Preserve Your Brand’s Image Online
Reputation management is very important for businesses – whether operating online, offline, or both, a business needs to stand ready to defend and bolster its reputation at any given moment. With users able to post and share information via blogs and social media, what once would have been a single poor review can spread like wildfire over the internet, making a small issue into a larger global problem.
A 4 Step Reputation Management Checklist
Each business has a unique consumer base, and as such will need to find the best way to manage its reputation on its own; no two businesses are exactly alike, so no two reputation management strategies will be either. So instead of giving you a list of instructions to follow, we have a few suggestions of things you can include in your business’ customized reputation management plan to help you further along the path to internet marketing success!
- Be Sure Where to Look – As a business you need to know where your customers are hanging out so that you can market to them effectively. You also need to know where they’re talking about you; examples are popular social media sites, blogs, and third-party review websites such as Yelp.
- Be Proactive, Not Reactive – Your business needs to consistently be looking for people talking about you, whether the news is good, bad, or neutral. If you wait for information about what others are saying to reach your ears on its own, something that might have been fixable can become an issue with a life of its own.
- Be Able to Refrain From Childish Behavior – Above all, you want your business to present a professional attitude at all times. Sometimes it is difficult to maintain this control when a user posts a very negative review. You might be upset or angry, but it is important to step back and calm down before responding to their comment. Your business with gain newfound respect in the eyes of those who see a calm and helpful response to negative feedback, and lose it just as quickly in the eyes of those who see your business responding with negativity of its own.
- Be Able to Promote & Share Positive News – For every negative review or piece of less-than-positive feedback, your business should be publishing and/or promoting three pieces of positive content. Positive information can never erase negativity, but it can overpower any negative information and push it down in the search engine results pages. Who is going to go to page three or beyond to find negative information about your business when the positive information is taking up all of page one?
Your business has an excellent chance of succeeding online if you are able to use these tips and others like them to manage your reputation!
Comments:
How does your business manage its online reputation? What techniques or methods do you use?
