Executive Guide · 14 min read

The CEO's Guide to Reputation

What every CEO should own about their personal and company reputation.

Your reputation is an asset class

Every investor who Googles you before an allocation is pricing your reputation. So is every journalist, every job candidate, every board prospect.

A $20k retainer to protect a personal brand tied to a $2B valuation is not expensive. Most CEOs don't do this math until it's too late.

Five questions every CEO should answer

1. What does page one of Google say when I search my name today?

2. Do I have a Wikipedia page — and is it accurate?

3. What do the AI search engines (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini) say about me?

4. Who covers me — and do I know them personally?

5. What's the three-sentence story a journalist would tell about me?

What to build before you need it

Wikipedia + Knowledge Panel (entity-level control)

LinkedIn + Bloomberg profile + company About page (owned properties)

Consistent thought-leadership rhythm (defensible authority)

Journalist relationships in your sector (warm outreach beats cold)

A crisis playbook with named vendors + on-retainer counsel