Information people find about you on the Internet can have an impact of your life, regardless of how much truth is behind it. It can affect your job search or promotion, your ability to rent or buy, acceptance into schools and social organizations and even your love life.

Your presence online creates a personality for strangers to attach to your resume, application or photo. Thus an online reputation is the perception of a name or brand that is being influenced by high-ranking web sites found in search results. And perception is reality.

In August 2007, ExecuNet released a survey revealing that the percentage of recruiters who say that they use search engines to learn more about job applicants has grown from 75 to 83 percent since February 2005. The number of recruiters who have eliminated a candidate based on these searches has nearly doubled, going from 25 to 43 percent during the same period. Lack of professionalism online can be a deal breaker if the race between job candidates is close.

A separate survey shows that 76 percent of candidates expected companies to search their name online but 22 percent of them had never entered their own name into a search engine. And 11 percent of executives fear that online information about them could ruin their chances of being offered a job.

Check yourself before you riggity wreck yourself
Advancements in technology have put your personal reputation at the mercy of search engines, social networks and blogs. You may need to start keeping track of your Net footprint. How?

1. Google yourself. Find what’s out there by Googling your name and common variations of your name. For example, I might Google Jen, Jennifer, Jenny, Jenni, and J-to-the-Izzo Whitfield. Okay, maybe not that last one. 1.6 million blog posts are created daily. Your credibility can be destroyed in no time if someone writes awful things about you.

If you own a Web site that you don’t want Google to index, you can request to have it deleted from the results. If someone else owns the content, Google can not remove it. You may ask the owner to remove it or hire a reputation defending company to do so.

And if you don’t find anything at all – get to posting! No information is a red flag as well. You may wish to submit articles to sites accepting entries related to your career or interests, start a blog or join a social networking site such as LinkedIn.

2. Use a people search engine. Pipl and Wink allow you to search by name and location for all sorts of information from property records to MySpace pages. Of course, you will most likely find information for other people by the same name. Hopefully folks checking into your background can differentiate between you and Bizzaro you, who very well could be an adult film star like Bizzaro Jen.

3. Be your own search engine. You will not find absolutely everything with Google or Pipl. For example, profiles on the popular social networking site Facebook are inaccessible to search engines. And just because you didn’t create a profile for yourself, doesn’t mean you won’t find one.

In most states, information about you (such as property ownership, divorce, licenses, arrests, taxes) is public record and available online for free or a small fee. This is what employers find in a background check. You should make sure the information is accurate by requesting a free public records report from ChoicePoint.

4. Defend your camp. Online reputation management (OLRM) is the art and science of creating and sustaining desirable, accurate information online. If you do find defamatory information on the Web, you may need to hire help. Reputation Defender’s MyReputation will search the Internet for $10 a month and remove findings for $30. If the findings cannot be removed, they will be buried under positive posts about you.

Jeff Henderson of Done! SEO, a search-engine optimization company, says “Anyone can have their image tarnished on the Internet, no matter how good a person they are. We’re the next generation of public relations. From here on out, you need to own your first few Google pages.” Done! SEO’s business increased tenfold after introducing reputation-management services.

However, some bad reputations are entirely accurate. Chris Martin, founder of ReputationHawk states that his company researches each case and turns down more clients than they take in. “Some people have made their bed and need to sleep in it” says Martin.

What shows up in search results for your name may become the foundation of your reputation. Building a defensible online identity that can’t be compromised by a non-credible Web site is essential. Anyone with a bit of computer savvy can manage their own reputation. Active monitoring of and participation in the virtual world may be the key to landing that next big job.