Or perhaps you had a very contentious break-up with an old flame, and they’ve since decided to air their beefs with you in a more public forum, and these complaints now appear every time you type your name into Google. Maybe you merely made a mistake one evening after a few too many beverages, but the proof now appears in video form online and as a result has become part of your public resume.

Edit: my friend Glen Allsopp just did a post highlighting 3 women who just took such action … its a good read A New Wave of Reputation Management Issues.

Remember this fiasco … Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s Flame

Truth be told … its happens all the time! Its becoming a whole lot more common too with the growth in personal blogging, and people beginning to understand that THEY ARE MEDIA. The service is referred to as Online Reputation Management (ORM).

The reality of the matter is that without legal injunctions and the like, the piece cannot be removed from the search results entirely. In many cases, legal tactics often have the exact opposite effect to that intended, and bring even more attention to the issue. Sure, you could also try Google Bowling it, but you’re likely to just further strengthen the post’s positioning. So, what can you do?

The Solution:
Here’s a relatively simple solution, that will work a large percentage of the time … unless you’re dealing with a more knowledgeable individual where more advanced tactics are needed. You need to bump the negative listing down in the search results to progressively lower positions, reducing the likelihood that it will ever be found. Keep in mind, most people never go beyond the 1st page of search results.

This can often be done by building a profile on various sites. The profile name should be the exact term/phrase that the negative piece is ranking for. Here’s a list of 50+ such sites you can use:

1. Digg
2. LinkedIn
3. Twitter
4. Stumbleupon
5. Facebook
6. Propeller
7. Magnolia
8. Jaiku
9. Simpy
10. Technorati
11. coRank
12. YouTube
13. BlogCatalog
14. Zimbio
15. HubPages
16. Reddit
17. UPCHUCKr
18. BlogMad
19. Curbly
20. Flickr
21. PublicBlend
22. Bumpzee
23. Pownce
24. ViewZoo
25. PeekYou
26. Hugg.com
27. Connotea
28. BlinkList
29. BlogFlux
30. Netvous.com
31. Plime
32. MyBlogLog
33. Giggg.com
34. DotNetKicks
35. Diigo
36. CoComment
37. LiveJournal
38. Faves
39. Indianpad
40. Blogmarks.net
41. MySpace
42. Mixx
43. ZiiTrend
44. FriendFeed
45. MetaCafe
46. Last.fm
47. ZippyVideos
48. Quizilla.com
49. Kirtsy
50. Photobucket
51. Deals
52. Agentb
53. BlogSpot
54. HuffingtonPost

If all goes well, merely building a profile on some of these will push the negative piece to the second page. If not, you’ll have to get more aggressive tactics. I’ve blogged about some of these Intermediate Tactics in this post How to Bury Negative Online Mentions of You - Intermediate Level Tactics

This is a good start for now though. Try it out with a few, and see how long before your profile appears in the search results for the profile name selected.

In the end … these sites can help protect your reputation from unreasonable ex-partners, angry clients, and others who wish to cause you harm online.

Here’s how to start.

Its a well known fact that Digg trusts content from some sites more than others. Why not … the larger sites are obviously more conservative and more sensitive to public scrutiny. Such sites are much less likely to publish rubbish for fear of reprisals, lost confidence, and reputation management fiascos. As I talked about in my post last week 4 Pillars of Social Media Algorithms - Trust x4, Digg rewards sites it trusts by permitting them to go hot at lower votes counts than those it trusts less. Makes sense right?

So, lets then begin by identifying some of the most trusted sites by Digg:

1. Youtube.com
2. Yahoo News
3. ArsTechnica.com
4. CNN
5. News.com
6. NYTimes
7. BBC
8. Wired
9. Gizmodo
10. Flickr
11. Reuters
12. RawStory
13. Washington Post
14. Physorg
15. Kotaku
16. ThinkProgress
17. TorrentFreak
18. TechCrunch
19. Guardian.co.uk
20. Nasa and its subdomains
21. Dailymail.co.uk
22. Timeonline.co.uk
23. LiveScience.com
24. ESPN.GO.com
25. NewScientist.com

This is the ideal way to start building your profile … submit from trusted sources. Obviously, there are other factors at work too, but this is definitely one of the biggest.

Enjoy submitting, and good luck!

In essence, this means that Yahoo is finally automatically redirecting Canadians searching via Yahoo Search (ie. Yahoo.com) to Yahoo.ca, presumably based on IP. The result is more Canadian sites will be found in the search results (and fewer U.S. based sites) since the vast majority of searchers assumed this was happening automatically.

Try it for yourself if you live in Canada … type in Yahoo.com and see if you are redirected to http://ca.yahoo.com.

This is great news for Canadian companies already feeling the pressure of a higher Canadian dollar relative to our neighbours to the south!

Google and MSN already offer this type of redirection, meaning Yahoo was the last of the big 3 to do so.

If you live in a country other than the U.S. I’d like to hear from you. Do Google, Yahoo, and MSN all redirect to a local TLD automatically where you are?

One word … TRUST!

Trust plays a huge role in organic search algorithms, so why wouldn’t it in social media algorithms. After all, it makes perfect sense intuitively. Social media sites rightfully want the best content to rise to the top, so at the end of the day there are really only 2 considerations for a piece of social news/bookmarking content:

• is it being supported enough to justify high visibility?
• if so, is there any reason to think that its support is artificial? In other words, is there any reason to distrust its apparent popularity?

Ultimately this means, the support for a content piece only needs to be assessed when it is about to be promoted to increased levels of visibility. So, how can trust/distrust be assessed? Below, I’ve outlined the 4 Pillars of Trust social media sites are likely to consider, and some ideas how they may assess each. Not all sites will evaluate all 4 trust pillars (eg. Wikipedia cannot really consider ‘Trust in Voting patterns’), and the relative weighting will be different too, but its a good conceptual starting point.

1. Trust in the Submitter:

a. where voting is a factor, is the submitter typically a blind voter (speaks to his/her motivations) or does the submitter typically look at the content first?b. has this user been flagged as an overly aggressive pusher (eg. Digg) or spammer (eg. Wikipedia) in the past?

c. have some of the user’s previous submissions been buried or removed?

d. where voting is a factor, how long are the voters spending on the actual article page before voting (Digg/Reddit/Stumble etc. have some techniques of assessing this)?

e. are voters finding the piece from ‘Upcoming’ pages, direct from the article, or do they arrive at the article’s Digg/Reddit page directly (an indication of a push)?

f. feedback from others on the submitter’s comments

Trust or distrust is further solidified over time. Stumbleupon, Reddit and Wikipedia submitters typically earn the trust of the sites as they spend more time on the respective sites. Digg on the other hand, appears to assess distrust only … new users start with a neutral score, and lose points over time as they become more active.

2. Trust in the Site Hosting the Article or Source of the Content:

a. how many times has the site been ‘hot’ or referenced previously?b. how many times have pieces from the site been ‘buried’ or removed previously?

c. is the site a .edu or a .gov?

d. has the host site redirected ‘hot’ submissions to other pages previously?

e. how frequently do pages from the host site get buried?

Trust in Site is another important variable to some social media sites, and less so to others.

3. Trust in Voting Patterns:

a. # and % of votes made from people arriving at the voting page via actual “upcoming” pages or via the piece itselfb. # and % of votes from friends

c. # and % of votes from ‘out of network’

d. # of votes secured through shouts

e. vote velocity … is it consistent with the overall voting velocity of the site

f. voter IP locations

g. comments

h. when the piece is given increased visibility on the social media site, does it garner more votes naturally?

4. Trust in the Voters:

a. are the Voters viewing the page the article resides on before voting, or merely blind voting?b. how long are the voters spending on the actual article page before voting (social media algorithms may have techniques of assessing this)?

c. are voters finding the piece from Upcoming pages or direct from the article, or do they arrive at the article’s page on Digg directly (an indication of a push)?

Implications of Distrust:
Ultimately, each social media site must engage in this trust assessment process. Sometimes its purely a human assessment (eg. Yahoo Answers or Wikipedia), and sometimes its a combination of both (eg. Digg, StumbleUpon).

The implications of Distrust maybe as simple as either a Yes/No assessment in which case Distrusted content is buried or disgarded. In most cases though, I suspect that overall trust follows a continuum, where the scores of each of the relevant Trust Pillars are weighted to arrive at a final score.

Wikipedia for instance, will weight the Submitter Trust factors very heavily, and place less or no weight on the Site Voting Patterns. Digg on the other hand, appears to weight ‘Trust in Site’ most heavily. Each social media site will have its own unique blend of weighting amongst the trust factors.

Next week I’ll delve more into Digg, and the weighting of the various trust pillars in its algorithm. Stay tuned …

If you like this post, subscribe to my twitter feed

Despite all the benefits of Twitter, its still a little bittersweet for me. I liken twitter to The Collective aspect of the Borg in Star Trek. A person can be easily overwhelmed with incoming information. That said … I’ve seen the light … I am now Borg. Resistance was futile!

The Contest:
The contest is very simple; the first to reach 500 followers on Twitter wins. $500 ($250 wagers from each of us) then gets donated to the chosen charity of the winner.

My Charity of Choice:
The charity I have chosen is Tuberous Sclerosis Canada (TSC). A good friend of mine’s daughter has the disease, so its a cause near and dear to my my heart.

How Can I Help?
If you’re on Twitter, merely goto www.twitter.com/jquipp, and follow me.

In the end, it’ll be the winner’s charity that ultimately wins. That said … best of luck Matt! May the best Twitterer win

Therefore below, find a number of ’scheduled maintenance’ pages shown by numerous social media sites. Which show the most personality? And which should be retired as boring an uncreative? Here’s the list:

1. Digg’s ‘We’ll Be Back Shortly’ Screen:
Sure a company is only as strong as the sum of its people, and this is nice ackowledgement of the “Digg people”, but wow … BORING! Common Kevin, get creative, have some fun!

2. StumbleUpon’s ‘We’ll Be Right Back’ Screen:
Nice use of colours (ie. notice the use of pastel colors to sooth and pacify), but YAWWWWWWWWNNNNN! BORING!

3. YouTube’s ‘Scheduled Downtime’ Screen:
Much better, nice use of color, relatively funny image and text. Not bad! Good job guys and gals!

4. Delicious’ ‘Temporarily Down For Maintenance’ Screen:
Nothing says corporate and stuffy like this screen … yawn! In fact, its not only boring, and lifeless, but the lack of creative images sees me imagining some myself … all of boring, stuff business people with ties choking the last bit of breath out of them, in ultra conservative 3 piece pin stripe suits. Common Delicious … you’re so much better than that. Live a little!

5. Twitter ‘Down for Maintenance’ Screen:
UREKA we’ve found it … personality! Move over YouTube, you’ve got competition.

6. Flickr ‘Scheduled Maintenance’ Screen:
Very original … take a negative and turn it into a positive. A competition with a chance to win something! Boooooooring image though and the text is far too plain and ‘unplayful’. Great concept, poor execution!

7. Slashdot’s ‘Database Maintenance’ Screen:
Boring, boring, boring! Common people … what does this screen say about the company and its people? Live a little!

8. Reddit’s ‘Scheduled Maintenance’ Screen:
OK, I see a hint of personality in this screen, but sell it baby! I see the bacon, but no sizzle. Someone turn up the grill!

9. Linkedin ‘Site Maintenance’ Screen:
Lets see … colorful, playful image, boring black text, and business speak. Yawwwwwn! Common people, business people have personalities too!

10. Technorati’s ‘Scheduled Maintenance’ Pages:
a. “The Monster Escaped Screen”:
Great concept … terrible execution! Give me an image people. Make me smile!

b. Scheduled Maintenance Screen:
Yawwwwwwwnnnnnnn. Boring! Somebody start CPR … we’re losin ‘em Scotty! Not sure this is the type of injury that anyone can recover from.

11. Mixx’s ‘Scheduled Maintenance’ Pages:
“Shhhhh We’re Napping” 1:
Yes, yes, yes! This is fun, cute, and shows personality. If it were a person, it would exude confidence and would be fun loving. Great job Mixx!

“Shhhhh We’re Napping” 2:
Even better than screen #1 since it links to some fun posts with the same playfulness. This company gets it … this screen is an opportunity not a problem. I also like the fact they have more than one screen, because dedicated users are likely to see a downtime screen more than once!

12. Orkut’s ‘Site Maintenance’ Screen:
Yikes … boring! Common Google … you can do better than this. Nothing about this screen is fun or entertaining.

We sooooo much like doing this, that if you’re able to do a similar screen capture for us (scheduled maintenance screen) of pages we do not have in our library, for any of the sites above, or those below:
1. facebook
2. myspace
3. propeller
4. yahoo buzz
we’ll name if after you (its dicoverer), and post it to this page … if we can verify its an actual ’scheduled maintenance page’ used by the company.

Or, if you feel like getting creative, create a screen you’d like to see used for your favorite social media site(s), and we’ll compile a list of those. Remember … have fun and show personality!

Source: http://darmano.typepad.com/logic_emotion/

Spheres of Influence & Influence Ripples … the Concept:
David Armano introduced the concept of Influence Ripples in 2006. His post Influence Ripples 2.0 shows how numerous bloggers with varied spheres of influence interact. Ultimately, networks become evident.

The concept is this, each person’s authority can be viewed as a circle (see above) on a 2-dimensional grid:

• the larger the coloured (Canadian spelling eh) circle, the more authority one has (the more RSS subscribers) … ie. the more ability to influence
• the larger each person’s circle, the further the ripples will travel (as shown by the concentric circles eminating from each) and their ability to impact the actions of others
• the overlap of ripple circles shows the individuals influenced by both
• the nearer a circle is to the core of a sphere of influence, the more it is able to be influenced by the ripples
• the outer most influence ripples for each person delineates that individuals ’sphere of influence’
• the circles are not static, meaning they constantly move about according to new friend/fan relationships.

I’d prefer to look at the mass of each of the spheres in terms of number of RSS subscribers, but links is a reasonable metric too, and helps us to keep in mind one of the reasons Authority is important. Keep in mind, this is a dramatically simplified chart, and shows only 2 dimensions where many may exist.

Classifications:
As noted within the above ‘Influence Ripples’ graphic, there are different levels of individuals, when structured according to influence. At one end of the spectrum, are the ‘newbies’, without much of a following yet. At the other end, are the ‘Rock Stars’ with multitudes of followers. The vast majority of us occupy the middle ground, which is good because not everyone can be or even wants to be a ‘rock star’.

Why Does This Concept Matter?
Viewing the space in this way helps because we as individuals have limited time. Accordingly, we have to make choices about how best to proceed to build more authority (assuming we want more) while maximizing benefit and minimizing time. Some of the implications for authority building include;

a. understanding your motivations for wanting to be an authority … is being a Rock Star a goal for you, and is it worth the cost given point b below
b. the power associated with being able to influence ‘Rock Stars’ … not necessarily to be a Rock Star
c. when building authority by guest posting, writing a column, securing speaking engagements, commenting and interviews (either as the host or the interviewee) … we need to consider:
• spheres of influence
• overlaps of influence
• finding circles of influence where your unique niches are not yet fulfilled

Conclusions:
At the end of the day, its merely a conceptual oversimplification, yet this is likely how all the major search engine and social media sites can view link and friend networks. For those that don’t believe me, check this out:
1. TouchGraph Google
2. TouchGraph Facebook
Now just imagine the data and networks that the search engines and social media sites can extract, especially Yahoo and Google which own numerous social media sites. If that’s the case, then it should definitely be utilized to forge friendships outside traditional networks. Its best for both search and social media success, and makes a good deal of sense from an authority building perspective.

Also, the goal of most should not necessarily be to ‘be a rock star’, but rather to have the respect and trust of rock stars, so that they can carry your key ideas forward … in many cases this will be most efficient.

Image courtesy: Prosoundweb.com

Well its absolutely true! A group of friends with similar interests but complementary skills is beneficial for all involved, especially where each works to help the others in the group. If each member is an authority in their respective realms, and truly respects the work and skills of the others, the whole becomes greater than the sum of the members … which tends to elevate the “authority” of each of the members.

Consider for a second if bands such as Led Zepplin, the Eagles, the Beach Boys never united. And there it is in a nutshell … we’re stronger together than apart, assuming you find other equally talented but complementary individuals.

The previous 2 posts in this series are:
1. Blogging - Step 1 of the Authority Building Process
2. Foundation Friending - Step 2 of the Authority Building Process

So now that you’ve forged your Foundation Friends, you need to support one another, and start to build the authority of each other. At this time, you’re in the intermediate stage, where the goal(s) are to:

a. associate yourself with your specialty
b. demonstrate your skills and abilities with respect to your specialty(ies)
c. develop a larger following than just your Foundation Friends
d. develop momentum, which means continuously reaching outside current friend networks to reach others

Here are some tactics:

1. vote and comment on the blog posts and social media submissions of your Foundation Friends.

2. submit friends blog postings to social media. Social media is not about the individual, but rather the community.

3. reference the ideas of the others in your group on your blog
There are many benefits associated with referencing and linking out to the related and supporting ideas of others.

4. interview others in your group for your blog to give them and their ideas and knowledge some attention.

5. guest post on each other’s blogs to highlight the knowledge of the others, while adding much needed quality content to your own site.

All of the above tactics help in a number of ways:

• the more well known and authoritative Foundation Friends become, the more exposure you’ll receive as they will be helping promote you in turn.
• the more your profile is seen on related sites, the more interested people become in you and what you’re ultimately about. This will result in gaining more fans.
• leaving intelligent comments can lead to others appreciating your intelligence and ideas
• more people will submit your blog postings to social media, leading to more fans, friends, and authority
• you personally develop an increased profile amongst industry peers

All in all, there is a whole lot to be gained, and with very little effort. Merely by forging a tight knit team, awareness of all members of the team grows beyond the level any could have achieved individually, as does the abilities of each member.

Obviously, the above list of tactics is not nearly comprehensive. What additional ideas have I missed that should be added?

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Refresher on Authority:
Just to give a quick refresher, being viewed as an authority in any given space leads to others appreciating your work, and linking to it. Accordingly, authority is beneficial in two ways:
a. it generate direct business
b. it generates links, which leads to improved search results, which leads to increased business

In fact it could be argued that a high ranking on Google is merely Google recognizing a site as an authority on a given subject. Then, when others see the omnipotent Google perceiving the site in that light, further credibility is then bestowed on the site. Transference of credibility! Interesting isn’t it … that’s really how authority works.

It happens often. The problem is; content alone is highly unlikely to be sufficient to build any significant authority. If half the battle is creating great content, the other half is all about who ya know. In the end, build a better mousetrap, and the world will not necessarily beat a path to your door!

This post is entirely about getting started by building what I call ‘foundation friends’ … which I define as those initial few friends (all fans of each others work) that work together to built the authority and profile of each other. They are the foundation of your authority building effort. Promotion is all about friends, and friends is all about momentum … so how do you get the initial friends to start the momentum in the right direction? Its not so much about how (though I do offer a few tips below), but the fact that this is a crucial first step.

For those requiring a quick refresher on why authority building matters, I’ve included a very brief synopsis at the bottom of this post.

Obscurity Stage: Stage 1, Step 2:
At this point in the game, you’ve finally got a blog up (see the first post in the series - Blogging - Step 1 of the Authority Building Process), and have posted a number of pieces of content that you feel pleased with. You’ve also likely got ideas, and at least a quasi schedule for posting going forward. Enter Step 2 of the Obscurity Stage.

You now need to start creating awareness of yourself, and your content, ideas, and abilities. You’ve not yet forged enough strong friendships/contacts to engage in guest posting, writing a column, getting interviewed, or to secure speaking engagements, so you need to build towards that. First, you need to make some good friends … foundation friends. You need at least some others to respect your opinion, and to help promote you and visa versa. These people will be your home ground, and the base from which your expansion efforts will occur.

Its unlikely at this early point in the process that you’ll gain much traction appealing directly to the industry powers that be. They’re already inundated by others trying to leapfrog the authority building process, and go right for instant notoriety. Perhaps no harm in trying, but do not be disappointed when it fails.

Friending Strategy
Instead, fall back on a tried and true tactic. Begin forging relationships with others that are relatively new in the space, though that have a niche that is different yet supportive of your own. You can support one another … strength in numbers so to speak. Also, the more authority (ie. industry friends) one has, the easier it becomes to grow perceptions of authority, and attract more friends passively.

Five friends that may not have been able to make it individually become a formidable group when working together … on social media sites and elsewhere. Others are likely to want to join that group, or at least to join in the fun … and the group certainly doesn’t have to be formal. The bigger the collective … the more attractive its members become though at some point that group becomes a micro-community itself, with different authority levels within. Original members will likely have much credibility/authority as they were the founders. My personal preference is for a group of roughly 5.

Here are some additional tips:

• Your first friends (I like to refer to them as foundation friends) should be your most trusted … these are the foundation of your original authority/credibility (must be solid). You will lay much more foundation going forward, but need to rely on that initial foundation at the start.
• start a friend group if one does not exist to join … ie. connect friends
• remove (passively isolate rather than making a scene) those friends are not supportive.
• support and promote one another (in the friend network) religiously!!!!!!! Remember, its about the individuals and not the group though. The more influential individual members become, the more “authority by association” is bestowed on that person’s close friends. So essentially your goal is to help build the authority of those you associate with, and your friends should do the same. I’ll discuss some of these tactics in my next post

Two quick techniques for finding and friending others are:

1. find industry social media sites if any exist. Then seek out friends obviously looking to make friends too. Some guidelines:

• most of these social media sites show some sort of users stats … look for those individuals newer to the site (at least initially), and with a quality blog also (they’ve got the most potential!), as they’re more likely to want to find foundation friends also
• to initiate a friendship, you’ve got a number of options:
• support their social media submissions
• contact them directly and forge a friendship

2. commenting
Commenting on blog postings, social media submissions, and forum entries is a good strategy to make foundation friends and even to get noticed by the powers that be. If you wish to try to leapfrog the authority building process, commenting on the blogs of industry heavyweights is a good tactic. Lets stick to the tried and true strategy for now though.

Again, we’re looking for bloggers of roughly the same authority status as our own. Here are a few tips for making commenting work for you when attempting to establish foundation friends:

• seed comments on industry friends or potential friends blog posts quickly after they post. Additional comments seem to flow more freely once initial comments are made, presumeably due to inferred credibility. I like to try to spark further comments by initiating a debate by ending with another question.
• ensure that there is some substance to your comments … overly generic comments are not memorable
• don’t be confrontational in your comments. You can disagree without being confrontational
• refer to other posts the blogger may have written, to let them know you’re a real reader.

The Next Post:
Once these initial 5 or so Foundation Friends are in place and you’re all supporting and trust one another, some interesting possibilities avail themselves. These friends enable you to move out of the Relative obscurity stage, and more into the Intermediate stages where now others become aware of you and you’re work. I’ll talk in more depth about how each of these Foundation Friends can help one another make this transition in my next post next Wednesday.

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Refresher on Authority:
Just to give a quick refresher, being viewed as an authority in any given space leads to others appreciating your work, and linking to it. Accordingly, authority is beneficial in two ways:
a. it generate direct business
b. it generates links, which leads to improved search results, which leads to increased business

In fact it could be argued that a high ranking on Google is merely Google recognizing a site as an authority on a given subject. Then, when others see the omnipotent Google perceiving the site in that light, further credibility is then bestowed on the site. Transference of credibility! Interesting isn’t it … that’s really how authority works.

In reality, Authority Building is a process … a linear process for the most part. This means that there are steps and stages, and perhaps even a natural evolution of actions. Within each stage, there are some tactics that will typically work much better than others.

The key here is to look for a process that can be replicated … and will consistently produce great results.

In my last post on Authority Building Authority Building - Tools of the Trade I looked at some of the tools available, and suggested that some are better used at certain stages than others.

Obscurity Stage: Stage 1, Step 1:
One of the tools mentioned as a good strategy in the ‘Obscurity Stage’ (beginning stage) was blogging. This is the absolute first step! A blog will tell people (potential friends and clients) a great deal about you, your knowledge, interests, strengths and weaknesses. It also acts as a homebase for you. All of your activities ultimately drive people back to your blog, and they’ll always know where they can find you. A blog therefore has a way of bestowing some degree of instant credibility.

In this post, I’m not going to discuss how to use a blog strategy to build authority. There are already many great posts to this effect out there already. Instead, I’ll provide a link to posts I think are exceptional. This post will be short, but highlights the importance of blogs as a first step in the Authority Building process.

Great Posts About Blogging:
Here are some really great posts about blogging. I suggest reading and internalizing each of these posts if you’re just getting started.
a. How To Sell Your Client on a Blog Strategy by Jenn Osborne
b. How To Create a Blog Strategy by Jenn Osborne
c. How To Become an Authority in Your Niche: 8 Content Development Tactics by Maki
d. The 5 Barriers to Blogging Success Series by Skellie
e. Beginner’s Guide to Blogging by Darren Rowse
f. Diggbait, Linkbait, Flagship Content, and Authority by ChrisG

Why Start With a Blog?
My point is to get a blog going before embarking on the Authority Building journey … it is the first step. Having an operational blog is the springboard from which all other Authority Building tactics are launched. In fact, I’ll argue that authority is near impossible (though not completely impossible) to develop without being perceived as an expert first. As I mentioned in the post What is Authority and How Do You Build It, there are 3 primary approaches to be seen as an expert:

a. be amongst the best at a particular niche
b. simplify and explain complex industry issues
c. break new grounds with respect to a subject

And each of these are most often made possible by blogging!

Once a blog is launched, use it to:
a) display your area(s) of expertise
b) promote your social media profiles
c) engage like minded individuals (to hopefully become friends) via:

- responding to comments
- linking out to others you want to befriend (hint … if you link to one of their blog posts, they’re likely take notice)
- use your blog roll to reciprocate friendships

Moving Onto Stage 1, Step 2:
Once the blog is launched, and a number of good quality posts are shown, then we can move to the next logical step in the process of Authority Building, which involves commenting, networking, and social media strategies … building industry friends essentially. Of course, these will be the topic of next week’s post.

What are your thoughts about a person’s ability to be perceived as an Authority without having a blog or a means of publishing their thoughts?

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