Well so am I! I guess I am a little behind the wagon train because I just signed up on this recent addition to Google’s bag of tricks. A “knol” as defined by Google is a “unit of knowledge.” Of course, I am a bit unclear about what a “unit” of knowledge really means and if it is supposed to be a metric or US unit, but nonetheless, it is some type of unit. Upon visiting knol.google.com, I signed up for my own profile, for which I was then required to verify over the telephone. It felt like I was sucked into that early 90’s movie Sneakers - “my voice is my passport, verify me,” though I am not comparing myself to Robert Redford in any way. Once I was in and all verified up, I was then allowed to write my very first Knol, and how exhilarating it was to create my very own “unit of knowledge.”

As the initial excitement began to wear off, I found myself quite familiar with this Wikipedia style content submission, the main difference being less focus on terminology and definitions and more on full articles with unique titles. Just like Wikipedia however, other users can comment on and amend the submissions of other users. The idea being that information will continue to be revised and updated to provide the best information to readers.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that anchortext links are quite welcome and encouraged by the edit html tool found on the editing page for any knol. So of course I tossed in a link back to me and a few others to various sites I think worthy, so I guess we’ll see what that does. I was also able to add “bio” to my profile, which also included some anchortext, but the interesting thing is that this bio is also considered a knol. I suppose my life story (not really) is at least a unit or two of knowledge. You never know what you might be asked on in the final round of Jeopardy.

Since the creation over eight months ago, Google’s knol has gained a bit of press in search engine circles. Various SEO’s have run experiments to see how the mother ship search engine treats this little toddler finding some pretty interesting results. It seems as though Google tends to give it some preferential treatment when it comes to ranking content from the Knol versus identical content posted previously on other websites. David Utter talked about this yesterday on a Web Pro News Blog. Personally I don’t see too much of a problem with it. They have been giving the same preferential treatment to their other services like adwords, analytics, blogging, and email for years, as do all of the other search engines.

By and large, I think this is a very interesting new space to explore, and I certainly plan on contributing quite regularly. I think Google is on the right track by introducing some more user generated spaces. The social media trend continues to grow, and they should continue to think of new ways to join the game in order to stay on top.

About the Author: Peter Hamilton is the Project Manager in charge of the Seattle office of ArteWorks SEO. His interest and experience in Internet marketing is largely focused on the social media optimization and multi-media facets of exposure. To learn more about reputation management and this search engine optimization firm, visit www.arteworks.biz.

In the old days, unless someone sent a letter to the editor or started an all out advertisement war, most big companies had little difficulty keeping a tight hold on their reputations. Unfortunately for some, the information age has turned the world of reputation management upside down. Anyone with a computer and a dial-up connection (or just an iPhone in their pocket), can post whatever slanderous thoughts they have or take out their frustrations on anyone in a very public way, and because search engines appreciate the authenticity of blogs and other user generated content, these comments, rants, and raves often find their way into extremely visible positions. Agreed, some companies probably deserve it, but the really sad thing is that many great businesses hurt by one person’s statements, suddenly lose an incredible amount of online credibility.

Social media websites have amplified the situation incredibly. These user-generated meccas are permeating search indexes and grabbing ranking results in virtually every possible market. Decide you don’t like the company you work for? Just give them a thumbs down in Stumbleupon and leave a nasty comment. It is so easy for a single voice to be heard that companies are walking on pens and needles, afraid of their social networking savvy employees or customers. Don’t get me wrong, I believe in a freedom of speech, but some of these negative claims have no foundation in truth, and in some circumstances, the company is just an innocent bystander.
Luckily, it is still possible to control online reputations using a very similar principle as in the old days.

Own the space.

By taking over the entire space for particular search terms, companies don’t have to worry about those one off bloggers or that one disgruntled customer (who was being unreasonable anyway). Consider a search for the phrase “hillary clinton.” I am quite certain that this senator as a large amount of slanderous material written about her online, but somehow a Google search does not reveal any of that material for at least the first two pages. Now does this mean there are not hundreds of blogs devoted to running her name through the mud? of course not. Because Hillary has a large amount of valuable and heavily linked online material associated with her name, she owns the search ranking space for her name.

Yes, this is an extreme example, but any company can take control of their name space by producing great content, building the strength of that content in the search engines, and using that content to build the strength of other websites in that space, are things that reputable SEO firms should have no problem accomplishing. Sometimes negative comments can stay in the rankings for years, and there is no reason why any organization or individual has to stand by helplessly as their reputation suffers. Online reputation management is a great way to protect your brand.

About the Author: Peter Hamilton is the Project Manager in charge of the Seattle office of ArteWorks SEO. His interest and experience in Internet marketing is largely focused on the social media optimization and multi-media facets of exposure. To learn more about reputation management and this search engine optimization firm, visit www.arteworks.biz.