For many people, one of the most daunting aspects of dealing with their online identity doesn't involve what information they want to give about themselves, but rather, what information they don't want others to be given. Trying to recover from a bad mark on your record can be stressful and seem like a hopeless task, but reputation management is not as difficult as it may seem. There are many effective techniques that anybody can employ to improve their online reputation, with minimal stress and cost. Some of these involve inexpensive payments to reputable companies and services that can help you better organize and understand the information that makes up your online profile.

While it may be impossible to completely erase all evidence of a major offense, like a DUI, from every online record about you, a little bit of effort can go a long way towards minimizing the impact of that offense at important times like graduation. Although it takes time, it is possible to keep undesirable electronic information about you from becoming easily accessible, even if it cannot be removed entirely, often with minimal cost.

One of the most prominent reasons why people have developed a fear of reputation management is because of scams and ripoffs that amass information about people that the people would not want on the internet, and then charging a "reputation management" fee to have the information removed from the web. Unlike service-based companies designed to help you manage your online reputation, these companies are often extremely difficult to deal with or charge an outrageous price, and some are not prompt or responsible about removing the information even after you have paid them. However, you do not have to let these companies play on your fear of the information they have; more often than not, they are harmless.

While paying these types of companies can be an effective way to manage your reputation, often there is no need to. This is especially true because many of these companies are unlikely to be considered a reputable source of information, meaning that it doesn’t matter whether they store your information or not.

While it may seem disturbing for a company to leave information about a past offense of yours on the internet, it's important to remember to look at the positive sides. More likely than not, negative information about you, makes up a very small portion of your online identity. If it makes up a larger portion than you would like, you just have to change the proportion, not completely eliminate the negative publicity. This is why one of the most important parts of avoiding reputation management scams is having an accurate idea of what your electronic presence and identity looks like, and what it consists of.

If a website's undesirable information about you is obscure and held by a source that isn't reputable, there is no need to pay them to remove it. There are companies that can provide analyses of your online profile for a nominal fee, to help you understand these aspects of your online identity and which parts of it are concern. This is a more cost-effective way of managing one’s reputation management than paying for removal of specific pieces of information from a specific website.