Reputation Marketing

In what has become a very competitive business world, companies must monitor and carefully manage their online reputation. Even if business is primarily conducted offline, it is imperative to realize that the internet is the primary tool used to find almost everything today, including shared good and bad experiences customers have had with both online and physical companies.

Knowing who is saying what is important in so many ways. It provides an opportunity to respond to complaints and address any negative publicity; it is also a way to learn where mistakes are being made. Most importantly, attention must be paid to these comments so an online presence can be managed and a business reputation kept as strong as possible.

Reputation Management Importance

There are more outlets than ever for individuals to gossip about everything from social topics to experiences with different businesses. One thing that should be clearly understood is that dissatisfied customers are much more likely to spread information socially than satisfied ones. With this in mind, steps should be taken to establish as much of a positive reputation as possible through the use of social media, regular blog and website posts, optimization, and active interaction with customers.

Another important way to do this is to request reviews and testimonials from customers that are made available to the public. Even though it should not be expected that every review will be a glowing, 5-star testimonial, a good job is nonetheless being done when there are many more positive reviews than negative ones. If not, it would be helpful to read what is being done wrong so that the situation can be remedied. The reason for soliciting reviews is to increase the number of positive statements for a company online, which is a way to have more control over what people are seeing in search engine results.

Complaint Handling Importance

An essential part of reputation management is seeking out negative online comments and then dealing with them promptly and politely in order to preserve a company's integrity and demonstrate interest in pleasing customers. This is important for all companies, not just those doing business on the web, since most offline businesses appear in online directories.

Whether a resolution is offered or the dissatisfied person is invited to make an offline contact to discuss the concern, responding quickly and positively shows that customers are important and any concerns about a problem will be handled. There is also nothing wrong with politely correcting false information found in online comments or reviews as long as it is done tactfully without trying to put the commenter in an awkward position.

Reputation and SEO

A lot of time and money is invested to get the best search engine results through SEO campaigns. How disappointing is it to a company when the first results returned after an online search are bad reviews, which will certainly create the wrong type of attention. Even worse, it may cause SEO efforts to fail, even when paying for PPC or other advertising. Why would viewers visit the website of a company that is shown in a negative light?

Since so much is affected both positively and negatively by search optimization, the previous two points should be taken very seriously. Damage control and the handling of complaints is critical, as is keeping search results pages constantly updated with positive information about the company.