Guest Post by Allison Volk

These days, everyone is inundated with so much marketing information that, as artists, it can feel like individual actor brands get lost in the shuffle. 

Have you visited IMDB lately? The site is often so plastered with ads that even the page’s background is littered with images that scream for attention. How can one individual actor who’s forging his or her way through the thousands compete with something like that!? 

Well, the good news is that you don’t have to. When you’re at the point in your career where you’re booking co-stars, guest stars and indie films, the best thing you can do for your future PR team (and current endeavors) is build a solid foundation in anticipation of working your way up the ranks. 

IMDB Will Still Trump

The way things are going now, it looks as though IMDB will still be the standard for casting directors looking up actors for years to come. Of course, it’s vital that every working actor have an IMDBpro account so they can manage their images, credits and organize their resume should they choose to add one. 

It’s almost as though IMDB is the actor’s equivalent of LinkedIn for the corporate world: make it look clean, professional and appealing. 

And by the way, have you noticed that when you post images of yourself on your IMDB account, those images are some of the FIRST to pop up in a Google search result for your name? IMDB has tremendous sway in Google search results. 

If you’ve been thinking that Googling your name is lame/vain/egotistical, time to have a change of heart. Here’s why... 

Control Your Image with a Blog

Several years ago, a friend of a friend ran a business that we’ll call “Sofa Monkey.” The company had a questionable reputation, but one of their clients felt that Sofa Monkey had ripped them off – and created a website called www.SofaMonkeyScam.com. 

The angry ex-client was so upset and determined to run Sofa Monkey out of business, that he posted regularly on the site, which pushed SofaMonkeyScam.com to the top of the search results when people Googled “Sofa Monkey.” 

Now, had Sofa Monkey been regularly blogging, their Google rankings would have been so much higher than this new website that very few people would have actually found it, creating less impact on their image and bottom line. 

I’m not saying anyone will be malicious enough to do something like that to you; that situation was highly unusual and mean-spirited. 

The point is, when you blog regularly, you get to control the kind of content that comes up when someone searches your name. If there’s another Brittany Williams in Connecticut who’s on the track team and she pops up when you search your name, you can bury her content within a couple months by posting on your blog every week. 

When you’re smart about blogging, you have more control over your online image because you decide what gets posted. 

Become Accessible

I used to run the casting department of a Shakespeare theater company in Santa Monica, California. I was always looking for talented actors, and I would save the programs after shows I saw around Los Angeles when I saw someone I liked. 

The next day, when I went to look up the actors online, I was shocked at how many of them were virtually un-findable. No website, no IMDB presence, no nothing. So of course, I couldn’t call them in, let alone offer them a job. 

When you blog, the right people can find you. Offer an email address or at the very least a link to your Twitter page. We live in the age of the Internet. Start thinking now about how to shape your online space, and if you’d like help crafting your online presence, shoot me an email at info@theblogbabe.com.

Allison Volk specializes in creating authority and visibility for businesses and entrepreneurs through effective content marketing. Her clients have appeared in The Huffington Post, Mind Body Green, LifeHack, and DentalTown, to name a few. Find out more at www.TheBlogBabe.com.