Online Reputation Management White Paper

Build, Boost, Repair Web Presence

By Steven W. Giovinco

Recover Reputation

Online Reputation Management White Paper

Why Online Reputation Management Matters

• 84% say online reviews influence purchasing. (Opinion Research Corporation).
• 77% of executive recruiters use search engines to research applicants.
• 35% have eliminated candidates based on the information they found (ExecuNet).
• 83% of companies will face a crisis that negatively impacts their share price between 20 and 30%, during the next five years. (Oxford-Metrica).

Reputation Process

The best approach to build or repair a damaged reputation is to flood the web with targeted, effective and well formulated content.

These are the four steps:

Business Analysis: Crafting a customized strategy based on thorough research and business analysis.

Platform Presence: Develop appropriate online platforms, centered around their industry.

Content Creation: Create blogs, articles, videos, images, presentations and audio files, and share.

Repeat: Constantly monitor, review, update and tweak — adding new content to the right places.

Best Approach

1. Inundate the web with positive content to either push down negative links or build a positive reputation.
2. Create strong presence on key online platforms and be very active there.
3. Generate excellent and original content showcasing the professional’s expertise.
4. Share this all on appropriate sites daily.
5. Continue several hours a day for about six months; pivot as necessary.

Start with a thoroughly researched analysis of the reputation case. Once a strategy is made, build the right platforms for the right audience. Forge original content geared towards readers, and share on these sites. Continually review, make constant updates, and pivot where necessary.

Most of the time, this takes about six months to complete; creativity, flexibility and attention to detail are key.

Delete

Remove or delete damaging content, comments or videos.

Build

Craft an online presence conveying trust and expertise.

Suppress

Push down negative links off the first page of Google searches.

ROI and Loss of 30 Customers

Most businesses know that online reputation management (ORM) is important. But how much does ORM cost and is it worth it?

One single negative link causes an average loss of 30 customers (based a Convergys Corp. Study).

In real-world terms, if a typical client spends $10,000 per project, then this (10,000 x 30) equals $300,000 in losses — a staggering number.

On the other hand, an online reputation solution can cost $3,500 per month for five months (3,500 x 5) or $17,500. This relatively small investment is clearly worth it to save $300,000 in losses.

What is Online Reputation Management?

When you Google yourself, business or brand, what do you see? When you check social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook, what shows up?

This is your online reputation.

Does it truly represent you or the business? Is it filled with past experiences and professional accomplishments? Does something negative show up?

Usually, important articles are missing, a bad review might need to be addressed or new social media platforms need to be built.

This is online reputation management and repair.

What Are the Goals?

The goals are to build a positive online presence or to repair a damaged one.

Representation management translates real-world experiences to the web. So when a client, headhunter or potential consumer Googles your name, you are seen as a trusted “thought leader” or as an experienced business.

What is NOT Online Reputation Management?

“Reverse” SEO

Reputation management suppresses negative content off the first page and builds trust; SEO drives website traffic.

PR/Public Relations

PR focuses on print, and usually does not fully suppress negative links or can build a complete online reputation.

Google Ads

Ads are separate from search engine results, and are not actual content; when the campaign ends, so does the online presence.

What Can Go Wrong With an Online Reputation?

Hedge Fund

An ex-partner is unhappy over compensation, so he purposely ruins a hedge fund’s reputation by posting false claims on RipoffReport.com, resulting in massive business losses.

Law Firm

A law firm with extensive experience but no online presence had trouble getting clients.

International Business

An international energy company seeks $100M investment but could not get funding due to multiple unrelated negative media articles about the entrepreneur’s family.

CEO

A highly successful 55 year old CEO couldn’t get a new job because of what happened to him 19 years ago at a holiday staff party which later was reported in the New York Times.

Student

A student loses job opportunities because of horribly exploitive unauthorized video posted on YouTube, becoming her digital “Scarlet Letter”.

These are real-world examples of what can go wrong (and whom Recover Reputation has helped).

Since about 95% of all clicks occur on the first page of Google search results, if something negative appears, clients or prospective ones find out quickly. And the damage can be significant.

Reputation Options

Reputation management focuses on three areas:

Remove damaging content.

Build a online presence conveying trust and expertise.

Suppress negative links off the first page of Google searches.

Removal

Completely removing a negative link, article or post can be extremely difficult or impossible, even it if it seems filled with lies, gross exaggerations, or libelous statements.

However, it’s possible where there is copyright infringement, website platform violatolations or the publishing of social security numbers or bank account information.

Build or Repair an Online Reputation

The best approach to build or repair a damaged reputation is to flood the web with targeted, effective and well formulated content.

These are the four steps:

1. Craft a customized strategy based on research and business analysis.
2. Develop appropriate online platforms.
3. Create blogs, articles, videos, images, presentations and audio files, and share.
4. Repeat: constantly update and tweak.

Start with a thoroughly researched analysis of the reputation case. Once a strategy is made, build the right platforms for the right audience. Forge original content geared towards readers, and share on these sites. Continually review, make constant updates, and pivot where necessary.

Most of the time, this takes about six months to complete; creativity, flexibility and attention to detail are key.

1. Craft a Customized Strategy Based on Research and Business Analysis

Extensive research is the first step: assess the damage and determine what needs to be built.

Pinpoint exactly where problem links are, scour the web for all positive articles, find existing social media sites, and idententify other good information that is buried or is simply not yet online.

2. Business Analysis

Business analysis is vitally important here. Sit down with key executives or the professional to have an in depth, thorough discussion to understand as much as possible about the business’ or person’s background.

Learn, too, about the industry, competitors, clients, goals and milestones. This determines the right strategy and identifies content topics for later.

3. Biographical Information

Write biographical information for the business or professional (or usually both). This should have a clear summary and one sentence “elevator pitch”, as well as some key business features, major accomplishments, awards and other detailed highlights.

4. Strategy

Compile this research and background information into an effective strategy. Be especially sensitive on topics to sidestep. I usually tell clients to avoid responding to negative comments since this usually draws more attention.

Part of the strategy is to determine the voice and style to be conveyed online. Should the tone be more casual and creative? Factual and non-personal? An industry leader with verbose comments? Brutally honest with outspoken comments?

5. Develop Appropriate Online Platforms

Start building. Some platforms are probably already made, so for these, review and update them. Make sure the profile is complete and that they link back to the main website.

Then make additional platforms. The most important ones usually are, roughly in order of importance: LinkedIn, Wikipedia articles, Facebook, YouTube, Medium, Twitter, Pinterest, Slideshare, and university alumni sites.

6. Business and Personal Websites

Business or personal websites can be very powerful. These should be updated with backlinks, and optimized for search engines (SEO). For biographical or “About” pages, make sure the URL link includes the brand’s or person’s full name, i.e. change:

“www.yourwebsite.com/bio,” to:

“www.yourwebsite.com/john-smith-bio.”

If key content or pages are missing, create them. For site administrators or techies, update Metadata Titles and Descriptions. This all helps Google find the site.

Nearly important as excellent content are the platforms themselves, which should align with the brand’s or person’s industry. For example, for creative or visually oriented content, use Behance.com, Flickr, Vimeo, SoundCloud; for finance: Crunchbase; legal: Martindale, Avvo, etc.

7. Create Excellent Content and Share

Probably the most important tool in online reputation management arsenal is English — or whatever your primary language is. A well written piece and knowing where to post it is paramount.

The driving force, as with everything else, needs to be the reader. Content needs to addresses their questions and concerns rather on what the brand or person wants to share. An original and well crafted article rises above negative links and, importantly, shows expertise.

8. Key Content Tasks

Focus on:

• Write a well-written blog weekly.
• Create several focused white papers upload to Medium.com and industry-related sites.
• Shoot videos — even if using a smartphone — and add to YouTube and Vimeo weekly.
• Take photos of people doing their jobs, “behind the scenes”, etc., and add to the blog, Behance, and Flickr.
• Edit or write a Wikipedia article.
• Constantly cross-share on all platforms.
• Engage with clients and other industry leaders daily.
• Rarely sell directly; instead, show expertise, trust, and be helpful to others.

9. Avoid Negative Comments

Stay clear of negative comments, unless there is a very good reason to do so. Starting a “flame war” most likely only makes things worse.

Also, while it might be tempting, don’t even think about creating fake reviews. It probably is illegal, and if caught, increases flares the online damage.

10. Repeat: Constantly Update and Tweak

Repeat. One of the most important keys to online reputation management is to constantly review, update and pivot.

Since just creating platforms is not enough, social media sites must be constantly updated, followers must be engaged with, and all forms of content must be continually added. As the project grows, new platforms or sites need to be built too.

Constantly review the project’s status. Use Google Alerts and check social media platforms to monitor results as well as to find newsworthy items to share.

If something is not appearing as anticipated, then shift to an alternative strategy. Being flexible and creative helps.

One “wild-card” is Google itself. Google is always changing and updating their algorithms to weed out “spam” or or low-quality sites. They frequently make minor updates and major ones every year or more. These changes can make it additionally important to be flexible and pivot to other solutions.

What Doesn’t Work

A “DIY approach,” is rarely effective and can sometimes make the issue worse or result in losing valuable time (remember: the longer damaging content is online, the more sales are being lost).

Here are things that don’t work.

Click Like Mad on Good Links

Why can’t I just click on the good links? While might seem logical — after all, the more clicks, the more it should rise to the top of searches — but since Google tracks computer’s IP addresses, multiple clicking is ineffective.

Enlist Friends to Click Links

This might seem like a creative alternative, but the same issue crops up quickly: anything after the first few clicks becomes a waste of time. Also, it’s not a sustainable response to a very serious issue.

Put Up a One Page Website

Creating a bare-bones simple web site via Blogger, Wix or Wordpress probably will have no effect. To move down something negative or to be thought of an industry leader requires a well-made site with good, visually appealing content.

Go On a Domain Buying Spree

A domain that matches the business’s or person’s name can be helpful, but buying a slew of others is not. Purchasing additional “.net,” “.org,” “.info,” “.us,” domains or varying the domain name is not useful since they rarely appear in the first handful of pages of Google search results.

Create a Twitter Account and Don’t Tweet

Setting up a Twitter or other social media accounts are good, but letting them sit idle after creation does nothing. More than ever, engaging with users and sharing excellent content is an important way to build a reputation.

Sign Up for Local Search Sites

Where and what you post online makes a huge difference. In the past, some local search or PR sites were helpful; now they are probably considered spam and should be avoided.

How to Gauge a Bad Online Reputation Issue

Here are ways to determine the severity of the reputation issue, how long it takes, and the possible effort necessary.

Number of Negative Links

Conduct a Google search (in Incognito view for Chrome browsers; Private View in FireFox; or Private Browsing in Safari) for the business or person and note how many damaging links appear on the first, second and even third pages.

Strength of Negative Links

Gauge how bad the link(s) are. Generally, Google values major news sites, newspapers, government organizations, and those with high web traffic. As a result, these are more difficult to suppress.

Position of Negative Links

If there are negative links, where do they show up? Those at the very top are much harder to suppress than those on the bottom of search pages.

Lack of Positive Content

The less good articles, blog posts, videos, etc., the harder it is to repair or build an online reputation.

Public Interest

Newsworthy or controversial articles usually are much more difficult to suppress because of general interest in the issue.

Lack of Social Media Platforms

Building or repairing a reputation is much easier if there are already existing social media platforms; if there are none, the repair process can take longer.

Lack of Web Site Development

A big reputation asset are business or personal websites, but if there are none, recovery is harder.

Lack of Search Engine Optimization

No SEO for websites, social media platforms and profiles take longer and require greater effort.

Social Media or Comments Activity

If a story is retweeted or shared on social media, Google could rank the negative article higher in search results.

Number and Strength of Negative Comments

Negative comments on blogs or elsewhere can be especially damaging and needs more time to repair.

How Long Does it Take?

Generally, most of the time it takes about six months. If one or two negative links appear at the bottom of the first page of Google searches, this could take about five months or less. However, if multiple articles from sites such as the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Huffington Post, RipoffReport, the time could be substantially longer, such as eight, nine or ten months.

Typical Estimated Milestones

Month 1: Analysis, some content creation. Expect some site visibility on search results.

Month 2: Content creation and social media usage; expect additional visibility.

Month 3: Continued content creation and social media activity; expect additional visibility.

Month 4: Assessment, content creation and strong social media usage; impact on negative link.

Month 5: Strong social media usage, content creation; downward movement of negative.

Month 6: Additional strong social media usage, content creation; estimated project conclusion.