles. 4 out of 10. Not bad...but I'd rather have all 10. Ok, maybe I won't take down Wikipedia (stupid island), but I could at least aim for 9 out of 10.

I have some thoughts on the subject (or tips, I guess), but I would rather hear from you first.

How many of the top 10 search results on your name do you control?
How do you think you can boost the rank of some profiles?

All of this is a fun test for your own name...but brands should be asking themselves the same questions, don't you think?

NOTE: I'm going to re-post this on my blog - using regular links in stead of no-follow links. I chose to nofollow these for the sake of the conversation (I didn't want you to think I was posting this just to spam some links for myself :)

[Vanessa Bright]

I must admit it is interesting... I am not preoccupied with my profiles dominating Google search for my name, but as long as I am looking for a job, I was watching the results carefully. My name is not that common, so I "own" 7 out of 10 results, and Google profile on the bottom (created it after Mykl's presentation - Thank you!!). To my surprise Extendr is on the second page, and NetVibes on the third... Though I think I would still recommend Extendr and NetVibes (unless Mykl thinks otherwise ;-) ).

[Craig Key]

Good Call Mykl ;)

Translating over into brandville - Mike I think you nailed it, it shouldn't take that much work *if* you spend a lot of time writing, sharing, etc in different places around the web. This is a great selling point (IMHO) on social media participation for brands. If the web is full of YOU out there participating in conversations, it will be much more difficult for negative nellies to rank on your brand name.

...however, if the only place your brand exisits on the web is at www.yourbrandname.com, you're looking at a crap shoot at who will rank #2-10 and so on.

I do have a few tips on some "seriously vain link-sharing campaigns" which I'll share soon (actually it's more like showing up on multiple pages within social media sites - therefore capturing more links to your own profile from within that site).

Great stuff - thanks for the input!

[Mykl Roventine]

My new advice for you, Craig: just change your name to Mike Keliher. Problem solved.

[Mike Keliher]

For my personal search-result dominance, it just happened. It didn't "just happen" in the magical sense, though; I've spent a lot of time writing, sharing, twittering, etc., and that's the stuff that's up high in the results. But their up-high-ness happened on their own. I didn't actively optimize anything or conduct any seriously vain link-sharing campaigns. :)

My clients, too, are in pretty good shape. Not necessarily in control of every top-ten result, but none are controlled by negative results or haters. There's always room for improvement, though.

By the way, you need to move to Florida. I mean, we'd miss you, but that'd be rad: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craig_Key. I could mail you letters addressed to "Craig Key, Craig Key, Florida."

[Craig Key]

That's awesome Mike!

Did you work towards that? Or did it just sort of happen for you?

Now that you have dominated your own brand...can you do the same thing for your clients? :)

[Mike Keliher]

Searching for Mike Keliher, every one is under my control, which is rad. I could maybe spent some time rejiggering which I'd want to rank higher -- or toss out a profile page or two I don't care to have people see -- but I'd say I'm in good shape.

Searching for Michael Keliher, I've been a slacker and let some other hooligans in on my Google juice. Still, I own for the first two Google results, and they're entirely under my control.

Thanks for inviting me to demonstrate my search-engine vanity.