Paschal Eze
It doesn’t matter whether you go online or not, says C. Paschal Eze, CEO of Reputation Training International (RTI), your reputation could still be damaged on the Internet by “disgruntled customers, an angry ex-spouse or employee, a vicious colleague or neighbor, or mean-spirited business competitor.”

RTI helps CEOs and top business and nonprofit executives as well as their marketing/PR and IT teams gain important information on how to manage their online reputations. This is usually done by exposing them to cutting edge tools and techniques designed to put them in control of their online destiny, proactively and reactively.

He says there are three types of reviews found online: professional reviews which are seemingly objective, self-praise reviews which are deplorable, and reviews posted by mean-spirited individuals on sites such as Yelp.com, Citysearch.com and Insiderpages.com. This can affect businesses as well as individuals.

“It affects small and medium scale businesses. Unlike traditional media where things are well controlled by journalistic and broadcasting ethics, Section 230 of the Communications Act allows people to post things anonymously online,” he said. “What I’m saying is people don’t have to wait until their reputation is damaged online to take action. It’s good to preempt them.”

That starts with research, he noted. A person should monitor what’s being said about them online.

“Over 50 percent of employers have admitted that they base their employment decisions on online profiles,” he said. “Studies have proven that many people even check brick and mortar stores out online before they decide to patronize them. Therefore, every individual, every business, every non-profit, has to be conscious about what people say about them online.”

He continued, “The Internet hardly forgets. Any information — good or bad — you or someone else posts about you online virtually stays there forever. If you go to archive.org, for instance, you can get information posted on websites that no longer exist, websites that were closed down many years ago.

“So, if a boy posted texts and pictures of him swearing, binge drinking or drunk driving on his personal website and closed it down, employers can hire someone like me to dig it up for them. When employers get this kind of information, you can be sure they’re not going to employ him.”

For young people, who will be moving into new jobs straight out of college, caution should be applied, Eze advised. The past can catch up with you very quickly online.

“Young people have to be proactive about their online reputation,” Eze said. “That thing they do today online on MySpace or YouTube can come back to haunt them tomorrow when they’re hunting for their dream jobs. This is more pertinent for a state like Michigan, which is facing a 6.9 percent unemployment rate.”

RTI is on the forefront of teaching people these trends and techniques, which they can actually learn at home. With DIY (Do-It-Yourself) reputation management training, business reputation briefings and one-on-one reputation toolkit training, Eze can guide interested people and business leaders on how to protect and promote their reputations online.

“What I do is to help people establish, monitor, maintain, promote and protect their online reputation and it entails a lot of things,” he said. “The question is not if others are going to post damaging things abput you online but when and how often. You have to preempt it by having a strong, positive presence online. What we do is to knock off the negative information about people and organizations. It is simply a case of overcoming evil with good. We can push it to the back of the line (of a search engine).”

Parents should be very concerned with how their children use the Internet, he pointed out.

“If you’re a parent, impress upon your children why they should be mindful of what they post or allow their friends to post about them online,” Eze said, adding, “Whatever you post online today could come back to haunt you tomorrow.”

The trend is not slowing down, and the best defense against a damaged reputation online is knowledge.

“People will continue to use the Internet for communication, commerce and, of course, smear attacks. You can actually make sure they see positive things instead of negative things about you or your business,” he said.

“For me, it’s the main tool of my reputation management trade. I can find the most hidden information about anyone or any business online when I do deep searches across important databases. I do so to protect people and businesses.”

For more information, call (319) 351-9695 or visit www.Reputationtraining.com.