Online Reputation Management

In this post we will try to explore the concept of “Online Reputation Management”. The purpose is to introduce you to this concept and give you a quick overview.

Online Reputation Management (ORM) as the name suggests, is the art of monitoring information flow on the internet of a person, brand or business with the purpose of decreasing the visibility of negative content and promoting positive or neutral content. In today’s era, anyone with a device connected to internet can post information, reviews and comments about you or your brand on dozens of highly visited online destinations. Businesses can no longer afford to create a website and assume that prospects will learn about the company solely from there.  Your customers are online and not just looking at your Website and Facebook page for information about your company. What took you years to develop in local reputation can be brought down in a day with negative commentary. Therefore, it pays to protect your brand where ever consumers are offered a degree of interaction. It is imperative that businesses actively participate in ORM especially when the battlefield has shifted online. ORM is not only about responding to the negative; it’s equally important to amplify the positive.

Some of the ways to get started on a reputation management program are:

What’s Buzzing?

Before you turn negativities into a positive spin you need to find out what’s being said about you, your company, its products and services. Google lets you set up custom searches on Google News for any phrase. When you subscribe to this search through RSS or e-mail, you receive an alert anytime this search phrase shows up in the news feed. To monitor closely what’s being said online in real time use Twitter’s search.twitter.com feature

Participate in social media

One of the best ways to fight negative comments is to make sure that there is lots of positive content showing up for searches of your name or company. Having a frequently updated blog, well written Facebook and LinkedIn profiles, submitting articles to article directories can help you ensure that there is substantial positive content attributed to your name

Employ social search engines

Claim and enhance your business listings on search engines such as Yelp, InsiderPages, CitySearch and JudysBook. These sites enhance your business listings and allow users to rate your services and write testimonials

Build your reputation

Off late, a number of sites such as Naymz.com and RepVine.com have been launched with the purpose of allowing you to build an online reputation by inviting people to write reviews about you and your work. LinkedIn also allows and encourages this practice

Encourage Brand Evangelism

People tend to complain more often that congratulate, however that doesn’t mean they don’t like sharing experiences. They just need a little encouragement. Create brand evangelists by giving them incentives to spread good news about your brand

A good example of ORM could be the campaign done by Chevy for Tahoe. In March 2006, Chevrolet ran a social media promotion where consumers could create their own ads for the new Tahoe. Anti-SUV activists took up the call, creating ads that portrayed the Tahoe as a gas-guzzling monstrosity that caused global warming and destroyed the environment. These negative ads became popular and quickly began making the rounds on YouTube. Instead of pulling these ads , Chevy openly acknowledged them on the company’s blog, dealing with the issues brought up in the ads and highlighting the new Tahoe’s good qualities, such as the fact that it gets 22 miles per gallon, can run on ethanol and has a high safety rating. By keeping the dialog open and addressing these legitimate concerns people had with their product, Chevy was able to turn a potential negative into a positive. ORM means addressing your consumer’s concerns and showing them how your company is striving to make things better.

-Rahul Mukherjee

 MDI, 2011-13