Reputation management: tools, methods and strategies

 

A good reputation is the key to business success. According to statistics, 79% of users study reviews before making a purchase. And one negative opinion can scare away dozens of potential customers. We are figuring out how to manage a company's reputation, and what methods and tools can be used for this.

What is reputation management?

Reputation management is a set of actions aimed at creating a positive image of a company. It includes three main areas of work: tracking mentions of your brand, working off negativity, and distributing positive content. Different methods are used to manage your reputation.: - ORM or Online Reputation Management is the formation of a positive image of a company on the Internet. - SERM or Search Engine Reputation Management is a subspecies of ORM, working on reputation in search results. - SMM is the creation of a good reputation on social networks, including through bloggers. - PR is a wide range of tools that affects the perception of a company both online and offline.

Why do I need reputation management?

Companies usually start thinking about reputation management in two cases: - When too many negative publications accumulate, and this already has a bad effect on business. - When a company is engaged in improving the level of customer service and wants to convey this information to the audience.

But the most reasonable approach to reputation management is to create a positive brand image from the moment it enters the market. In this case, you will be able to create the right image in advance and prevent possible crises. The high competition in the market and the rapid development of the Internet have greatly changed the rules of the game. Today, customers don't just study reviews — they place quite high demands on them. According to statistics, 52% of people will not buy a product if its average score is below 4 points. At the same time, 70% of the audience pays attention not only to the reviews, but also to the company's responses.

Good reputation management gives a business many advantages.: - Brand awareness increases, marketing costs decrease. - Customers make a purchase decision faster, and sales volume increases. - The negative is leveled off, the rating on rating sites is growing. - A positive image of the company is being formed, so it is easier to attract investments and hire employees. - You control brand mentions — the risk of a sudden crisis is reduced. - The information field needs to be managed, as negative reviews and other emotional messages about the company can greatly harm the business.

Which companies need it?

Without effective reputation management, it is difficult for businesses that: - They provide services. This is something that cannot be "touched", so people focus primarily on the opinions of other customers. - They are tied to geography. If the product is usually searched through search engines, maps, or aggregators, such as 2Gis or Yandex Travel, then the company's rating is crucial. - They work in a field where expertise is important. For example, medicine, law, consulting. The price of error is high here, so they pay special attention to reputation. - They sell through marketplaces. According to Aliexpress Russia, 9 out of 10 purchases in this channel are made under the influence of customer reviews. - They actively attract investments. For a large business that is looking for investors or going public, brand image issues are critically important. AP News estimated that more than half of the company's market value is shaped by its reputation.

For example, a metallurgical plant that operates in the B2B sector or on government orders may not track every mention of itself. Sometimes it is enough for such companies to maintain good relationships with key customers. But if a business suddenly needs to quickly recruit a lot of talented employees or attract sponsors, then it will be necessary to create a positive image of the company. And this is not done in one day. What affects the reputation

Reputation is not just a set of reviews about a company on the web, but a general subjective perception of the brand. It is based on many factors, including: - customer and employee reviews; - the information that a person sees in the search engine Yandex and Google, for example, on Wikipedia or news sites; - online and offline media posts; publications on behalf of the brand, including on social networks or a blog; - corporate values and the mission that the company translates, for example, through socially significant projects; - the personal brand of the business leader and his top managers.

It depends on this information whether customers will contact the company and trust it. At the same time, working on a reputation is always a long—term game. It can take years to build the right image. In the book "The Rules of Wealth," Warren Buffett said: "It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to destroy it." To prevent this from happening, it is worth monitoring all channels of communication with customers and forming a positive perception of the brand.

How to measure your reputation level

To assess a company's reputation, you need to correlate the amount of negativity and the frequency of positive mentions of your brand. Here are some ways to monitor your reputation.: - Manual monitoring. If there are few mentions, then they can be easily found by simply typing in the company name and the word "reviews" in the search engine. The second option is to manually track individual sites, such as social networks or marketplaces. - Pay special attention to review aggregators, including websites. flamp.ru , irecommend.ru , yell.ru , otzyv.ru and otzovik.com . Be sure to take into account the specifics of the business: for example, mentions on TripAdvisor are important for hotels, and mentions on Yandex Market are important for online stores. - Automated analytics. If there are a lot of messages involving the brand, it is better to choose one of the automatic data collection systems. For example, Brand Analytics, Medialogy, Babkee, IQBuzz or YouScan. This service allows you to track all mentions of the company. You can use it to determine the tone of each message and evaluate audience engagement. - NPS score. The Net Promoter Score is a consumer loyalty index that is measured among the brand's real customers. It reflects how satisfied people are with the product and what comments they will give to their friends and acquaintances — positive or negative. If the NPS is above zero, then there will be more positive reviews. - The choice of monitoring method should be made taking into account the size of the company, its goals and objectives, the main sales channels, the specifics of the industry and the characteristics of the target audience. How to improve the company's reputation

To create a positive brand image and enhance a company's reputation, you need to work in three main areas: evaluate its level, neutralize the negative and spread the positive. 1. Track mentions

Renowned economist Peter Drucker said: "You can't control what you can't measure." Therefore, reputation management begins with tracking mentions of your brand: evaluating the number of negative and positive messages, and rating the company. Global monitoring should be carried out regularly, for example, every few weeks or months. Reviews on key sites should be monitored daily: on marketplaces and on social networks, it is better to respond within an hour. Don't forget to pay attention to the TOP of the search results — what the client sees when he searches for information about your company. For each period of working with a reputation, be sure to set a goal for yourself, for example: Increase the rating of ten key products on Ozon and Wildberries to 4 points for the next month. To displace the first page of Google negative reviews about the brand during the quarter. Conduct an NPS survey with at least 50% of existing customers. Compare the measurement results with the goal — whether it has been achieved, whether there is progress. 2. Neutralize negativity

There are various ways to reduce the number of negative publications in the company's information field.: Solve the client's problems and ask him to add a review or change his rating. Negotiate with the site to delete the message or news. This method is relevant if the publications are erroneous or created at the request of competitors. You can push negativity out of the top of search engines using SEO promotion tools. To do this, you need to write some positive materials for the site and optimize them so that links appear at the top of the search. The main rule of dealing with negativity is to react to it. You should respond to negative reviews calmly and constructively, taking care of the customer. Don't use boilerplate phrases or give the same answers to everyone. Try to find an individual solution to the problem and demonstrate your willingness to help.

Life hack: Take the client's contacts and transfer the discussion to non-public channels. Continue communicating with the person in person, namely by phone, messenger, or mail. This way, the details of the situation won't get online, and fewer people will see negative mentions of the brand. Reviews are a way to get customer feedback, and it provides an opportunity to improve your product. If the reason for the negativity is real and not subjective, then measures should be taken to ensure that such situations do not happen again in the future. In the case of a larger crisis, when it's not about single customer reviews, but about company news that gets into the media, you should act like this: - Determine the scale of the crisis and calculate the possible consequences. - Be aware of the situation and keep your finger on the pulse of all changes. - Develop an action plan — how you will solve the problem. - Make a public statement and tell us what steps you plan to take. - Communicate with the audience and the media, answer questions openly and provide the necessary support. This way you can minimize losses and maintain customer trust. In other words, the information space is best filled with messages on behalf of the company. Otherwise, the presentation and emotional coloring of the news will be difficult to control. 3. Spread positivity

Another important area of work with reputation is the dissemination of positive content about the company. These can be customer reviews or any positive brand news. To get more reviews: - Ask customers to share their impressions of the product. - Please indicate which popular sites can do this. - Offer a bonus for reviews — discounts or points that can be spent on future purchases. According to AliExpress Russia statistics, 31% of users are motivated by such actions.

Positive company news, useful articles and posts, as well as other expert content formats can be distributed using SEO, SMM and PR tools. This includes content marketing, email newsletters, social media promotion, and active communication with journalists. Be attentive to requests from the media - share press releases and news, promptly answer questions.

Increase the media coverage of your business: - participate in industry events and organize them yourself; - attract famous speakers or bloggers, create a brand ambassador; - secure membership in professional associations; - launch a social project and cover it widely in the media. Such work on reputation will help to create the right image of the company and increase brand awareness. Tips and tricks

Here are some more tips and life hacks that improve the effectiveness of reputation management. Fill out the company cards

Reputation marketing starts with simple things. To begin with, we recommend that you fill out detailed information about the company online: on the 2Gis and Yandex websites, as well as in the feedback form. In the company's card, you can specify contacts, working hours, a detailed description of goods and services with prices, a list of current promotions, add vivid photos and tell about the advantages. This way, potential customers will get more information about your business — the first impression will be good, and this is the key to a positive reputation. Posting this data is usually free of charge. At the same time, each platform offers its own set of advertising opportunities, which can also be used if desired.

Consider geography

The search results may vary from region to region. For example, the responses to the query "Sports Club" in Moscow and Yekaterinburg will most likely not match. Therefore, when conducting a reputation audit, consider the impact of geography. In other words, if a business wants to have a good reputation in several cities, then it is necessary to do an analysis for each of them. You need to understand what users see in the search results of each key region. Create a guide

Develop a standard for responding to positive, neutral, and negative consumer comments. Include the best practices and cases of communicating with customers online and offline. After that, train all the specialists who work with people — your team should know how to act in any, even difficult, situation. Automate the collection of reviews

Modern technologies allow you to set up automatic collection of customer feedback. Create a convenient form and send a link to it via SMS, email or messenger to each customer. This way the client will be able to fill it out quickly and send it to you.

Use hidden marketing

This is a type of promotion through so—called agents of influence - bloggers, popular authors, or influencers. They talk about their own impressions of the product, write about the experience of its successful use. Such indirect advertising on the Internet inspires people's trust, it can bring the company many new customers and create the necessary brand image. Recent research shows that native advertising works very well for micro-influencers. These are authors on Telegram, Vkontakte, or YouTube who have a small but engaged and active audience. They can create posts, articles, or videos about your product, do reviews, "unpack," and make product ratings. But it's best to integrate native advertising into one of your personal stories: about what kind of problem a person had and how they solved it with the help of your brand. If you approach this issue correctly, then this way of promotion will look harmonious and unobtrusive. The terms of cooperation for all bloggers are different — they need to be clarified from each person separately. Interestingly, some micro-influencers are willing to advertise for little money, but at the same time, the response from the audience can be good. Let's summarize

In today's world, business information is the most important factor that influences its success. Reputation management helps to create a positive brand image and a company image that will attract customers, partners and new employees. Most often, reputation management is understood as ORM, which is the work on brand perception on the Internet. Or SERM — generating positive search results. But reputation is a broader concept, influenced by PR and SMM tools, as well as the personal brand of the head, the mission and values of the company, and much more. To manage your reputation, you need to follow three main recommendations: - track brand mentions manually or using automated services.; - reduce the amount of negativity; - fill the information field with positive information. How carefully you manage your reputation and how much resources you invest in it largely determines the volume of your organization's sales and how easily you attract new customers.