Social Media Marketing is as much about building your reputation and brand as anything else.  Lets face it, individuals have much more influence than what was ever possible in the past, in the pre and post Internet days, with sites like Youtube and Mysapce.  People are launching entire careers on Social Networks such as Kimbo Slice and Dane Cook, to name a few.  Household names in some circles. 

But for every positive story out there there are many, many more negative stories.  A single disgruntled employee or jealous competitor can reek havoc on your business, and there's a good chance you won't find out until its too late.  

The solution is to be proactive about building your personal or business brand in circles of influence.  That means, all the major social networks and establishing your online presence in the blogosphere, then linking these various social sites to your personal profile pages, to create a web presence that will basically bury the few disgruntled ex-employees, business competitors or any type of negative press.  Unfortunately one or two negative comments about your or your business can have a profound impact without being the benefit of being placed in the total context of your reputation. 

Currently there is not a reputation management softare that people currently use, but until its built, you can hire an outside consultant to do all this work on your behalf.  Online Reputation Management, Social Media Optimization, Social Media Platforms, Social Media Marketing, and Blog Publishing Platforms are all of similar interest to those reading this blog.