The chances are that you have heard about Online Reputation Management. But, are you using it? Do you even know its impact on your business? You see, online reputation management is a robust system that helps you attain a positive brand image. What is the importance of online reputation management? Quite simply, it helps you know what is being said about your business online and allows you to be part of that online conversation.
This article will guide you in the right direction. Keep reading to find the five best ways you can start creating an online reputation management strategy for your business today!
Social Monitoring
The first, and perhaps the most important, use of online reputation management is monitoring what customers and other businesses are saying about you. About that, where is the focus of business gossip? Social media!
That’s where online reputation management starts working; it gathers discussions about your business around social media platforms. And it doesn’t stop there; online reputation management also surfs public directories for highlights about your business.
In essence, you can use online reputation management as a spy to get a glance at what people are saying about you. But does it matter what people think of your business? Yes, it matters – at least 25% of your business market value is a function of its reputation.
Refacing Negative Image
Remember we said what people think about your business matter! Well, when what they think is negative, that can be damaging for you. The worst-case: when you ignore such poor feedback, you limit your opportunity to demonstrate your credibility.
In essence, you should take negative reviews seriously. Constantly seek them and manage them. And fortunately, online reputation management can help with all the processes. With online reputation management, you can fish for all poor images of your brand and then reface them with constructive and reassuring responses.
Related reading: How To Respond To Negative Reviews
Highlighting Transparency
While refacing the negative reviews of your business, online reputation management also helps you show your strengths – your expertise. More importantly, in the process of satisfying disgruntled clients, you automatically show prospects of your customer service.
Overall, your entire business model and relations will be transparent to your customers. When that happens, you will turn what seemed like negative branding into a hotspot for sales.
Pro tip: don’t only focus on negative reviews; reply to the positive ones too.
Enhancing SEO And Profile Claiming
There are several strategies online reputation management employs to manage negative reviews. Here are the top three – by our standards at B. McGuire Designs LLC:
- Online reputation management pushes more keyword-optimized content to the first-page results of your business.
- Another approach is directly replying to the negative review.
- The last, and perhaps the most effective, strategy is to keep delivering great jobs and getting more positive reviews. That way, you’ll push the negatives down the list.
Regardless of the approach you use, you will direct traffic to your business. And by doing so, you would optimize your brand for search engines. And in the case where search engines don’t recognize your business, consistent posts would help you claim a profile online.
Enhanced Marketing
Much like PR, Public Relations, the ultimate goal of online reputation management is marketing – to drive more leads to your business. And while the former focuses on external influences, online reputation management considers both internal and external factors. For that reason, it is the ultimate way to sell more without spending all your fortune.
A little warning: using online reputation management manually can be time-consuming. Instead, you should invest in the best online reputation management tools. This point is where our reputation management solutions can help – here is a quick breakdown of what you can expect. Online reputation management solutions help you more easily monitor what is being said about your business all across the internet and become part of that conversation.
