Do you have any idea of how many of your customers are now using search engines, reading online news dailies and making purchase decisions based on information published online? Well, there are many. Online Reputation Management is more important than ever. Read on!

It is a practice that involves selection; refinement and execution of various strategies to make sure the information (articles, discussions, reviews, videos, consumer complaints, photographs, podcasts etc.) published online encourages people (partners, suppliers, vendors, customers & human resources) to have business with you and not the other way round.

Listed below are a few reasons that explain why ORM (Online reputation management) is important for a business in today’s information age:

1. A single consumer complaint can lead to the loss of hundreds of customers. A regular consumer rant, once ranked higher up in a search engine, can literally devastate sales volumes of a business unless it’s carefully handled by ORM professionals. Such a complaint can be identified immediately, resolved if possible, proved fake if it’s fabricated, defended wisely on a forum or just deleted after speaking to the webmaster.
2. People should come across information that you want them to see (social media profiles, official blog, positive reviews etc.) – every time they look up on search engines, social networks or blogging networks for your company, products or services. ORM experts can use SEO, SMM, content marketing or a variety of reputation management tools to increase brand visibility so that negative or unwanted information is pushed far, deep into the web.
3. A carefully executed website reputation management program ensures that competitors (small time scammers or establish companies known for adopting unethical business practices) cannot just duplicate your content or appearance (online identity as a whole) and scrounge you off your precious clientele.
4. Bloggers, columnists and others on the internet air opinions freely on the internet. At times, they can write stuff that’s potentially damaging to the reputation of your business. Negative vibes travel very quickly on the web, especially because the competition adds all the fuel a negative story needs to get viral on the internet. An online reputation management system in place helps ensure that such issues are not just identified but also resolved at the earliest.
5. Millions of people are on the internet today. Online and offline reputations or identities of businesses and individuals are now merging together. Even if a business does not carry out any operations on the World Wide Web, it still needs to have a healthy online presence so as to continue getting newer customers in the offline market!

Soon, each one of your customers is going to consider your brand’s online reputation before having any business with you! Business partners would want your name and identity on the web to elicit confidence, trust and prospective customers would wish to come across no consumer complaints or personalized rants about the poor quality of service your least performing executive provided.

About the author

An enthusiastic Human Being with a zeal to express as much she can in words... and Blogs gave her a medium to express and share her knowledge. Has written for eminent blogs and fields like the social media, internet marketing, technology, lifestyle (tattoos, body art, fashion, etc.), politics, and the list is still increasing.