Growing your business starts with mastering your customer’s experience to understand the complete path to purchase. It is critically important to master your online reputation management process and communicate with your customers consistently and authentically in the spaces they already operate, especially in online business listings and review platforms.
Online brand reputation management is one of the most effective ways to grow your business. A positive brand reputation establishes authority and builds trust and loyalty with potential customers. Ultimately, it also drives sales and growth.
In today’s online age, developing a powerful presence on social media, blogs, review sites, and search engines is essential for any organization striving to become an authority in their field. With conversations happening around the clock it’s vital your brand sets itself apart from the rest – don’t miss out!
What is Online Reputation Management (ORM)?
Online Reputation Management, also known as digital reputation management, combines public relations, marketing, and search engine optimization to create a positive image of a business or brand. This includes brand reputation monitoring by monitoring online mentions of your brand, addressing negative comments that could damage a brand’s perception, and developing an online reputation management strategy that helps people find the right materials when looking for your brand online.
Reputation management aims to create balance, address misleading information, and leave customers with a positive impression of who you are and what you do.
Many channels fall under online business reputation management but understanding the four main pillars will provide you with a solid foundation.
- Paid Media — allows you direct control of placement on paid channels such as Google Ads, social media ads, and sponsored posts.
- Earned Media — should be a priority focus for all businesses. Free online earned media is trusted most and can significantly impact growth and brand perception.
- Shared Media — allows you to engage customers and prospects directly. One negative Facebook review can seriously harm your brand reputation, but a quick, transparent response can help mitigate a negative windfall.
- Owned Media — is fully under your control. Creating a quality website and blog content can improve the pages’ ranking that are most important to your brand’s perception.
How is Online Reputation Management Beneficial?
The internet has evolved over the past decade, creating a connected, digital society. With the growth of social media and easy access to the internet, businesses have adapted how they market their brand and products across websites, social media, and online advertising.
While it would be great to fully address all your customers’ wants and needs, that typically isn’t possible. Of course, products can have imperfections, employees may not respond appropriately, and at some point, there will be a bad review, negative Tweet, or Facebook post.
Let’s look at a few online reputation management tips that can benefit your business
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Impact Buying Decisions
Managing or the lack of managing your online reputation and content influences a buyer’s decision significantly. Over 60% of consumers begin the buyer journey with a web search. In this highly competitive environment, your online perception can, without a doubt, make-or-break a potential customer’s final decision.
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Build Trust & Credibility
People are going to write negative reviews and comments; it’s inevitable. Ignoring the situation can have long-term effects on your business. Taking accountability and quickly addressing negative feedback will make it easier to regain trust and restore confidence in your business.
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Get Valuable Feedback
Monitoring reviews and social media comments can provide insights into what people love and don’t love about your products or services. When you refine your business for the most common complaints, you show customers their thoughts matter, and you are willing to adapt. This will help build brand loyalty.
How to Improve Your Online Reputation Management Strategy?
Having a solid strategy in place is key to successful business reputation management. It involves improving SEO strategy, consistently monitoring social media, and creating quality, branded content. The process will vary for each business, but the key components remain the same.
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Perform an Audit
Before you can put an ORM plan into place, you need to conduct a full reputation audit. Start with a Google search and see what audiences find when they search for your business. One negative article can put your business at risk of losing potential clients.
Negative search results aren’t your only risk factors. You want to look at your website for inconsistencies, confusing calls-to-action, and outdated content. Additionally, look at old social media posts and images that could be taken out of context.
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Develop an SEO Reputation Management Strategy
When people enter your business name in search engines, what they see will mostly be their first impression of your brand. Google and other search engines can’t decipher what is true or false, so they rank what’s most popular. Developing a lasting, effective SEO and search engine reputation management strategy that leverages keywords and useful content will help establish a positive brand perception and drive traffic to your website.
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Monitor Social Media Channels
Social media is an integral part of brand reputation management. Well-managed social media profiles allow you to show the best of what your company offers through company content, industry news, and updates. You also get to shape your brand or business’s perception by interacting directly with current and potential customers who have chosen to follow your brand.
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Implement Google Alerts
Google Alerts provide an invaluable tool for staying abreast of your brand. With just a few clicks, subscribers can get timely notifications delivered directly to their email inbox with summaries of all relevant search activity – allowing them to stay informed with little effort. Topics you may want alerts for include:
- Business or organization name
- Business or organization leaders
- Key products
- Trademarks
- Competitors
- Industry developments
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Respond to Negative Reviews
Don’t be tempted to overlook negative reviews—they’re actually a chance for your brand to form an authentic connection with potential customers. Thank people for their feedback and provide tangible solutions; don’t just offer them discounts on future purchases. Show that you genuinely care about customer satisfaction by going the extra mile, and building trust in your business along the way!
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Encourage Customer Reviews
An effective way to boost your online presence is with positive customer reviews! By encouraging customers to leave ratings and feedback on platforms like Google and Yelp, you can improve the visibility of your business in search results. Various approaches can be used such as rewards programs or friendly reminders through email – anything that incentivizes customers for their honest input will go a long way towards building trust among potential clients.
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Promote Positive Content
Positioning yourself in the public eye starts with content highlighting your brand’s positive image. Companies can demonstrate their commitment to excellence by prominently displaying customer reviews, promoting third-party endorsements, and partnering with influencers for maximum reach – all while thanking those involved along the way and engaging in any joint endeavors that could further enhance what is already a glowing reputation.
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Create High-Quality, On-Brand Content
Buyers across industries use digital content to research and influence their purchasing decisions. Quality content drives SEO by pushing websites to the top of search engine results pages. It can suppress negative perceptions as well as showcase your best qualities. Make sure customers find content with consistent brand messaging in tone and voice across branded search, social media channels, and online review platforms.
Take Control of Your Online Reputation
At New Path, we put people first when it comes to marketing. Growing your business starts with mastering your customer’s experience to understand the complete path to purchase.
It is critically important to communicate with your customers consistently and authentically in the spaces they already operate, especially in online business listings and review platforms. Sometimes this means you need to outsource your marketing and ORM to an online reputation management service or marketing agency.
Online reputation monitoring and management is a core component of our people-first marketing service pillar. We help clients develop a long-term strategy model that learns, adapts, and builds equity.
Ready to take control of your online reputation? Contact us today or view Our Services to learn more about our offerings.
