Perhaps it’s gossip, or your business made a mistake, but the online world makes it tough to forget negative content that surrounds your brand. Your online reputation is critical. In fact, it can literally make or break the bank depending on the severity of the complaint. That’s where active and continuous online reputation management can keep a disaster from happening.
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1. What is Online Reputation Management?
A term borrowed from public relations, online reputation management (ORM) simply refers to the act of ensuring your digital presence is as clean as possible, at all times. It’s the attempt to shape public perception by influencing digital data. You don’t get to make a second impression online. ORM will look at:
- Social media
- Web content
- Reviews
- Blog posts
- Forums
- Competitor sites
- Press releases
Or anywhere online where people can actively say positive or negative things about your brand.
2. Does ORM Apply to Me?
Two out of three people see the internet as the most reliable source of information about a person or business. So, if you are online—or any of your customers go online—then yes, ORM certainly applies to your business and brand. Heck, even to yourself personally.
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Everyone from Fortune 500 companies to small businesses needs some form of reputation management. Whether it’s to showcase new skills or diffuse a negative situation, it’s an important strategy for modern business.
3. Why Should my Brand Care?
85% of consumers trust online reviews just as much as peer recommendations. For the first time in history business owners can be a fly on the wall for customer complaints or answer an immediate question for the sale. The internet is a powerful tool for research and it’s the first place consumers go before making a purchase. Don’t you want to exercise some control over first impressions?
4. What Can I do On My Own?
The best place to start it to claim your brand name and register it across the web. That includes submitting all company data to Google and opening social profiles across the board. It would be a shame for a company with the same name and a bad reputation to affect the sales of your brand, simply because you never claimed your status. All of this, of course, is free to do. It just takes a few minutes of your time.
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5. How do I Locate Content and Reviews?
Just Googling your name (a.k.a vanity search) isn’t enough. In fact, the more you Google yourself, the more you compromise results, which reduces the effectiveness of your actions. That’s because the search engine remembers the data you enter.
Social listening is a great place to start. Google has a program called Google Alerts that allows you to enter any brand name or keyword and be notified when it is mentioned. This helps brands stay up-to-date on their reputation by the second.
6. What Can I Do About Negative Stuff?
It depends on where it is and what it says. Google lets you remove bad reviews if they are irrelevant to your brand or product. Other ways to minimize bad reviews is to fill page 1 of Google with so much good stuff, it pushes the bad content to page 2+.
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The most important thing to remember here is that being proactive is your best bet. Put the fires out early and sometimes consumers will correct bad reviews.
7. How Will I Know When I Need Help?
Google yourself at the library or on a friend’s computer. This will give you the most accurate information possible. Setting alerts should also inform you immediately when something bad pops up. If you see a drop in your conversion or return on investment, it may be time to seek a professional online reputation management service to fix the damage.
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Remember, as much as 90% of people use the internet to do online research. Ignoring a problem will never make it go away. That’s why practicing continual online reputation management is critical to keeping your brand in a positive light. Not everything is perfect. Expect some bad stuff every now and then, but with authenticity, transparency, and diligence, your brand should do just fine online.