Reputation management — much of which is achieved through SEO. This means effectively using search engine optimization to improve the information that becomes available when someone searches for your business.
If your last few products or your recent services haven’t been up to your usual standard, then this might result in some bad reviews appearing prominently in the search engine results. This in turn means that the first things people find about you will potentially be negative when they look for your brand online.
Getting your own website to be the first result when searching for your business then is obviously one way you can begin to combat this. At the same time, you can work to increase the visibility of the positive reviews that are out there to help them rise above the negative ones.
Reputation management also means other things. For example, you need to ensure that you are generating those positive reviews which you can do simply by asking your customers and visitors to. Another option is to offer incentives for good reviews – such as discounts. A good strategy on social media is to say that you will write X post or provide X product but only if you receive a certain number of likes or reviews.
It’s also important to make sure you’re seen to respond to negative reviews in a polite and effective manner. Express your concern that your customer was not happy with the product or service they received (even if you don’t really feel that way!) and then offer to make amends in some way or other. This is reassuring for other potential customers, it demonstrates that you care and if you can solve the problem for the customer then they may even alter their review and make it more positive.
