Online Reputation Management Strategy: 6 Tips for Improving Your Reputation Quickly

The majority of business is already done online, and your online presence will only become more important in the future. The internet puts the power back in the consumers’ hands. Not only can everyone tell the world about their experience with each business, more and more consumers are checking reviews before they even set foot inside the business. Today, every business needs a strong online reputation management strategy.

The technological world evolves quickly, and to ensure the greatest profitability, businesses need to develop a relationship with a diligent and knowledgeable digital marketing expert who keeps up with all the new trends. Read on to discover six tips for improving your online reputation quickly.

Why Online Reputation Is Crucial

Many customers consider a Google review to be as trustworthy as a personal recommendation, so businesses have to monitor their online reputation. Any good online reputation management strategy is complex and multifaceted. Your business has to have a professional-looking online presence, and you and your employees must be trained to interact with customers appropriately when you are online.

Finally, you need a system to monitor relevant online discussions and provide you with convenient, actionable reports. Online reputation management strategy is in a constant state of evolution, and you must be able to implement new tactics and abandon old ones or risk falling behind competitors. Here are some important tips to consider.

6 Tips for Online Reputation Management Strategy

1. Don’t Try to Do It Alone

Many businesses make the mistake of attempting to handle their online reputation management strategy in-house. Running a business poses a unique set of challenges, and your reputation management strategy can be too much to add to an already demanding work schedule.

Reputation management is as important to the health of your business as your legal representation or your contracted accountant. Just because an employee is social media savvy does not mean they are qualified to handle your fundamental online reputation strategy. A business that assigns online reputation management to its employees often sees an increase of hours wasted on social media with no benefit to the reputation of the business.

Without a knowledgeable strategy, these individuals often use ineffective marketing tactics and often fail to obtain an accurate overall picture. The result is that decision-makers in the business do not have the information when they need it, and the money spent is ultimately thrown away.

2. Focus on Results-Driven Tactics

A professional consultant will allow you to capitalize on results-driven tactics that are much more affordable than traditional strategies. Ever-evolving smart tools allow businesses to scan the internet and harvest information. This information is then interpreted and supplied in the form of an actionable report that shows up as a text message or email.

This format allows business owners to get a quick glimpse of their online reputation while they’re having their coffee in the morning and alerts them immediately when they must take action. Smart monitoring and marketing tools are much more efficient than traditional strategies.

Smart tools allow you to target potential clients so you can focus on the specific individuals who are most likely to be interested in your goods and services. Businesses often discover that when they switch to an online reputation management company, they see dramatic savings and improved effectiveness over traditional marketing efforts.

3. Monitor the Discussion

With smart reports, you can see what people are saying the moment they say it. The days of the anonymous customer suggestion box have long since passed. Today, when customers have a complaint, they are much more likely to post about it on social media with the hope and assumption that the criticism will get back to the business.

If you never see a social media complaint, you are unable to correct the situation, and it reflects poorly on your business. With smart reports, you can be assured of receiving notifications whenever there is a problem. This allows you to turn a potentially negative situation into a positive for your company.

Potential customers observe how a company interacts with online complaints, and if you conduct yourself well, you can earn the trust of new clients even if the initial complaint was unfair or unreasonable. Capitalizing on opportunities for social media interaction between a business and its clients is one of the best and most affordable ways to improve online reputation.

4. Assure Correct Information

One of the most vital components of an effective online reputation management strategy is also the simplest. It is important that every online listing regarding your business shows the correct information. Unfortunately, may web services copy their information from preexisting sources.

If a listing is incorrect, or your information changes, the incorrect information could proliferate throughout the web. If customers obtain bad information and arrive at your business when it’s closed, the result could be an unfair, negative review.

Smart monitoring tools will help you stay on top of all your listings to ensure that your customers always have the right information. The more you can do to eliminate the possibility of bad reviews, the better it is for your online reputation.

5. Bury Negative Reviews

Many individuals report that when they are looking for goods and services, their research goes no farther than the star rating of a business. No business is invulnerable to receiving a few one-star reviews from unfortunate customer interactions that may or may not have anything to do with the level of service provided.

You can manage a few one-star reviews, and they won’t hurt your business provided it’s clear that those reviews are an aberration. When a one-star review is clearly fake, you have the option to report those reviews to the host site. This will initiate a review and, if you’re lucky, the review will be taken down.

However, a more proactive tactic is to ensure you have plenty of five-star reviews to offset any negative comments. You can use in-store and digital promotions to cultivate five-star reviews, so your star rating remains healthy even after you receive a few unfair comments.

6. Have Clear Expectations for Employees

Everyone who works for your business will reflect on your business. Your employees have to understand the effect they can have on the reputation of your business both when they are working as employees and when they interact online in their spare time.

You can’t over-emphasize how detrimental an inappropriate online interaction with a customer can be. A discourteous response from a social media account linked to your business has the potential to go viral and cause enormous damage to your online reputation.

It’s important that you have a clear and courteous conversation with your employees so that they understand what is expected of them in their online interactions. Workshops and regular refresher courses are also encouraged. It is always better to prevent an online reputation crisis and develop employees who are assets.

Improve Your Online Reputation Quickly

The internet can be very intimidating, and it’s often unfair. The good news that it is possible to improve your online reputation quickly and affordably by following these and other sound reputation management tactics. If you would like to develop a relationship with a customer-first company that focuses on online reputation management strategy, contact DM Collective today.

November 18, 2019October 6, 2022

4 Signs It’s Time to Rethink Your Online Reputation Management Strategy

Your online reputation determines how you’re viewed by consumers and can make a big difference to your bottom line. To keep brand equity high, you have to protect your reputation from emerging threats, act quickly to resolve a crisis, and (should the worst happen) have a plan in place to rebuild your online reputation. The question? Is your online reputation management strategy working for you?

4 Signs Your Online Reputation Management Strategy Needs to Change

You Aren’t Actively Working on Social Media

If your reputation management strategy doesn’t include a proactive investment in social media, it’s time to rethink. It’s not enough to just manage bad reviews and remain passive. It’s definitely important to monitor sites like Yelp and TripAdvisor for local Calgary reviews that reference your company; but social media gives you the opportunity to go a step beyond simply responding.

These are platforms where you can control how you’re viewed by controlling what you post. Wendy’s is a great example of a brand that has embraced a particular social media presence on Twitter and run with it. Competitors got in too late and have found themselves dragging behind. They don’t have the same strong, easily defined presence on Twitter, and they often end up simply mimicking what Wendy’s is doing (and looking a little sad in the process).

You Aren’t Aggressively Monitoring Your Reputation

There’s more to reputation management than just looking for bad reviews, though these are certainly important to find and address. You also need to be proactive about blog posts, negative links on sites that search engines find spammy, and negative returns when someone searches for you online.

Many people will have their first experience with you via Google search results, so it’s not just important that your own website rank highly: you also need to get rid of negative third-party references that might pop up. Don’t dismiss these just because they’re from a third party. They can strongly influence how people feel about you.

You Don’t Have a Response Plan

A negative review is going to come. You can bet your money on this. You can monitor all you like, but what happens when you find a problem? Are you waiting until you find an issue before you decide how to respond?

Everything goes much more smoothly when you have a plan. Think through some of the important questions before a crisis happens. For example, who responds to negative comments in your company? How do you decide which comments merit a response and which do not? What Calgary, Canadian, or world issues (if any) do you want to take a public stand on, and who is responsible for making those decisions?

You Don’t Respond Quickly

Speed is of the essence when you’re trying to manage a bad situation. When someone complains about you online, it’s only a matter of moments before their closest friends and followers respond. Give it an hour or two and the issue may have gone at least locally viral.

Most people complain because they’re having a moment of anger or frustration and need to let it out. If you respond quickly, with professionalism and sympathy, you have an excellent chance of turning a negative interaction into a positive one. At the least, you’ll say something important about who you are by noticing and responding with restraint. The complainer might not notice, but others will, and that can only help you.

Turn Your Online Reputation Management Strategy Around

Your reputation means everything. If it’s time to rethink your strategy, call Digital Marketing Collective today and get local Calgary marketing professionals on your side.

November 11, 2019October 6, 2022

4 Amazing Things About Company Online Reputation Management You May Not Have Known

Nearly everyone is aware of online reputations and how valuable they are; but company online reputation management needs to go far beyond the basics. Read on for a few amazing things you might not have known about how important online reputation management is.

Everyone Needs It

Company online reputation management isn’t just for local Calgary companies or small-time institutions. Everyone, from the biggest Fortune 500 companies to the smallest local plumbing service provider, has to keep an eye on their online professional history.

Online reputation is mostly about managing your company’s digital presence. Depending on the situation, you may need to deal with old personal information about someone integral to the company, a bad review, or even issues that seem to have nothing to do with your business. It doesn’t matter if this information is obsolete and irrelevant: if it’s online and linked to your company, you need to stay on top of it.

You Might Not Be Doing Enough Company Online Reputation Management

If you think you’re safe because you don’t put out photos of yourself or your employees, your view is shortsighted. You shouldn’t think of the digital space as just a negative to manage and avoid. It’s also a positive to embrace.

The Internet can work for you, and by embracing what it has to offer and taking proactive charge of your online reputation, you can build your own reputation and get ahead of negative reviews.

It’s Almost Impossible to Erase a Bad Review

One of the first things people ask when they see a negative review is: “how can we erase it?” The glorious, and terrible, thing about the Internet is that you can only rarely erase anything. The Internet is a positive, free space where everyone’s views and opinions can be expressed. Even going after someone with a lawsuit is unlikely to work: in fact, it might very well backfire.

That doesn’t mean there’s nothing you can do, however. The good news is that once you’ve buried bad publicity far enough that it disappears off the first page of a Google search, it is, for all intents and purposes, gone. Online reputation management can make that happen.

Reactive Is Not Enough

Many companies think they’ve done enough when they respond quickly to bad publicity. While that’s important, it’s the proactive reputation management that makes the biggest difference. For one thing, it costs a lot less to prevent problems than to erase them. For another, prevention and a proactive online presence solidify your brand equity and say something significant about who you are what you value.

The law is still working out what is in the “public domain,” who has access to that information, and what to do now that anyone can easily access nearly any information online and say anything they want. In the meantime, online reputation management can broadcast the values you want associated with your brand instead of leaving you to desperately react when something happens.

You Can Build Trust: Even With People You’ve Never Met

Decades ago, the only way to build trust was to interact personally with consumers and trust that they would talk to their friends and family about you. Now it’s possible to do so much more. Instead of hoping that satisfied customers might talk about you, you can talk about yourself.

You have to do this the right way, of course; but assuming you do, online reputation management gives you the power to get your own message out there instead of crossing your fingers and hoping for the best.

Grab Control of Your Online Reputation

Your online reputation isn’t out of your hands. You can stay in control with the right digital media marketing company on your side. Check out Digital Marketing Collective today and see the benefits of working with a local Calgary area digital marketer committed to making your online brand all it can be.

August 26, 2019

The 4 Basics of Review Management

Everyone, regardless of who they are, needs to pay attention to their online reputation. As a business, how you are viewed online will have a direct impact on whether or not you are successful, and that is why review management is so important.

Not Just for Big Business

There was a point in time when only big companies needed to worry about their online reputation. Now even local businesses in Calgary, Edmonton, Red Deer, and the surrounding areas need to ensure that they are taking care of review management and putting their best self forward. People are talking, and every business needs to be listening.

Review Management Basics

The thought of being involved with review management can seem overwhelming. However, by knowing what is expected and taking small steps, businesses of any size can handle their online reputation.

Be Proactive

One of the best ways to handle review management is to be proactive. This means asking customers to add reviews to the various review sites, as well as responding to reviews once they are posted—both positive and negative. You can ask customers online and when they visit your business in person. You may not get everyone to leave a review, but it certainly doesn’t hurt to ask.

By being aware of what people are saying about your company, you are in a better position to solve any problems before they become major issues and change to better meet the needs of customers. Responding to both positive and negative reviews will let all of your customers know that you are listening and appreciate them taking the time to send you feedback.

Claim Your Business on Every Review Site

There are numerous review sites in existence, and making it easy for customers to post on their favorite one is important. Make sure your business appears on the big ones (Yelp, Google, and Facebook) and on any local sites that might exist. You’ll then need to keep track of all these places so you can respond to any reviews that are posted.

Learn from the Reviews

Both positive and negative reviews can help you learn and grow as a business. The negative ones might be slightly more helpful in this endeavor, as they will point out what weaknesses you need to work on, but the positive ones will let you know what you are doing right.

Consider Cross-Linking

If you’re doing it right, you should have a webpage and social media accounts. This will ensure that you are interacting with customers across all platforms online. In addition to having all of these accounts, make sure to cross-link them to one another. This means including your webpage link in your bio on your Facebook and Twitter pages, as well as links to your social media sites on your webpage.

You might also consider putting links to your reviews on your various sites, as this will allow customers to quickly and easily access that information. You can also use positive reviews on your various sites to highlight your business and how customers rank your products or services.

Yes, It’s Worth the Effort

When it comes to review management, there’s no doubt it takes time and effort; but it’s worth it. You only get one chance to make a first impression, and this is how it is done in the digital world. For big businesses and local businesses alike, most customers’ first impression of you will be what they see online, so make sure you look good.

If you don’t have the time or skills to take this task on yourself, there’s nothing wrong with getting help. At Digital Marketing Collective, we can help you with your review management and any other advertising needs you might have.

August 19, 2019

4 Reasons Why Review Management Is More Important Than Ever

If you want to be found by customers, you have to have a presence online. However, you have to do more than just have a website: you also have to be active on social media and be engaged with review management.

With advances in mobile technology, people can look things up while they are on the go, and this may be exactly how they find your business. However, where once it was enough to inform them about what your products or services, now you need to do more; including taking care of review management so people get a positive view of your business when they search for you online.

Why Does Your Business Need Reviews?

Reviews are basically like word-of-mouth advertising. It is one person sharing their experience with others, and this review can have an impact on whether or not your business finds and retains new customers. Just like the internet has made it easy for people to find and share information, it also makes it possible for them to share an opinion.

As a business, you want all of your reviews to be good, but this isn’t going to happen. There’s no way you can make everyone happy all the time. However, how you handle the negative reviews will say more about you than anything. When it comes to review management, you need to consider how you respond and interact with customers who leave you good and bad reviews. You also need to realize that others will read these and form an opinion about your business, which could lead to you getting more business or fading away.

Why Review Management Is So Important

Now that you know why your business needs reviews, here are the reasons why review management is so important:

They Allow You to Put Your Best Face Forward

You may not have a lot of control over how a person reviews your product or service, but you do have control over how you respond to a negative review. This can help you manage your online reputation and show to others that you are willing to go out of your way to make sure customers are happy with what you have to offer. It can even show that you’re “the bigger person” in an argument.

They Build Trust and Credibility

While responding to a negative review is a good way to show others that you are willing to make things right, responding to positive reviews is also a good way to keep happy customers engaged. This will let them know that you care about what they have to say and are listening to their opinions. This is a good way to build trust and credibility among those who are happy and unhappy with your company, as well as let potential customers see that you are willing to engage with everyone.

They Help You Discover Your Customer’s Wants and Needs

It’s important to respond to negative reviews during your review management process, but you also need to keep in mind that you may not be able to solve everyone’s issues or make them like you. Use this as an opportunity to learn and figure out exactly what your customers are looking for. Even if you can’t give it to all of them, you can make the majority of them happy and let them know you care.

They Are Part of Your Online Reputation

There’s really no choice in the matter anymore about being online. If you want to be found, you have to have a presence, and that leaves you open to criticism. However, if you handle it correctly and learn from the process, you can come out with new customers and an increase in sales.

As a business owner, doing your own review management can be challenging and confusing. At Digital Marketing Collective, we can help you with your management and advertising needs to make you look good and attract new customers.

August 12, 2019

3 Tips to Maximize Your Review Management Strategy

If you’re like most business owners, the thought of online reviews probably makes you sweat. Anyone can go online and make comments about your business and the service they received, but it seems like the only ones who take the time are those who are unhappy. However, there are ways to maximize your review management.

Word of mouth and reviews are still the best way for new customers to find your business. While you may cringe about people getting on Yelp or other review sites, having the right review management strategy in place can actually help you get more customers.

The Importance of Reviews

More than 90% of people read online reviews to decide if they are going to go with a company or not. They trust these reviews as much as they would trust their friends and family. Having reviews can boost your search ranking and improve your conversion rates. Thus, it’s worth your time and effort to invest in reviews.

How to Maximize Your Review Management Strategy

Now that you are aware of how important reviews are, you need to put a strategy in place to get them. You need to make it as easy as possible for customers to accomplish this task. This can be achieved by making sure your business information is claimed across all major review platforms.

The big ones are Yelp, Google, and Facebook. There may also be some local ones in Calgary, Edmonton, Red Deer, and the surrounding areas, so do a search and see what exists. If you can’t find your business on these sites, add it. This will ensure that your customers can find you and leave a review. But that shouldn’t be the end of your strategy:

Ask for Reviews

This can be done in many different ways, including in person when a customer visits your business or through emails. If you send out a regular email, add a link to the various review sites at the bottom so the customer can decide where they want to post their review.

Respond to Reviews

Not all of your customers will take the opportunity to respond to your request for reviews, but those that do have the option of leaving a good one or a bad one. While you more than likely prefer to get a good one, that doesn’t always happen.

The way you respond to reviews—both good and bad—can speak volumes to other customers who look at your company online. If you go out of your way to try to fix an unhappy customer’s issue, this makes you look good.

Interacting with good reviews also creates a relationship between you and your happy customers. It lets them know that their opinion is being heard and that you appreciate them. This can make them lifelong customers who are more than happy to recommend you to others.

Use Reviews to Your Benefit

As part of your review management strategy, you should be using the reviews to your benefit. You can use the positive reviews in your marketing campaigns to let others know what customers think about your products or services. Highlight these in marketing materials and on your web page.

When it comes to negative reviews, you can use these to learn how to improve your company and services. Negative reviews give you a chance to fix problems, and you can show others your growth and ability to change by addressing these issues and doing what you can to make customers happy.

Conclusion

When it comes to online review management, most companies cringe at the idea. This can be an incredibly time-consuming process, but it has far-reaching implications. Having a professional help you with this can be beneficial, so connect with Digital Marketing Collective (https://dmclocal.com/) to maximize your review management strategy.

August 5, 2019

4 Amazing Ideas for Online Reputation Management Services

Your online reputation is a major factor in the success of your business. Potential customers rely on customer reviews when choosing someone to do business with. In the past, conscientious business practices was enough for reputation. Today, however, unscrupulous competitors can plant false reviews to discredit their rivals, and the internet has made it more likely that some people will complain online rather than coming to you directly with an issue. All businesses need online reputation management services to ensure their online presence is an accurate reflection of their dedication to client satisfaction.

Online Reputation Management Services

Online reputation management services are as important to a business as a legal department or an accounting team. Every business has an inherent commitment to providing the best service possible for a client. It is important to respond to customer dissatisfaction promptly and courteously.

Businesses must monitor their online reputation to discover customer complaints or suggestions and have a plan in place to satisfy client needs. The best reputation management services offer efficient, streamlined system for reputation monitoring to produce convenient, excellent results and a strong return on investment. Here are four of the most innovative ideas for making the most of your online reputation management services:

Use Monitoring Tools

There are many social media and review sites with new content published every day. An online reputation management service will introduce you to a set of smart marketing tools that send you convenient alerts about all comments published regarding your business no matter where they happen on the web. These tools allow you to gauge your online reputation and alert you when it’s time to take action.

Keep Track of It All on a Single Dashboard

The best monitoring tools need to be convenient and easy to use. From a single dashboard, you can monitor your entire online reputation over a variety of social media and review platforms. The purpose of online reputation management is to provide tools to quickly and easily sift through all the information available on the internet and give you instant access to concise and actionable reporting.

Leverage Knowledgeable Consulting

Technology changes fast, and you are too busy with the demands of your business to keep up to date with trends in a whole different industry. Online reputation management services keep their fingers on the pulse of new online trends and developments so you don’t have to. The best consultants keep you from spending time on strategies that are no longer effective and help you implement new tactics that will provide you with a competitive edge over your competitors.

Use Reports to Train Employees in Smart Strategies

It is important to have a well-defined corporate strategy for online reputation management that every employee will understand. Anyone who works for your business reflects upon that business, and their online interactions can be detrimental to the reputation of the business. Employees need training to avoid inappropriate responses that might go viral and cause unwanted media attention. Employee training is an important component of online reputation management.

Your Reputation Is Your Business

No business can afford to disregard its online reputation. Social media and review platforms allow clients an easy venue for expressing their impressions of a business. Interactions on social media are a tremendous way for a business to build a loyal customer following, and to listen to sincere comments on how their professional services can be improved.

Reputation management is a big job, but with professional consultation, all business can implement a convenient strategy using technological tools to provide detailed and concise reporting at a very affordable price. Contact the friendly professionals at DM Collective to learn more about how online reputation management services can help your business.