I have been buried in 18 hour days lately. My frist inclination towards anything that comes my way has been. “I’m buried. Leave me alone.” or “I will get back to you on it.” But this story tugged at me a little. Enough for me to take action.
See, back in the day here on BHB, Brian Brady put up a post about Ashley Dupree, the person who made headlines with Elliot Spitzer, the then governor of New York. It was more of a lark than anything, seeing how much irrelevant traffic could be generated from a post and from Greg’s being in good graces with Google. Brian’s post proved the power of serch marketing pretty handily.
It is wild to see how this story would affect the life of a fellow REALTOR.
Carolyn Capalbo is a fellow REALTOR in Northern Virginia who shares her name with Ashley Dupree’s mom. Can you see where this is going? Online Reputation Management Trainwreck. Let me have her tell it to you in her own words. You can see at the bottom of the post that she is asking for anyone to help her regain her credibility in Google. Every time someone Google’s her name right now in relation to a real estate deal, they get stories about Ashley Dupree…and pictures. Nice.
RealEsetateWebmasters started an Online Reputation Management contest to draw awareness to the issue. I have had my head down working on code and did not see it until an email crossed my desk. I am far more interested in simply doing a good deed for this fellow traveler than worrying about the contest. (Morgan did throw in some huge prizes to get it going – nice work!). I decided to throw in a prize or two of my own for anyone showing up on the top three pages of Google.
so the goal is REALTORS UP – SMUT DOWN. Pretty straighfordward (grin).
I did put together a Carolyn Capalbo post on EricOnSearch. It is sitting right now at #11…I will be working on that. 😉
So now I am seeing more than a few bloggers start to post entries and help a fellow REALTOR out. If you can assist us by either posting about Carolyn’s situation with a link to her site or blog post (and mine both here and at EricOnSearch if you feel inclined, thanks.) or by entering the contest and putting up a post of your own, that would be great.
Oh yeah… I did notice that once Real Estate Webmasters posted about the contest, Carolyn Capalbo domain names started flying off of GoDaddy’s shelves…grin. Here’s a Carolyn Capalbo contestant… 😉 Knew that would happen…hehe.
Ok. I have to get back to work now, but if we can help the Carolyn Capalbo who DESERVES notoriety for being a great REALTOR out, it would be most appreciated.
Carolyn Capalbo Helper says:
Great Post Eric! It’s always nice to help a fellow REALTOR. I’ve added a post to my blog too, hope its helps 🙂
May 28, 2010 — 7:34 am
Carolyn Capalbo says:
Thank you so much for your post and help, Eric. Also thank you for your most generous and kind contribution to my “cause.” The out-pouring of support has been amazing. One of the most frustrating things about this has been the inability to track “lost business.” How many people googled my name and moved on when they saw the bikinis? Thanks again!
Truly,
Carolyn
May 28, 2010 — 8:00 am
Eric Blackwell says:
@ Helper – Nice Anchor text (grin)
@Carolyn – glad to pitch in and help where I can. Good to meet you!
May 28, 2010 — 8:09 am
Brian Ward says:
I’ll do what I can to dispute any incorrect references I hear about this Realtor verbally or otherwise. Blogs and search engines can be great and useful … they can aso be very destructive. Come on, Google, get this under control.
May 28, 2010 — 8:39 am
Rich Stover says:
Just saw Brian’s comment and I agree. We’ll do what we can to dispel the false impression given by Google search results.
May 28, 2010 — 8:42 am
Eric Blackwell says:
Brian;
I have to disagree in a friendly way there. Google is doing what Google does. They index the information based on notoriety. They are not capable of being abjectly fair to everyone and that is not their aim.
There are likely MORE folks legitimately looking for information on the Carolyn that is Ashley’s mom. Google has no way of knowing that.
We are simply trying to create enough notoriety to manually override the system and help create some equity.
It’s an algorithm. By definition, it is not an exact science. 😉
May 28, 2010 — 11:06 am
Scott Cowan says:
Eric and Carolyn,
I just posted a brief note on my site. You can visit it here. I hope I can be of some help in some small way.
http://classichomesnorthwest.com/will-the-real-carolyn-capalbo-please-stand-up.htm
May 28, 2010 — 11:14 am
Eric Blackwell says:
Awesome, Scott.
Hope you have a great Memorial Day.
best
Eric
May 28, 2010 — 1:58 pm
Preston Guyton says:
I posted something on my blog a couple days ago. Always happy to lend my voice, especially for something like this.
http://www.prestonguyton.com/blog/carolyn-capalbo-northern-virginia-real-estate-professional.html
May 29, 2010 — 11:52 am
Robert Worthington says:
since this is an seo contest, my bet is on my coach, the undispited extraorindaire, the one and only, the messiah of seo Eric Blackwell. (smirk)
May 30, 2010 — 3:38 pm
Wayne Long says:
Reputation management is becoming a very important component in everyone’s online presence. This illustrates how important it is to monitor and address.
I am glad to help out. Linking to some of the best posts may be the best way to help at this point????
May 31, 2010 — 4:07 am
Eric Blackwell says:
@Wayne – Yes. Linking out to some of the posts is a great help. And as Morgan mentioned on his comments in his blog post, another big help would be to push links to her site in general. It was #3 for her name at one point and will be there again.
Please push links to any blog posts that you feel you can. (I am not in this as much for a contest as I am simply to help someone one.
Just trying to pay it forward. 😉
Hope things are great for you down in Columbus Ga!
best
Eric
May 31, 2010 — 5:03 am
Paul Caparas says:
Hey Eric,
I just posted mine and hopefully Carolyn will dominate the keyword Carolyn Capalbo soon because a Realtors reputation is huge.
Paul
June 2, 2010 — 12:38 am
Carolyn Capalbo - Getting Her Name Back says:
I think we will easily get Carolyn’s name back on top. The Elliot Spitzer news should fall down in the serps, especially with our help.
Judy Orr
June 2, 2010 — 7:19 am
Eric Blackwell says:
@Paul- Thanks for joining in…much appreciated, my friend.
@Judy O- Agreed. (Especially with you out there now.) Thanks! It has been awhile since the TeamEric days..good to get back in touch!
June 2, 2010 — 7:37 am
Marc Rasmussen says:
It is great to see the troops gather and help. Nice post Eric. I just threw my hat in and wrote a post – http://www.sarasotahome.org/blog/carolyn-capalbo-northern-virginia-realtor.html
June 6, 2010 — 6:30 pm