In today’s technologically enabled world, being listed on Google’s first page is considered a success. This is because users tend to interact with businesses that appear at the top of search results. The internet has evolved into more than just a source of information. People believe that anything the internet displays is trustworthy. To stay connected with the user, it is vital to seem good on the internet. This is where ORM, or Online Reputation Management, comes in.
What is Online Reputation Management?
Online reputation management is the technique of managing a brand’s internet reputation by replacing deceptive content, posting trending content, and making it visible with the assistance of other internet algorithms.
For a user, the brand must present or provide appropriate answers to their questions. If the questions are not answered, a user may lose trust in the brand for their needs, prompting the user to provide bad feedback on the company, which is then flagged by internet algorithms. This has a significant impact on the brand’s reputation because it falls lower in the search results, allowing competitors to surge higher.
Factors Contributing to ORM
While each company’s approach to online reputation management will differ, ORM should include a combination of the following:
- Employee and customer tales, user-generated content (UGC), reviews, webinars, and brand-created content are examples of owned media.
- Sponsored social posts, lead generation, affiliate programs, and native advertising are examples of paid media.
- Earned media consists of media relations, influencer marketing, and public relations.
- Community service and partnerships, co-branding efforts, and organic social media posts are examples of shared media.
What Is the Importance of Online Reputation Management?
Although reputation management should be part of an ongoing strategy for developing a healthy online brand, many businesses wait until the harm has been done before taking action.
#1. Changing the Narrative
Restoring your online reputation is really difficult.
An unpleasant experience with your company can not only deter a single consumer from returning, but if they chose to publish a nasty review on Google, Facebook, or elsewhere, you could soon see sales decline.
If you’re not actively monitoring brand mentions and online reviews about your company, you can miss out on an opportunity to change the narrative before long-term unfavorable perceptions take hold.
According to a Khoros 2022 survey, 83% of customers are more loyal to firms that respond to and resolve their issues.
Consequently, not only may quick response keep new consumers from leaving, but it may also allow you to keep angry existing clients.
#2. Knowing Your Clients
If you don’t have your finger on the pulse of online brand conversation, you could be spending thousands of dollars on new marketing campaigns that fail at the first hurdle because you didn’t address greater issues sooner. The message could be in striking contrast to client concerns, coming across as inconsiderate and potentially disrespectful rather than having the desired positive impact.
#3. Getting Ahead of Problems
Remember that your online reputation is permanent.
Numerous firms and people have discovered this the hard way.
Remember the viral interview with then-BP CEO Tony Hayward days after the Deepwater Horizon accident that killed 11 people? When actual death had occurred, his comment, “I just want my life back,” did not land well.
A wave of criticism surged through BP’s online platforms, with former President Barack Obama claiming he “wishes he could dismiss him.”
You might rapidly find yourself in a lose-lose situation if you do not control your online reputation.
Yet, with proactive efforts, you can maintain control of your brand’s story in search results and plan ahead for any potential issues.
What Is the Difference Between Online Reputation Management and Public Relations?
While the terms “reputation management” and “public relations” are frequently used interchangeably, they actually mean completely distinct things.
Both can be used effectively as part of your overall brand strategy, but it’s critical to grasp the distinctions before investing in one or both.
Whereas ORM focuses only on the needs of the brand and maintaining a positive online image, PR fosters a more mutually beneficial relationship between a brand and other organizations, particularly the media.
Public relations initiatives can and should strive to improve a brand’s public perception.
Yet, the purpose is usually to convey information about something more specialized, such as a new product or service.
Public relations, like other forms of advertising, is a direct marketing channel that firms may utilize to boost their presence both online and offline.
Although ORM and PR can function alone, combining the two will assist a company handle both behind-the-scenes brand creation (ORM) and public-facing marketing (PR) (PR).
When your business confronts online hostility, even if you have a robust ORM program in place, PR can be utilized to distribute essential updates or remarks through the media to assist address the issue.
Online Reputation Management and Social Media Marketing
Brands have almost no control over online reviews, and nowhere is this more evident than on social media.
Indeed, dominating search engine results pages (SERPs) with good brand stories is an important aspect of ORM.
But, efficiently managing and responding to comments elsewhere on the internet is also important.
It is critical to remain active and engaged in social dialogues about your business.
There is lots of software available to assist you in staying on top of this, including Mention, BrandWatch, Sprout Social, and BuzzSumo.
Many of these have sentiment analysis tools, allowing you to readily track if your mentions are skewed more positively or negatively.
You may also track your brand’s branded hashtags, mentions, and direct tagging across numerous platforms.
With strong monitoring in place, you’ll be able to reply promptly to any comments that come in and refer these individuals to the appropriate internal sources to fix any issues as swiftly as feasible.
Techniques for Online Reputation Management
Let’s take a look at the most crucial things you can do to improve the reputation of your online company.
#1. Do a brand audit
A brand audit is an important first step in developing an online reputation management strategy. Take stock of and evaluate your complete online presence, which includes your website, blog, social media profiles, and third-party business profiles.
Examine the results of your Google searches as well. What comes up when people search for your brand name and relevant keywords? Are there any off-brand or undesirable outcomes? Are there too many news pieces and not enough brand assets under your control? Recall that positive articles are excellent until something negative occurs. Then, overnight, those positive mentions will be replaced with negative mentions.
#2. Track brand mentions
Actively monitoring brand mentions on the web is an efficient strategy to manage your brand online. Set up notifications for your brand name and associated keywords, and then respond swiftly to any mention, positive or negative. This covers social media mentions as well as any mentions of your brand in blog articles, forums, videos, and so on.
The sooner you detect and eliminate bad references, the better. Most consumers are willing to accept honest mistakes if the company makes an honest attempt to correct the situation.
#3. React to unfavorable feedback
You may be tempted to disregard poor online reviews in the hopes that they would go away, but this is a bad idea. Negative reviews provide an opportunity for your brand to address issues head-on, exhibit customer care, and establish a more honest connection with future customers.
Reply to all reviews, whether positive or bad. Thank customers for their comments, no matter how negative it is. And always provide genuine solutions to challenges.
If a customer has a negative experience, they don’t want a discount of 20% off their next purchase. There will be no subsequent purchase with that strategy. Go above and above to demonstrate to clients that you stand behind your brand and that they can rely on you to make things right.
#4. Invest in SEO
SEO is an important aspect of online reputation management, although the technique differs differently.
Most frequently, we utilize SEO to rank multiple pages on a single website for a variety of search queries. In terms of ORM, however, we employ SEO to rank a variety of websites for a few brand-specific queries. As a result, you’ll be able to push unfavorable search results to the bottom of the page and replace them with positive information that you control.
Your branded SEO plan should prioritize optimizing as many controllable web pages for brand-related keywords as possible.
- Write relevant content for your website’s reviews and leadership pages.
- Create backlinks to essential pages that you want to rank on Google’s first page.
- Positive brand mentions can be obtained through digital PR, events, sponsorships, and influencer marketing.
- Participate in major social media networks such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram.
- Claim and optimize relevant third-party accounts, such as Google My Business, Yelp, Trustpilot, and business profiles over which you have complete control.
Remember that when it comes to SEO for reputation management, Google almost always favors authoritative, trustworthy sources. Focus on boosting the authority and trustworthiness of your own website, as well as optimizing your presence on authoritative third-party sites, in light of this.
#5. Make use of public relations
By producing positive news for your brand, good public relations can help you boost your online reputation. This press can take several forms, including:
- Guest posting on reputable websites
- Company executive interviews
- Publications in the press
- Branded gatherings
- Charity events
- Co-marketing with well-known personalities or brands in your field
- Appearances on podcasts
- Live streaming in which you respond to any and all inquiries
- Public remarks acknowledging any major errors committed by your company
The purpose of your online reputation management public relations initiatives is to emphasize you’re essential values and develop trust and expertise.
#6. Promote consumer feedback
Encourage customers to submit reviews on sites like Google, Yelp, Trustpilot, Capterra, and others as one of the greatest online reputation management techniques. This is due to the fact that favorable evaluations can take up important real estate in Google’s search results and affect customer behavior.
You can encourage customers to post reviews by doing the following:
- Send emails to your consumers requesting that they post reviews.
- Make it simple for them by clearly indicating where and how they may post a review.
- Provide them with discounts or other special offers in exchange for submitting a review.
- Reply to all reviews, whether positive or bad, so that customers believe their input is valued.
Customer reviews are one of your most precious tools when it comes to online reputation management. Use this to your advantage by encouraging customers to submit reviews on relevant, trustworthy review sites.
#7. Spread positive content
Finally, promote content that puts a positive light on your brand, such as:
highlighting testimonials and reviews on your website
Occasionally sharing favorable evaluations on social media, along with a thank you to the reviewer
- Displaying substantial third-party brand endorsements
- Collaboration with influencers to promote your content Sharing material in which you are positively mentioned
- promoting any collaborative activities with individuals or brands
Top Online Reputation Management Tools.
Online reputation management necessitates a significant amount of effort and time to monitor and track. There are numerous tools available to assist you to check your online reputation and monitor how your business is perceived.
Here are our top 9 online reputation management tools:
#1. BrandMentions
BrandMentions allows you to monitor every social channel as well as a wide range of blogs, news, and review sites. It then provides you with an overview of how and by whom your brand is being discussed. You may also observe who is talking about your competitors, which provides information about their reputation management tactics.
#2. Buzzsumo
Buzzsumo is a platform that searches the web for material based on certain phrases or brand names. You can see how popular a piece of material is, as well as who shared it and where they shared it. This is an excellent tool for spotting unfavorable sentiments about your business and measuring your online share of voice.
#3. Mention
Mention allows brands to monitor social media and online conversations about their brand. The platform gives you detailed information about who is talking about your brand and what they are saying. You can respond to specific social media conversations as well as develop social media content depending on audience patterns.
#4. Google Alerts
Google Alerts is a free service that monitors any mentions of your name, brand, products, keywords, and competitors. When it discovers a mention of the terms you typed, it will send you an email with the link.
#5. Socialmention
Socialmention is an online tool that allows you to type a term and select from a number of search possibilities. It can search blogs, microblogs, photos, and other sources and will display the results from the previous day. The granular degree of filtering allows you to locate brand-related topics that you may otherwise miss.
#6. Reputology
Reputology is a review monitoring technology that can assist businesses in managing their online reviews. It can track and reply to reviews for your brand across different review networks. It also allows you to automatically poll customers at crucial moments in the customer experience, allowing you to discover and address issues before they become major.
#7. Birdeye
Birdeye provides enterprise-level internet reputation management tools to help businesses provide great customer service. One of its most powerful features is the ability to automatically seek reviews from consumers and then respond to those reviews on over 150 review sites. This makes it much easy to obtain positive consumer feedback and respond to any negative ones that may arise.
#8. GatherUp
GatherUp is a comprehensive set of tools for managing online reviews and the customer experience. It provides review request tools, review response tools, and social networking tools for simply sharing positive reviews. It also includes an embedded review widget that can be used on any website.
#9. Meltwater
Meltwater offers an all-in-one platform for monitoring brand reputation. It allows you to monitor a wide range of sources, including social media, online news, print media, podcasts, and review sites. It also includes a social media management tool for posting material and interacting with followers. It also comes with a social influencer management tool for identifying relevant influencers and running reputation management campaigns.
When Should You Use an Online Reputation Management Company?
There are numerous factors to consider while selecting online reputation management services. Before making a final decision, consider the following questions.
- Do you have experience working with corporate brands like ours?
- Could you please describe your privacy, security, and data management systems?
- Can you establish a track record of long-term success rather than just short-term success?
- Do you have any customers who can serve as references?
- How long have you been in operation?
For Fortune 1000 companies, the stakes are high. A bad reputation has an influence on hiring, retention, sales, and investor confidence. As a result, working with a company that genuinely understands how Google operates is important.
Conclusion
Aside from the aforementioned factors, what makes a company’s reputation truly visible and important on the internet is its honesty and dependability. If the company is ethical, it will not be concerned about a bad reputation.
Being online is always a risk due to various issues, but what distinguishes a business is how a client perceives it. As a result, while a company should focus on controlling its online reputation, it should also strive to improve its services for the individuals it serves.
- MEDIA MONITORING: Top Media Monitoring Tools In 2023
- BRAND MONITORING: Definition and Detailed Guide
- REPUTATION MANAGEMENT TOOLS: How It Works, Free and Best Tools for Reputation Management
- ONLINE REPUTATION MANAGEMENT TOOLS: Meaning and All You Need to Know
- REPUTATION MANAGEMENT SOFTWARE: Best Reputation Management Software for Business
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