Today, most people know online reputation is important, but they may only have a vague idea how to go about improving it. Online Reputation Management (ORM) is a non-specific term for any initiative that creates better internet publicity, but what do reputation managers actually do? Different ORM companies offer different services; which are the most important? Do businesses retain control over how the brand is presented?
At ReputationDefender we offer a broad spectrum of quality services to fit every need. After meeting with our reputation specialists, company leaders can choose from a range of programs focused on fixing current issues and creating a wealth of reputation capital for the future.
These are some of the most important components in a typical ORM campaign.
- SERP Management – the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) is the cornerstone of a brand’s online reputation. These days, customers find out about the products and companies they’re interested in by searching for them online. Most don’t look past page one, so these first 10 results can make or break the company’s image. Bad reviews or scandals ranking high on the SERP mean a negative first impression for anyone researching the brand. If a competitor is listed at the top of the page, most people will click on their site first, and likely go on to buy the product there. SERP management focuses on ranking target results that represent your company positively so potential customers are encouraged to learn more.
- Google Suggestion – As soon as a business’s name is typed into the search box, Google Autocomplete will generate a list of search suggestions based on the terms that are currently associated with that brand. If negative reviews and misinformed articles have attracted a lot of attention, search suggestions will be based on these topics. Customers, prospective employees or anyone else researching the company will be exposed to bad publicity before they even hit enter. Search suggestion assistance focuses on creating a positive buzz around your content so that Google algorithms start to associate professional topics with the company name. This will direct the casual researcher toward content you want them see.
- Image and Video Remediation – Images and videos have a high ranking value with Google and they also take up a lot of space on the SERP. Negative visual material is extremely damaging, whether it’s a customer’s live documentation of poor service, or an unfortunate video clip from the office party. ORM focuses on removing these types of results, or outranking them with your own content. Creating and promoting your own positive videos and images will take up this spot on the SERP and push unflattering content onto later pages where it is rarely seen.
- Develop Reputation – An under-developed online presence is just as bad as a negative profile. In fact, this is one of the three most common reasons companies fail, according to the Office for National Statistics. It’s obvious when businesses haven’t put a lot of effort into building an online reputation: a search for the company name brings up irrelevant results including advertisements for competitors, bad reviews and general, non-specific pages about the industry. Not having an online presence means that any negative comment posted about your company will rank immediately on a search for the brand. Reputation development services will address this issue by creating positive content to fill the void. Generating your own high-traffic results makes it a lot harder for unflattering and misinformed content to gain ground.
- Social Media Reputation – Social media offers a unique way to interact with customers in an informal atmosphere. Once someone likes the company page, content you post will appear in their newsfeed alongside posts from friends and family. Besides the big names like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, there are many smaller social media platforms, each one offering access to valuable groups of potential customers who may be hard to reach in any other way. Social media management allows company leaders to manage company profiles across a number of different sites at the same time. Content can be scheduled and published simultaneously and most platforms will also let you launch a targeted advertising campaign aimed at the demographic most likely to be interested in your products.
- Review Management – Every company gets some negative reviews; unfortunately, unhappy customers are often the ones most likely to go online and write a comment. The best way to minimise the damage is to increase the overall number of reviews so people who’ve had a good experience also join the conversation. With a hundred or more reviews, a four or five star rating won’t be affected much by one customer giving a single star. However, if this is the only review you get, it can be devastating. Generating feedback through surveys, review requests and social media activity will create genuine positive testimonies that you can promote to add credibility to your online profile. It’s also important to respond to the negative comments and resolve complaints a soon as possible so these stories don’t go viral and end up causing a lot of damage. Reputation management tools will let you concentrate all of these efforts in one place.
- Reputation Consultancy – A Reputation consultant will help you design your own ORM campaign based around what’s best for you. A team of professional reputation specialists will take a close look at all aspects of the business to determine the root cause of the reputation issues the company is facing. They will then work on devising solutions to these problems. If you’re not sure how to fix the company’s reputation, a consultancy team can help you find answers.
- PR Strategy – ORM is focused on the internet, but it is closely connected to the company’s overall public relations strategy. The reputation management team needs to work closely with marketing experts to create and communicate a better image. Integrating these two fields is a vital step in building a comprehensive brand persona. At ReputationDefender, our staff help in-house teams develop an affective brand message and create online content that expands on the company’s other marketing initiatives. We plan, organise and recommend new initiatives based on client priorities and we’ll help create PR strategies that take the company in the direction you want to go. Call one of our experts or visit the website to lean more.
For more information speak to one of specialist today.
