Your company’s reputation is vitally important when it comes to doing business. Many major companies consider brand reputation risk a major issue, according to a study by Deloitte.
On the internet today, one bad review, article, or even a disgruntled employee can severely damage a company’s reputation, impacting sales and severely decreasing profits.
In fact, one hit on brand reputation can impact online sales up to 22%, and 60% of consumers say they would avoid doing business with a company perceived as untrustworthy.
So, what can you do to ensure your online presence remains positive?
Monitor Your Online Presence
The first step to protecting your brand’s reputation is to regularly monitor your online presence. This ensures you’re aware of what people are saying about you, your business, and your brand. It can be as simple as using a search engine, such as Google, to search for any online mentions regarding your company.
Or you can hire a reputation management company, such as Status Labs, to watch the internet for news, posts, and comments regarding your company.
Obviously, knowing what people are saying about your business is important, but the timing is also crucial. If someone makes a negative remark on a social media platform without being mitigated, more people are likely to see your company every day in a negative light.
You can learn more about assessing the risk of reputational damage here.
Building a Positive Online Image
Because your company’s reputation is crucial, it’s important to craft a professional online persona that resonates with your customers. It should appear knowledgeable, approachable, helpful, and transparent. You can greatly improve your company’s reputation by providing helpful and informative blog posts, articles, and white papers.
Use these tools to showcase your company’s skills and achievements–including what makes your company unique. By informing people about your company, you can attract new business that would otherwise go to competitors.
Crafting Your Image on Social Media
How often have you heard about news breaking on X (formerly Twitter)? Maybe you have an Instagram account or a Facebook page. Your social media presence is very important. Your potential customers use social media to discover new brands, stay in contact with friends and family, and be entertained. People will often talk about companies on social media, both positively and negatively.
It’s important that your company has a strong social media presence so customers can find you and learn about your product. What’s more, you can build a positive image for your company through your interactions with your customers and potential customers.
Navigating Social Media and Online Review Challenges
Social media is both helpful and harmful to businesses. On one hand, you’re able to create a presence that attracts customers. On the other hand, your company can be the subject of negative comments and criticism. It’s not a matter of if, but when, you will have to address a disgruntled customer or employee.
At this stage, it’s important to come up with a timely response that will not only admit any failings, but also any steps you might take to rectify the situation. For example, if a customer complained on Facebook about a product that was damaged in shipping, a possible response would be to offer a replacement free of charge, and then follow up on your promise.
That way, you can turn around a negative review or comment into a positive experience not only for the customer, but for potential customers.
When you sell a product online, it’s important to follow up with the customer as to their experience, and encourage online reviews. You can have a bot in place that will email the customer after the purchase and request they follow up with a review of their positive experience.
Have the software flag those who have a negative experience, and have your customer service representatives follow up to rectify the situation. Reputation management companies, such as Status Labs, can help you set up procedures, so you get more positive reviews, and fewer negative ones.
Recovering From Reputation Damage
At some point, your company will experience some reputation damage. But, you can minimize negative reviews and comments by doing the following:
● Monitoring your internet presence regularly.
● Crafting a positive response to the comments, owning up to any problems that occurred, and offering solutions.
● Building a positive online image.
● Crafting online media using search engine optimization to raise positive articles and reviews in searches, and burying negative reviews and news.
● Using a reputation management company, such as Status Labs, to help improve your company’s reputation.
Article and permission to publish here provided by Prince Kapoor. Originally written for Supply Chain Game Changer and published on May 31, 2024.
Cover image provided by Prince Kapoor.