“If you lose money for the firm, I will be understanding. If you lose reputation, I will be ruthless,” said Warren Buffet.
Reputation management has become a necessary component to many successful businesses in the internet age where any customer can say anything about their experience with a company’s product or services. A company’s reputation can be permanently tarnished with a flippant tweet or a long-winded Yelp review that can impact millions of potential customers if not handled correctly. On the other hand, a company’s online exposure can benefit exponentially from positive online conversation and reviews.
In 2013, 83% of customers said they consult reviews before purchasing, according to a Consumer Review Survey.
If social media and social reviews have taught us anything, it is that online negativity towards your company will not sort itself out and it will cause loss in customers and revenue.
Negative online reviews online are dreaded among businesses, and rightfully so since 80% of customers have changed their opinion based on a negative review.
However, bad reviews cannot be ignored and they especially cannot be deleted. Instead, the business must learn to handle the review appropriately which usually yields a change in heart for the customer who was negatively impacted. When customers were contacted about a negative review:
- 34% of users deleted the negative review
- 33% of users changed the negative review to a positive review.
Of course, equal attention should be paid to loyal customers who leave positive reviews too, since an one star difference on Yelp can impact a business up to 9%.
In a digital, social and Internet driven society, reputation management is only as good as your company’s search results. Luckily, SEO and Reputation Management go together like two peas in a pod to create a strong operation and ensure responsive customer service.
Combining reputation management with SEO tactics boosts search rankings by:
- Increases links to and from your website
- Increases conversation about your business, causing people to seek it out online
- Responding effectively to negativity, which eliminates penalization from Google
- Tracking improvements over the timeline of your SEO campaign
- Aggregates online conversation about your business that is shared online
Managing your company’s reputation is highly effective and efficient once you understand how to approach it. It is up to you to spread the story of your company, utilize reputation management to ensure it’s the correct story being told.
