Have you ever wondered who’s talking about you, and your dental practice, online? You might have googled your name to see where and how often you show up in search results. Oftentimes, however, dentists aren’t aware of being mentioned by a patient, in a social media post or online review. While it isn’t foolproof, Google Alerts is a tool that can let you know who’s talking about you on the Internet.

How Alerts Work

Google Alerts will send you an email, in real time, daily, or weekly, with links to where your name was mentioned online. If your name is posted on any page that’s indexed by Google, you should receive an email alert. Like I said, it’s not foolproof, and not everything online is followed by Google’s robots. For instance, pages with a “no follow” tag in the code are not indexed.

How to Get Alerts

First, you need a fee GMail account. If you don’t have one, get one now. The logins you use for your Gmail account will allow you access to Google Analytics, Webmaster Tools, Google+, YouTube, and all other Google-owned applications. Once you’re inside your Gmail dashboard, click “More” on the top of the page, in the navigation. From the dropdown list, choose “Even More.” You’ll land on a page with all of Google’s cool applications. Scroll down to the category “Specialized Search,” and select the bell icon next to “Alerts.” Read More