Monday, April 12, 2010

Unvarnished: Personal and professional reviews

Your professional and personal reputation are next up for review – by anybody – on the Unvarnished website. Unvarnished gives an opportunity for anyone to post their “review” of you as a person. Unvarnished could definitely be useful, but it could also end up being a pain to handle. Denying you the best personal loan rates will, at least, hopefully not become a way that Unvarnished gets used.

Unvarnished bills itself as reputation management

Unvarnished is a website that invites you and others to post your “unvarnished” reviews of people. As a business tool, Unvarnished claims that it helps you “get recognition for your achievements and actively manage your career growth”. Any user can post a review, and any user can create their own profile. User’s identities are verified using Facebook profiles. This link to Facebook appears to make Unvarnished more legitimate, but faking Facebook is much easier than faking a payday loan company.

The issues Unvarnished raises

The problem with Unvarnished will most likely be something similar to other review websites. Review websites can provide valuable services. At the very same time, there are two sides to every review. Bad reviews will supposedly be kept in check with a community system. The simple reality of Unvarnished is that unhappy people are more likely to speak out than unhappy people. This reality means that while the reviews are Unvarnished, they may be very skewed.

Should your profile go Unvarnished?

So, yes, Unvarnished review could possibly be very skewed. And yes, Unvarnished could supply a real pain some days. However, in the end, most professionals and businesspeople would do well to get an Unvarnished account. If nothing else, knowing what others are saying about you is important – especially if it is negative. An account on Unvarnished will let you respond to bad feedback. Keeping an eye on your online reputation is important.



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