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What is reputation? What is reputation management? How is it done? - Expand panel below to find out.
What is reputation? What is reputation management? How is it done? This free guide will give you the inside scoop on strategy, protection from threats, benefits of online brand management, statistics, and tools for effective management.
A brands social and search engine profile is essentially the same thing as a public version of it's credit score. Online reputation management aims to create and/or improve the quantity, visibility, and relevance of positive online content for a brand. Online reputation management is often abbreviated as "ORM" or "SERM" which stands for "Search Engine Reputation Management", the terms are often used interchangeably.
The objective of most ORM campaigns is to improve how a brand - be it a person, product, service, political entity, or company - is seen online. Companies that provide reputation management services use SEO, PR, content design and management, search engine marketing, review management, negotiation, legal methods, and psychology to achieve the goals of their clients.
Online reputation services are used to improve Yelp, Google, Facebook, and other reviews, improve branded search results, and to remove or suppress negative online content. Examples of ORM services include:
The practice of ORM often includes a number of different disciplines and frameworks like the Reverse Wikipedia ORM Strategy. The end result of each is usually the same - to improve how a brand is seen online. Services to accomplish this goal often include:
Reputation management services can be accomplished through both ethical an unethical means. Ethical ORM involves what people often call "white hat" techniques - they serve to make the online environment better. Unethical methods involve the use of "spam" or low quality content or other actions that go against search engine best practices. Reputation X is an ethical ORM firm.
Not long ago, individual or corporate reputation was largely driven by word-of-mouth. Then search engines arrived, and evolved. These days, search engines and social media give buyers an unprecedented level of influence over the public online reputation of companies and individuals everywhere.
The history of ORM is, to us, fascinating. Companies and individuals can rise and fall at the whim of consumers, and the content that takes them down doesn't necessarily even need to be true. Russian meddling in the US elections proved that truth is a highly fungible thing and that sensationalism and popularity are more important factors in the way information vendors like Google and Facebook rank results than truth.
The information these companies display has a real-world effect on not only politics but commerce. In fact, a single star more on an independent review site can easily be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenues to a company. Corporate reputation management helps brands take more control of how they are seen online by improving search and social messaging.
Here is a graphic showing the approximate relative amounts of time various online image campaigns take:
Here's a look at online brands are affected by search and social sentiment by the numbers:
Online reputation management (ORM) is not quite the same as public relations (PR) - but there is overlap. Although the two share similarities and may be used in conjunction with one another, PR tends to be more forward facing and visible to members of the public. Whereas online reputation management (ORM) services often occur behind the scenes. PR companies often use ORM companies to quietly improve their clients' brands by improving search results in a more technical manner.
SEO is one of the tools used by the best reputation management companies to improve the value of their services, but most firms do not engage in search engine optimization due to the cost - Reputation X does. SEO is different than ORM in many ways, but the biggest difference is between branded vs. non-branded search terms.
Branded search terms related to a company, product, or service name. Non-branded search terms are things like "best blue widgets" and have more to do with the product or service offered. SEO is best for non-branded search terms related to a company website. ORM servics are best used for branded search terms relating to the company website and all other search results specifically about the brand.
The ORM process is part “technical public relations”, part content management, part review curation, and part public relations. ORM strategy leverages things like SEO, content development and publication, online review management services, social media, legal tactics, and more to improve the online presence of a brand or individual.
The truth is, ORM costs vary dramatically depending on what you need and how difficult it is to achieve. But more importantly, keep in mind not all reputation management is created equal (and it’s not always easy to tell what you’re getting).
The qualitative difference between automated, software-based, or DIY solutions and intelligent, creative, human-driven campaigns is huge in both results and cost.
Getting the attention of a global publication or moving a negative search result on that publication down in rankings for $500 is not realistic. The resources required for such a change are significant.
Prices normally range from about $1,500 per month for an online review management campaign and from $3,000 per month for a reputation repair campaign. The latter can cost much more per month depending on the resources needed to solve a given problem such as a variety of search phrases, multiple markets, language translations, etc.
Improve online sentiment by cleaning up search results including removing negative online results, improving reviews, enhancing positive content, and improving search engine rankings.
