Google Now Helps You Get to the First Page in Search Results

Google Profiles is your area in Google’s universe where you can store and link all sorts of information about yourself. Why is this important? Because it’s yet another area on the interwebs where you can have a presence which is discoverable by search engines, *cough*, especially that little one who made the profile page, Google.

Have you been keeping your Google profile tidied up? Did you even know that you had (or could have) a Google profile? You can find your profile here.

Over the past week or so Google has been making improvements to Google Profiles.

First, they changed the way the URL displays for your page. It used to be (…and still is unless you change it) a string of numbers that identifies the page as YOU. For example, to Google I was: http://www.google.com/profiles/113345621158656129639. But, with the change in settings, I’m now easily found as: http://www.google.com/profiles/justin.levy. The only two minor notes here, as reported by Lifehacker: If you’ve previously linked your profiles page to your Gmail account, you can’t change it. Your link will be your Gmail user name. The other caveat is that you can only change your URL once, so be careful with that choice.

The second change was announced this week and concerns the prominence that your profile receives from Google. Google will now start displaying profiles on the first page of Google search results.

Both of these announcements are HUGE from Google. Why you may ask? For some, reaching the first page of Google is a never-ending losing battle. It can be very hard, if not impossible, to reach the front page. Now Google is ensuring that at least some part of YOU reaches that front page. You need to take advantage of this. Maximize your profile by linking your websites, blogs and other profiles. Use the “About Me” section to highlight all of the important stuff that you would want a potential employer, prospect or partner to find.

Want some more tips? Google has provided a few tips on making your profile more useful over here.

Now, stop reading and head over to your Google profile and optimize it…

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Tagged as: google, personal branding

Don Lafferty

Five years ago I decided I would take a run at becoming a more published writer. This meant, as you know, building platform, which includes landing on the first page of search results on Google where you can be found by agents and editors.

So for the first time ever I googled my name, only to find out that the late Don Lafferty happened to be the winning-est, most renown checkers player of all time. Yeah.

Five years later now, and Don and I sorta split that first Google search page.

While the change in Google Profiles has the ability to accelerate the process of climbing the search ladder, it'll also swamp us with search results as more and more users of this free service load up profiles with all manner of information and then, as often happens, abandon the profile or otherwise lose their access to it.

But like any place on the Web, as you point out, Justin, it bears some time and careful consideration to craft a profile that fits with your overarching objectives and feeds them appropriately.

@jenhalloran

Really helpful info, Justin. Thanks for sharing. (I'm ashamed at how bad my default profile was...)

Analisa

Funny, I just told my boss about this yesterday!

I wonder if there will soon be a way to connect with other Google profiles...like friends on Facebook or connections on LinkedIn? It would be nice to be able to direct visitors to your friends or co-worker's profiles.

Thanks for sharing these tips, glad to have my own URL now :)

Martin Reed

This was news to me, too. I can't believe I hadn't even heard of Google profiles prior to reading this article. I have now set one up (unfortunately my first five choices of URL were taken - typical!), and verified my name - odd that you can only do that through Knol, though.

I wonder how long it takes after publishing your profile for it to appear in the search results - not getting anything yet for my profile or yours, Justin.

- Martin

Loud Mom

Wow, I didn't even know that Google had profile pages. Although I think I may have set one up through Google Friend Connect (I'm not sure though if they are the same thing?) Will have to check out my google account and see what other goodies I might be missing!