It seems that in just a short amount of time, social media has swept the world off of it's feet with the freedom to communicate and network via websites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.  It seems as if there is almost no end to what you can share and find on websites like these.  Social media is an easy, fast, and fun way to keep up with the new age and share your life with your friends, fans, and loved ones.  Communicating with them on a network that's easy to access makes these social media super appealing to people of all age groups.  What you share on your social media account is totally up to you, and what you share is what you'd like to represent as you.  Although this is an amazing and popular feature, sometimes social media isn't the best place to share personal information, locations, and images. Sometimes the content you post on social media can do more harm than benefits. 

6 Surefire Ways To Maintain Privacy when Online Shopping

Keeping Yourself Private

I admit it: I absolutely love online shopping.  In my mind, it is infinitely easier to search for and buy gifts for my friends and family without even getting out of my bed – especially around the Christmas holiday season!  While this has the benefit of not dealing with long lines, traffic jams, and gigantic masses of humanity, there is one risk I have to watch out for: my own online privacy. 

 Editor’s note: Aloshia Jackson is an M.B.A. student at Wayne State University’s School of Business. Recently, she examined Internet methods available to business to track consumer behavior. In her post, she also questions the ethical implications for business and privacy options for the individual online consumer.

Advances in online technology over the years have tremendously impacted the way in which marketers obtain information in order to improve targeting, segmentation, reach and therefore profitability. It has also impacted the way products are marketed to consumers.

Such advances allows marketers to tailor ads and search results to the consumer based on activity storing cookies on consumer’s computers and other data collection methods. As a result, marketers are able to keep items of interest in front of the consumer rather than annoying advertisements, products, and services that the consumer is not interested in and provide a huge array of services to consumers. While there are many benefits to tracking and collecting data through modern day internet technology several concerns arise:

Who’s Really In Control?????

A reputation is all a company has to be successful.  The fact is that people are talking about companies (good or bad) whether they like it or not and it is crucial that attention is given to those conversations.  Building a good reputation is the first step, but the final task is to maintain that reputation.  Consider a good reputation like enrolling in a class.  You start off with an A, but it takes effort to maintain that A.  Companies lost control of their reputation when they are trying to maintain control, if that makes sense.  The focus is not to wipe the conversations away, but too get involved in those conversations and turn the bad into good.  Ted Leberecht, in his lecture, 3 Ways to (usefully) Lose Control of Your Brand, put it perfectly.  Companies need “more control over the loss of control.  Companies must focus on ways to manage the conversation online.  You can’t erase what is already out there, you can’t undo what is already done."