Bees make me swell. Badly.

You see, I am allergic to bees, so when they show up, I close my eyes and magically, they disappear but we all know that they’re still hovering over me with their stingers aimed at my face. By being absent online, you’re simply closing your eyes and hoping it’s not there. Whether you like it or not, someone is talking about you online and it may be excellent or it may be a terrible crisis. If they’re not talking about you, they’re generalizing your field of expertise and lumping you in with others in your field.

How to fight off the bees:

The easiest way to manage your reputation is to be present. By being part of a conversation, you know what is being said and where. There are many tools that give you email alerts when your name is mentioned and others that help you track your influence as measured by your network value, but that’s all technical mumbo jumbo. If you’re not online, get there. If you don’t know what you’re doing, have someone hold your hand- we do it for a living and we live in a society of collaboration, so there really are no excuses left other than you just want to close your eyes when the bee swarm comes.