Did you know that it’s entirely possible for one angry customer to destroy your reputation online? Robust reputation management is critical for any business concerned with how others view them. Without a reputation management strategy, anyone using Google or another search engine could find concerning, damaging information about your business first and foremost. Whether your business is new or established, large or small, reputation management needs to be a priority in your marketing strategy and a consideration for your content budget.
How to Outrank Negative Information About Your Business Online
When someone searches for your business online, the search engine displays what it determines to be the most relevant, honest, and informative results. Google’s stated directive is to be helpful to the user. If your business, product, or service has reviews written about it, this is one of the things a search engine might deliver to anyone searching for your business.
A number of factors drive these search results, and to have a modicum of control over what appears in the results means being aware of search engine optimization, or SEO. SEO includes factors such as article formatting, quality of writing, and details about how and when images are used on your page.
Step 1: Rank For Your Business’ Name
The first step to controlling your business presence and reputation online is to rank for your branded keyword -- that is, your business name. Most businesses rank for their own business name due to their webpage. After that, you’ll typically find the Google Business page and possibly a Wikipedia page. Following those pieces of information will commonly be reviews from sites like Yelp! or even Amazon as well as social media sites.
The best way to rank for your business’ name on Google is to create a strong presence on your own website. Write plainly and candidly about your business on your website, describing your products and services. Link out to any social media sites you want affiliated with your business -- and any other relevant pages.
Links are important here because Google uses them to determine what information is relevant to your business. Including your social media pages here will help those pages get ranked as well.
At this stage, it’s also fundamental to include keywords on your website, placed naturally. Keywords are a major part of search engine optimization. A solid keyword strategy involves determining what people are looking up (or will look up) to find your site. For example, if your business name is Joe’s Ice Cream Shop, people might look up something like “ice cream shop in Philadelphia.” To rank for that, you’ll want to include location information on your site, so Google knows you’re located in Philadelphia. If you’ve won an award, you might also boast about being the “best ice cream shop in Philadelphia” to rank for this term.
Keyword strategy planning and execution can be massive depending on the size of the business, competitors, industry, and other factors. There are software services out there entirely devoted to optimizing your website for search engines.
If you’re trying to outrank existing material written about your business (such as a bad review or a takedown piece), you’ll want to use software to analyze the piece to determine how to outrank it.
Step 2: Rank For Your Products and Services
Once you’ve implemented your keyword strategy for your branded keyword, it’s time to take a look at your products and services, with and without your branded keyword. Repeat the same procedure as above to outrank negative reviews -- both ones that already exist, as well as those that could in the future.
Because Google appreciates factors like age of page, page updates, and mobile friendliness, you have the opportunity to get ahead of less technically skilled writers out there as you create search engine optimized copy for your business’ site.
Step 3: Monitor and Respond to Reputation Dings
Lastly, it’s important to monitor and respond to anything people write or say about your brand. This could look like reaching out to someone who wrote a favorable review to offer them a coupon on a future purchase -- or instantly responding to something negative posted about you anywhere online. Most marketers monitor their branded keyword (brand or business name) using Google alerts and reputation management software such as Status Labs so they can get instant email notifications when a mention occurs.
Each opportunity to reply to a review is another opportunity to manage your reputation online, and to rank. For example, your ice cream shop could respond in this way: “thank you so much for sharing your positive experience about visiting Joe’s Ice Cream Shop in Philadelphia. We’re proud that you consider us to be the best ice cream shop in Philly.” Not only does this show that you’re responsive, it helps you continue to rank for those included terms.
This entire strategy requires regular content creation and monitoring as part of your marketing activities. You can also manage your Google Business profile, access the employer center on Glassdoor, and more to carefully craft your presence.
