Vanity Search #2

I wish I could say that my footprint has changed.  I googled myself “Sally Woolley”, and the hits were the same as before.  The first link that appears is to my Facebook page, which is set to private, so only my pictures and job information appears.  The second link is for a Sally Woolley at PricewaterhouseCoopers; I hate to admit it, but I think she must be in a much higher paying profession.  The third link was for LinkedIn, for which I do not have an account.  The Sally Woolley Twitter link that appears about 7^th is not mine either.  On the second page, my E-portfolio website appears as does several other portfolio postings. 

Clicking over to images, the second image is a video of myself, and the third image is a picture from my current job’s website.  There are several other images included on the page that are used in my E-portfolio website that are showing up this round that didn’t before. 

This time I went a step further and searched for “Sally Woolley Orange, Texas”.  This search listed my Facebook page, website for E-portfolio, and my YouTube channel all on the first page.  On the images page, the first three are correct videos or images of myself.

I was wondering why my other accounts that have been created are not popping up in the search results.  I feel that it maybe because they are too new or have not been utilized enough over the past few weeks to trigger a hit.  What this tells me is I need to be working to use the Web 2.0 tools in order to shape my profile.  I need to make sure that my professional links and followings can be seen so that my students know I am working hard to reach them at their technology level and trying to understand their world.

My students need to understand that it is difficult to change your internet legacy.  Even though I have created and used several new accounts, some for multiple weeks, it still was not enough use to change a vanity search.  They need to understand that their high school or college social media use will follow them when they do try to apply for jobs outside of school.  A know a former high school principal that googled everyone that applied for jobs.  They wanted to see who the person was and if they were going to be a good role model for their campus.  Students must learn that their web footprint is big, far-reaching, and will not go away any time soon.