Managing your online reputation is sometimes thought of as the dark side of social media and Web 2.0. Online reputation management has become a necessity for many public officials, major companies, celebrities and various other online businesses. It is a fact that bad news travels faster than good news.
If you have a bad reputation online it can negatively affect sales, brand names, customer relations, employee retention, social connections and even friendships. With more people and organizations hopping online everyday, a good online reputation is crucial for business.
Online reputation management (ORM) is becoming important for everyone online. If you are applying for a new job and you have a negative online reputation, will you be hired? Managing your online reputation is becoming increasingly important if you are seeking a key position.
Find below 3 tips that can help you with the management of your online profile.
Managing your online reputation
Monitor: Setup and create tracking processes to notify you as soon as a posting is made online about yourself, your brand, or your company name. The easiest way to set up a tracking system is to use Google Alerts which is a free service that you can use to be notified when your name is mentioned.
Respond: This part is also called “damage control”. Once you are notified about a negative comment, it is very important to determine the best response to minimize the effect of the negative comment. Your response can also determine to turn the person that posted the comment into an advocate.
Repair: Once the damage is done there is a process you can follow to start repairing your reputation. Since you can’t delete what was said about you online, you have to research and create a campaign around the negative comment to push the comment further down the search results. This campaign will usually target a specific keyword and keyphrase such as your name.