In our information age, everything has become public. In these conditions, the role of reputation for companies has increased as never before.
Building and maintaining a reputation, however, is not easy and time consuming. Trust is the entrepreneur, company or brand that has a high-quality reputation on the Web.
Contrary to popular misconception, reputation is not something that develops by itself. Even if your services are really high-quality and deserve the best reviews, it is far from the fact that people will notice you and want to leave these reviews.
In such a situation, a reputation management service can help, which not only forms the information background for brand trust, but also often affects the search results.
When a brand benefits from a reputation management service:
- if negative reviews and comments about the company began to appear on the Internet. Underestimating the impact of reviews leads to more and more losses every day;
- if the company intends to expand the territory of communication with potential customers.
Ideally, the reputation of a brand on the Internet should be taken care of before it appears on the market. But what if the negativity has already appeared and your online reputation has been damaged?
Method 1
It is a fairly common practice that SERM (search engine reputation management) agency employees track any mentions of a brand and immediately publish positive reviews, as well as dilute negative reviews with positive ones.
Someone might think that this is a gray scheme, but even large and famous brands use it.
Method 2
A really gray scheme is when, along with positive reviews about you, agency employees publish sharply negative reviews about your competitors. Such a war of brands is especially noticeable on specialized sites like Otzovik.
Why is it so difficult to get honest, positive reviews? Firstly, for a start-up company that has few customers, without any tweaks, in principle, it is problematic to get any feedback about itself. In addition, the psychology of people is designed in such a way that they are much more willing to leave negative reviews in the case of a poor-quality service than positive ones in the case of a high-quality one. Since in the first case, they are pressured by negative emotions that they want to throw out. Those people who are satisfied with the service, as a rule, remain unheard.
Method 3
Another way to manage reputation is through direct advertising. The method is more and more outdated, but does not lose its relevance. The most effective strategy is considered to be reaching out to a celebrity who has a lot of loyal subscribers on the Web. In this case, the celebrity shares with you a piece of their own reputation, which is the main benefit for you.
Method 4
It is also a common method when the employees of the SERM-agency initiate discussions on the forums, for example - "Where is it better to buy a computer". As a rule, agents themselves ask questions and answer them themselves (naturally, on behalf of another user). To stimulate the audience to choose the right company, agents can expand an entire dialogue over several pages with a lot of arguments and consistent persuasion.
To make such dialogues look as natural as possible, strictly specialized platforms are used. There is no point in spamming the entire Internet. It is important that the information reaches precisely those people who really need it.
Further, you can try to promote the thread on the forum in the search results by purchasing links and other methods. At the same time, it is important that the branch is optimized for the required request.
As a result, people interested in buying a computer will constantly see your brand mentioned, which will also contribute to its recognition.
Of course, promotion through agents is not cheap, but it is still much cheaper and often more efficient than ordering regular advertising or signing contracts with celebrities.
But it is best, of course, to resort to different methods of promotion. So you will understand which of them is more rational in your case.
SERM services are especially needed by newly launched brands or products entering the market. This works for any business - especially medicine and pharmaceuticals.
Method 5
Of course, you can try to motivate your customers yourself. For example, offering them a discount in exchange for a review. This does not always work, but it is always possible to post positive reviews with the help of agencies.
Method 6
The mistake is that companies do not pay due attention to the client, which is why negative reviews appear on the web. With the help of the monitoring service, such reviews are instantly detected, and then the agency's specialist, directly on behalf of the brand, finds out the order number from the client and proposes to solve the problem, for example, to send a new product instead of the spoiled one. Such a strategy will be costly, but it will emphasize the concern for the client on the part of the company and completely neutralize the negative impact on the brand's reputation, which is much more valuable. You can then ask the user to remove the negative review. Experience shows that the user not only willingly agrees, but also changes the negative review to a positive one.
Method 7
Another strategy is to work with repeat customers. Since they have contacted you more than once, they are obviously satisfied with your service. Thus, they can be asked to leave a review. And it often works.
The most common mistake in reputation management is that companies churn out almost the same reviews on different sites, and their "phony" becomes immediately obvious to users. The main problem is that site administrators recognize fake reviews by IP and ban them along with company accounts.
That is why, to manage the image and reputation of a company, it makes sense to turn only to professionals who know how to improve the quality of reviews, as well as use services that allow you to change the IP address and location of the user.
