Did you know that over 90% of consumers read online reviews before they visit or buy from a business and over 84% of these trust the reviews? In this world of digital marketing, a positive online reputation can be a brand's greatest asset or its biggest weakness. There is barely a business that manages to run smoothly without occasionally having issues with its client. When this happens, it is important to resolve things before it reaches a point where the client believes that the issue can only get solved through public forums or, worse still, warning people to keep off your business.
When your online reputation is tarnished, you can easily lose your customers and even partners. Therefore, it is only important to pay full attention to your business's online reputation. Online Reputation Management (ORM) is the only way to manage the online reputation of your business and improve it. This involves creating an online presence that can be able to change the perception that the public has about your business and help you have an edge over your competitors. Keeping this in mind, here are 7 online reputation management tricks that will help your business to protect its good image.
Feature Positive Reviews on Your Website
If your business does not feature customer reviews on its website's homepage or feature a customer feedback section then you are under-utilizing your resources. When you have a business website, which you should be having by now, ensure that you feature some of the positive reviews that make your company a good impression. Just ask your customers for their permission to use their feedback. When you do this and pair the reviews with your business's incentives, customers will make their choices very quickly online.
Try not to get into Online Arguments
Nowadays, it is very easy to find yourself engaging in an online argument. However, even if you are technically right, getting into online arguments may make you lose out overall by appearing as harsh and unprofessional. In addition, you may get emotionally riled up and even end up saying things that may further damage your reputation. The best approach is to be nicer in all your online interactions, strive to take the communications offline, and try to reconcile with the customer. Your professional responses will even prove to win you more customers.
Respond to All Customer Reviews
When a business takes time to respond to customer's reviews, it appears caring to its customers. Responding to your customer's reviews and expressing your appreciation makes them feel valued. Therefore, encourage positive reviewers and thank them for submitting good comments. Apart from helping you build a good relationship with the customer, it will also encourage them to post more positive reviews in the future. When it comes to negative reviews, only respond to them with the help of public relations professionals or, if by yourself, after doing careful research.
Manage the Online Reputation of Your Executives
Most People often research more about a business that they are considering buying from Apart from the normal reviews, they may also go ahead to research the top people involved in it. If you have only paid attention to managing your brand's online reputation, you also need to come up with a reputation management strategy for all your key company executives. The first step towards achieving this is making sure that each executive in your company has a bio page on your website dedicated to them. After that, strive as much as possible to get media coverage about that executive through blog posts, Media articles, and press releases. This will help your executive names rank highly on search engines and in turn build credibility and trust for that individual.
Be Active on Social Media
Being active on social media sites has great potential for improving your business's reputation. Managing how your business communicates with the public and how other people are talking about it on all the major social media platforms is a must if you are looking for a positive online presence. This means that your business should not miss any of the major social websites including Facebook, Twitter, Google, and Quora. All the accounts should be active and linked with your business's blog and website. Monitor closely all hashtags about your company and never let comments and negative reviews from customers go un-responded to, In addition, your business should always update its social media profiles regularly and produce positive content to provide the best information to your potential clients.
Admit Your Mistakes and Try to fix them
Generally, people don't hesitate to give second chances and this means that you can still redeem yourself in case of mistakes. Therefore, if your business messes up or does something wrong, be frank about the mistake and make a genuine apology to those affected. Also, ensure that you point out all the steps that you are taking to fix up things. It may be easier to dig in and deny the problem but in the end, it will only make things worse.
Don't Hesitate to Look for Help when Needed
Lastly, you can consider bringing in an expert to help you build or repair your business's online reputation when necessary. What people see online after searching for your business or executives is the impression that will stick with them forever. This is why one of the biggest investments that you can make for your business is managing its online reputation. Since this process requires lots of time and knowledge of search engine optimization factors and how to create the right relationships with media properties and outlets, you can consider getting outside help.
Conclusion
It only takes a few minutes for a bad customer experience to go worse and even viral. The key to protecting your business's online reputation is by optimizing your content appropriately, monitoring your search engine results regularly, and always being ready to take action if something negative comes up. By following these simple online reputation management tricks, you will be able to put yourself and your business in a better position when someone says something or something happens that tarnishes the name of your brand.
Venkatesh C.R. is the CEO of Dot Com Infoway - a professional SEO Company that also provides software and mobile application development, internet marketing solutions for online businesses, and a whole gamut of IT solutions and products to clients.
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