Do Your Spring C.L.E.A.N – ing Now

Kabani, author of the best-selling book, “The Zen of Social Marketing,” founder and chief executive officer of The Marketing Zen Group, recommends that every business-and individual for that matter-put on their apron and rubber gloves and do a little online Spring C.L.E.A.N-ing. This acronym details exactly how to clean an online identity and image.

“Cleaning your online ‘house’ is more important than getting rid of those dust mites in your home, especially with the increase in identify theft and cyber-attacks,” said Shama Kabani, president of the The Marketing Zen  Group, a Dallas online marketing firm. “Consider this: More than 294 billion e-mails are sent worldwide every day, representing about 1.9 billion users Data varies on the average number of e-mail accounts per person, but it ranges anywhere from three e-mails addresses, up to seven or so, with many being of them not being used. That’s when you know you definitely need to sweep up the mess.”

Shama recommends this approach using the C.L.E.A.N. acronym:

Clarify:
Set your goals. “Today, we not only have our personal lives, we also have an online life, so cleaning is important,” said Kabani.  “Start with knowing what you want to accomplish. Do you need to get rid of clutter, better manage your time, increase your online reputation, or maybe you’re job hunting and you know you need to update your online profiles.”

Listen:
Explore online to find out what is being said-and shown-about YOU. “You want to search your name and find out what’s being said, or what pictures are online that may be old or just not flattering. To listen online can be a simple Google search of your name, or use these two free online tools,” said Kabani.” The first is Google Alerts, which will e-mail you any time your name is used online. The second is SocialMention.com. Type in your name and it does a comprehensive search online, including FaceBook and Twitter.

Eliminate:
This is simply getting rid of all the online clutter in your life. How many e-mail addresses do you have vs. how many you really use? “Many of us don’t even remember the number of addresses we’ve set up. A good tool for finding those obsolete addresses is namechk.com, which does a search for a specific username,” she said. Other clutter includes old websites, many of them templates first created early in the Internet boon, and all those archived e-mails you’ve kept for so long.

Amplify:
Amplify is all about turning up the volume a bit on your online image and using online tools to save you time that increase your image, but don’t take hours and hours to do,” said Kabani. A great tool is postlink.com, which allows you to update your online image across many sites. “You can do one update and it will update your LinkedIn, FaceBook and Twitter all at the same time.”

Note:
Make a Note of all your passwords, and keep them secure. There is a tool called KeePass.info that secures all of your passwords in one place. “This is a great way to remember your passwords automatically, and they remain secure,” she said.

She added that companies can also do online cleaning by making sure that all data are backed up and archived for immediate access. “Once you know there are back-ups and data redundancy across the organization, it’s a great idea to communicate with employees about online image and cleaning their systems of the clutter. Just be sure all data are backed up,” said Kabani.

About the Author:
Shama Kabani, a nationally known social media expert who wrote the best-selling book, “The Zen of Social Media Marketing.” She also hosts Shama.TV and leads the 25-person global web marketing company. For more information, visit http://www.marketingzen.com.

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