This document provides guidance on online reputation management. It discusses how online reviews and conversations influence perceptions of businesses and individuals. It emphasizes the importance of actively monitoring online conversations and engaging with customers. The key aspects of online reputation management covered are evaluating an entity's current online presence, monitoring for new content, and using search engine optimization techniques to highlight positive content and push down negative content. Best practices discussed include encouraging genuine customer reviews, responding appropriately to negative reviews, and maintaining a consistent online presence across various platforms.

1. A GUIDE TO
ENHANCING
YOUR ONLINE
PRESENCE

2. Understanding the staggering influence that
your online reputation has on the health of your
business is the first step to building a positive
impression of your company online. Whether
or not you are involved in the conversation, it is
important to recognize that your customers are
talking about you. The internet provides a wide
range of mediums for these interactions to take
place and it is essential to tune into what is being
said about your business. Are you aware of the
opinions being expressed and taking an active
role in the conversation? If you are not taking
part in the chatter regarding your business it is
necessary to continue to fix the problems of your
customers and satisfy any related needs. If you
don't respond to your customers then someone
else will, which can open the door to a large
spiral of online negativity.
Reputation Management was once only a
concern for large corporations, but the internet
has changed this drastically. Projecting and
maintaining the nessage and reputation of your
name, brand or business, now demands a much
more involved approach. Online Reputation
Management is no longer an optional tactic and
consumers are now demanding a higher level of
engagement than ever before.
In this document, we will provide some
background to the Reputation Management
process and share some tips and tools for
listening to the online conversation surrounding
your name or business. We will also discuss some
best practices for developing and boosting your
Reputation Management strategy.
INTRODUCTION

3. WHAT IS ONLINE REPUTATION
MANAGEMENT?
The reputation of of
an individual or business
heavily involves perception. The
image that you project and how people view
you establishes the foundation of your public standing.
Monitoring and preserving your reputation is
much simpler than attempting to repair one that has
already been harmed. Whether this damage resulted
accidentally or intentionally, it can often require great
effort to repair. If the appropriate action is not taken
in a timely manner, the reputation involved has the
potential to suffer
from permanent damage.
This is why Reputation Management has become
a critical aspect of a strong public image. This is
especially significant when a reputation is damaged
online. A single negative piece of content on the
internet has the potential to reach a large audience
and can be posted to multiple channels. This content
can stay online for years and appear in the search
results of all the prominent search engines. The good
news is that there are strategies and tools to manage
and repair both personal and business reputations
online.
Reputation Management is a systematic approach
to building, recovering and maintaining the public
image that is tied to an individual or business. In the
past, this was only necessary for large businesses and
corporations that were under the watchful eye of the
media and general public. The internet has changed
this and the process of Reputation Management now
applies to small and medium-sized businesses.
However, with the proper knowledge and
approach, a good reputation can be modified,
preserved and enhanced. While it can be fairly
straightforward to maintain your personal reputation
by appropriately managing your relationships and the
way you conduct your day-to-day activities, when your
reputation is affected by content on the internet it can
pose a special challenge.

4. WHY CONTENT LIVES FOREVER
ONLINE
The content that is posted online can have a
profound effect on the way your business is viewed.
It is no longer possible to stay out of the spotlight and
wait for negative news to pass with time.
SearchengineslikeGoogle,andreviewsitessuch
as Yelp, have made it possible for people to broadcast
their opinions and experiences about your business
to people they don’t even know. Even if a damaging
review or piece of content was created several years
ago it can still appear in the search results for your
business and heavily influence user decisions.
Google is constantly indexing information on the
web and saving past copies of content that has been
found to make note of changes. This means that the
names of individuals and businesses are logged and
associated with both negative and positive pieces of
content that relate to them. This information is stored
and made available to anyone who searches for your
name or brand. This can include a variety of things
such as:
• Arrest Records
• Defamatory Images
• Customer Complaints
• Customer Testimonials
• Product Reviews
• Your Personal or Business Website
• Social Media Pages and Profiles
All of this data can be accessed by anyone with
internet access, viewed in multiple languages and has
the potential to wipe out future business prospects
and personal relationships. Everything that you or your
business has ever been involved with can be found
online, and if you are not keeping track of this content
then you won’t be able to take the needed action to
manage it.

5. WHY IS REPUTATION MANAGEMENT
IMPORTANT?
Online Reputation Management is becoming more and more in demand. This is mainly due to the
astounding amount of highly accessible content that is posted on the web every day. The research
of people, brands, and products online is no longer uncommon, which amplifies the reach of this
content. It can have a great impact on the reputation of businesses and individuals and is making
Reputation Management increasingly important.
STATISTICS
of adults are likely to consider purchasing
products that have been recommended by
real life friends and family. - Pollara
of consumers trust the recommendations of
others. - Forrester
of people believe the CEO’s reputation is
a significant component of a company’s
reputation. - Hill and Knowlton
Traffic to the top 10 review sites on the web
were visited by 158% more consumers last
year. - Compete.com
of executive recruiters regularly use search
engines to gain more information about
candidates, and 35% have eliminated
potential hires based on the information that
was found online. - ExecuNet
80%
90%
87%
158%
78%

6. of people who made a purchase based on an
online review discovered that the review was
accurate. - Comscore/The Kelsey Group
of people have more trust regarding
the information found online than from a
salesperson or other source. - Wall Street
Journal
of people have used social media channels
to express their feelings about a company:
26% to share dissatisfaction, 23% to post
information about products or companies
they are fond of. - Harris Poll
of people do not believe that companies are
truthful in advertising material.
- Yankelovich
of people take advantage of user reviews
for product information or research before
making a decision regarding a purchase.
- Razorfish
OnlineReputationManagementisbecoming
more and more in demand. This is mainly due
to the astounding amount of highly accessible
content that is posted on the web every day. The
research of people, brands, and products online
is no longer uncommon, which amplifies the
reachofthiscontent.Itcanhaveagreatimpacton
the reputation of businesses and individuals and
is making Reputation Management increasingly
important.
75% of online U.S. adults have completed
a search using their own name in a search
engine. Of those that entered their name into
the search, nearly half (48%) stated that most
of the search results were not positive; almost
a third (30%) said that they found nothing
associated with their name.
86% of online U.S. adults have used a
search engine such as Google to find more
information about another person.
Almost a third (31%) of online U.S. adults that
have looked up another person online have
searched for a politician. Of those that did,
more than half said the search influenced
their voting decision.
Nearly half (43%) of online U.S. adults that
have searched for someone else online
have looked up a potential date, significant
other, or ex-girlfriend/boyfriend, which makes
searches involving romantic relationships
one of the most common searches among
U.S. adults.
92%
92%
34%
75%
61%
75%
86%
31%
43%

7. These stats illustrate the heavy use of the internet to complete research about individuals and
businesses before making hiring decisions, dating decisions, voting decisions or purchasing products
and services.
Even if your current customers are advocates for your business the management of your online
reputation is still critical. If you don’t take an active role in shaping your online reputation then you are
leaving it exposed to the will of others.
In the case of a business, this might mean that a negative review written about your company
was posted and left unanswered. For the reputation of an individual, this could mean that images or
stories from your past are published online and harming your present and future relationships and
potential for success.
Taking advantage of the services offered by a Reputation
Management organization will give you the opportunity to tune
into what is being said about you or your company online.
Once this content has been identified it will be possible to
look into a number of different solutions that can minimize
or eliminate the impact of the negative while highlighting
the positive.

8. HOW DOES IT WORK?
The strategy behind managing a reputation online involves three key
components:
TheprocesstobeginaneffectiveReputation
Managementsolutionrequiresananalysisofyour
current personal or organizational reputation
online. This typically starts with an evaluation
of your ranking on Google with a focus on the
first page of Google’s search results. This will
provide a general idea of the state of your online
reputation. However, this is just the beginning
and a more in-depth view of the content
(photographs, reviews, videos, news, etc.) is
1 EVALUATION
necessary in order to gain a well-rounded
impression. This initial search will be a primary
tool to gauge the prevalent content associated
with your image.
The evaluation will then be continued with
an emphasis on social media channels such as
Facebook and Twitter. This will provide additional
insight regarding the condition of your online
reputation and related reviews and comments.

9. 2 MONITORING
Once the evaluation phase has been
completed, the next step involves monitoring
your name or brand to keep track of the things
that are being said about you or your business.
This can include some of the following activities:
• Following news and other posted content on
the web that relates to your name or brand.
One of the simplest ways to do this involves
performing a Google News search for your
name, product or brand. You should also set
up ‘Google Alerts’ to be sent to your email
to let you know when your name or brand is
mentioned online.
• Receiving notifications about negative reviews
can be done by creating a profile to Yelp,
Facebook, Angie’s List and Google Local. You
can have emails sent to you every time your
business is reviewed. This allows you to
respond in a timely manner when you are
notified of a negative review. This ensures
that other consumers will see your response
to negative comments.
3 REVERSE SEO
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) involves
tactics used to increase the ranking of a person
or business in the search results. Reverse
SEO accomplishes the opposite and is used
in Reputation Management to push negative
content to lower rankings so that it is less
prominent. Some of the steps that take place
with reverse SEO include:
• Submitting legal requests to remove libelous
content.
• Obtaining links and mentions from sites with
strong rankings.

10. • Creating new blogs and websites as well as social media profiles
that are used to promote good news and opinions that will
outperform negative content.
• Using cross linking and keyword anchors of positive
material and web pages to drive them to the first page
of the search results to push down negative content.
• Offering free services/products to popular blogs
and prominent reviewers to promote your name
and/or brand.
• Submitting online press releases to enhance
brand presence with positive news.

11. ADDINGSOCIALBUTTONSTOYOURWEBSITE
One method of increasing the relevance of your
personal or business website is to link it to your
social media profiles by adding buttons to the
site. This supports the flow of traffic between your
social pages and website and also enhances the
prominence of each.
BUILDINGAPRESENCEONBUSINESSLISTING
SITES
Creating profiles on the dozens of listing sites can
help validate the authenticity of your business.
These sites provide basic business information
to consumers and support rankings for local
search results.
BEST PRACTICES FOR
REPUTATION MANAGEMENT
ENCOURAGING CUSTOMER
REVIEWS
Online reviews are strong signal that
help promote the legitimacy of your business.
Asking customers to review your products or
services and directing them to popular review
sites can boost your local search presence and
balance out negative reviews.
REFERENCING GOOD REVIEWS
Positive reviews can be quoted on your website
and linked back to their original posting source.
Not only is this a powerful way to create a good
impression with customers, it also establishes a
connection between your business site and the

12. profiles on the review sites, which are essential
to a healthy local search presence.
STAYING ACTIVE ON SOCIAL MEDIA
Regular posts on your social media profiles
can support brand messages and promote
conversation between your business and your
customers. These social signals can increase the
prominence of the positive content associated
with your business.
OBTAINING DIVERSE & HIGH QUALITY LINKS
Linking your website to relevant sites such as
business listings, social profiles, online review
sites, news articles, etc. will support your online
authority and help increase your ranking in the
search results.
MAINTAINING A CONSISTENT PRESENCE
Your business information should be posted in
multiple locations online and this content should
be kept consistent. Information that is outdated
will harm your local visibility, which makes it
essential to audit this content on a regular basis
and make any necessary changes.
USING A VARIETY OF CONTENT
Using diverse forms of content online creates
moreengagingwebsites,socialprofiles,business
listings, review site profiles, etc. These elements
can include video, graphics, high-quality writing
as well as other types of content. Diverse forms
of media will also help you rank higher.

13. ONLINE REVIEWS
Whether the online reviews about a business are positive or negative they
can have a significant impact on the reputation and bottom line of the organization.
This makes it vital to differentiate between appropriate and unfavorable ways to promote
affirmative comments.
The following points outline some of the best
ways to engage your customers and encourage
them to post truthful reviews about your business
on the web:
• Ask for Reviews
The simplest and most practical way to get
reviews is to ask your customers for them. Your
best customers may not have ever looked up
your business reviews so it can be helpful to
remind them to contribute to these forums.
• Mention Reviews in Printed Material
Directing customers to review sites with review
excerpts and a call-to-action demonstrates
confidence in what is being said about your
business and can help increase online reviews.
These visual aids can be tastefully added to a
number of customer-facing material such as
brochures, coupons and business cards.
• Make Requests from Regular Customers
Detailed reviews can make a great impression
but are often difficult to come by. Regular
GENERATING NEW ONLINE REVIEWS

14. customers that have more experience with your
company are more likely to provide well-crafted
reviews with an honest feel.
• Don’t Ask for Good Reviews
Customers will not appreciate being directed to
provide a good review. This can come off as an
attempt to manipulate them and has the potential
tobackfire.Makingarequestforanhonestreview
of their experience will establish trust and your
customers will be much more likely to make an
effort to write a positive review of your business.
• Don’t Ask All Your Customers for Reviews
It appears more natural to have reviews show
up periodically, rather than having a cluster of
reviews pop up in a short span of time. Potential
customers who read these reviews may become
suspicious and choose to use a competitor
instead if they feel the reviews are not genuine.
Periodically asking customers for reviews will
help build the credibility of your business with
regular organic feedback.
• Don’t Use Artificial Reviews
It is usually easy to recognize fake reviews that
are crafted in a similar writing style. This will
cause people that are reading them to become
distrustful of your company and choose not
to do business with you. Reviews should be
written by individual customers to reflect the
natural diversity of each person and their opinion
of your business.
• Don’t Bombard Your Customers
Spamming your customers with aggressive
messages is a great strategy for promoting
negative reviews. The occasional request for
reviews should be done with a concise and
friendly message.

15. It can be difficult to handle negative reviews,
especially since they can seem like a malicious
attack against you and your business. However,
if they are dealt with appropriately, a critical
online review can be used as an opportunity to
respond to customer complaints in a manner
that promotes your business. The following tips
provide some best practices for addressing
negative reviews.
• Don’t Start a Battle
Picking a fight with a reviewer will not benefit
your business and can even result in additional
harm to your reputation. Steer clear of accusing
or implying that the reviewer is being dishonest.
Don’t give the negative reviewer any more fuel
to vent their displeasure by responding with
sarcasm, rude retorts or arrogant statements.
Your response should also avoid a rant or an
expression of your frustration.
If you engage in this type of behavior it
will only serve as a poor reflection on you and
support the claims in the negative review. If you
are unable to respond in a diplomatic and helpful
way, then it may be best to wait until you are able
to do so.
• Don’t Take it Personally
Even if you believe that a negative review is
completely unwarranted you should try to avoid
taking it personally. It is more effective to view it
as a chance to demonstrate that you care about
your customers by publicly addressing the issue
and offering constructive feedback.
HANDLING NEGATIVE REVIEWS

16. your business to customers that read the review
and may also sway the opinion of the customer
who wrote the negative review in the first place.
A professional and helpful response to a
bad review is a great way to demonstrate the
way your business deals with criticism.
• Stay True to the Facts
While it may be tempting to alter or leave
out certain points from your response, it will not
reflect well on your business. Even if the facts
do not completely support your side of the story,
honesty will garner more respect than poor
excuses. It is better to deal with issues in a direct
and forthcoming way than to refuse to admit to
fault.
• Don’t Ask Customers to Delete Negative
Reviews
Requesting that a customer take down a
review can create hostile feelings, even if you’ve
already resolved the issue. This could cause
you to lose the customer and may even provoke
further negative posts.
• Respond to Complaints in a Calm and
Factual Manner
Negative reviews may contain false
accusations and can be excessively damaging
to the integrity of your business. However, even
in these types of cases, it is important to keep
your response calm and stick to the facts. Make
sure you speak in a respectful manner and never
place the blame on the customer.
Outline the process you have engaged in
to look into the situation and be truthful about
your findings. It is ok to calmly point out the
inaccurate points to the accusation but it is also
necessary to admit to any fault on your part.
Customers understand that you are human and
can make errors, but a thorough explanation, an
apology and an attempt to fix the situation should
accompany any mistakes.
• Don’t Threaten Reviewers with Legal
Action
There are occasions where legal action
may be necessary to salvage your business
reputation.Anexamplecouldinvolveacompetitor
attempting to damage your business name with
an unethical campaign but you should consult a
lawyer before taking any action in these types of
cases.

17. However, most of the time legal action is not
required and can even make the problem worse.
Your customers should be allowed to express
themselves and if you attempt to prevent this
you will probably need to deal with a host of
additional negative reviews.
HANDLING NEGATIVE REVIEWS
You can successfully avoid a good deal of
negative reviews by providing customers with
another way to express their concerns and feel
like they are being heard. In this next section,
we’ll examine some best practices to minimize
the number of negative comments posted on
review sites.
• Ask for Customer Feedback Offline
If you have the chance to resolve a customer
issue at your business location, or through other
means of communication, you can significantly
reduce the likelihood of having the customer
leave a negative review online.
Using customer surveys and other forms of
service and product reviews are effective ways
to provide your customers with an outlet to
express their views about their experience. If you
receive any complaints it is important to follow
up quickly to resolve the situation before it gets
out of hand.
• Monitor Review Sites
A critical step in the process of preventing
negative online reviews is the regular evaluation
and monitoring of review sites. Business owners
who choose to ignore review site activity are
leaving themselves open to unchecked criticism.
Checking out these websites on a weekly basis
will give you the chance to respond to negative
reviews and gain insight into common customer
issues.

18. • Learn from Customer Complaints
Negative reviews are usually opinion-based
and may not apply to the rest of your customers.
However, some critiques can point out a general
problem with a product or process that can be
improved. Rather than becoming defensive, it
is best to thank the reviewer for sharing their
perspective and describe any steps you are
taking to fix the issue. This approach can also
prevent future negative reviews for the same
problem.
• Don’t Ask Customers to Sign Agreements
Concerning Reviews
Businesses in certain industries have attempted
to have their clients sign “will not review”
agreements to limit the potential for negative
reviews. This approach is guaranteed to harm
your relationship with current and potential
customers and these agreements are unlikely to
hold up in court.
• Don’t Post Fake Reviews
Paying for fake reviews is illegal, appears
unnatural and can damage the reputation of your
business. Review sites have also improved their
process of identifying sham reviews and they
are not likely to remain on the site for very long.
In addition to being an ineffective and unethical
business practice, this strategy is also a waste of
time and resources.
• Don’t Offer Bribes to Customers
Bribingcustomerstopostgoodreviewsweakens
the validity of the reviews and can turn people off
of your business. However, it is still acceptable to
offer incentives to encourage customer reviews
as long as you don’t attempt to influence the
type of review they post.

19. SOCIAL MEDIA
Optimizing your social media presence can serve as a great asset to
influence the public perception of your business. While it requires an investment
of time and resources, having a well-rounded understanding of best practices and effective
strategies can streamline the process.
BEST PRACTICES FOR SOCIAL CHANNELS
Consistent Branding
Make sure to keep your brand image and
messaging consistent on all of your profiles. Use
thesamelogoandtypesofimagesoneachsocial
channel to maintain a professional image. This
also helps your audience associate your logo
and message with your company and recognize
you across the different social platforms.
Provide Essential Information
Each one of your social media profiles
should be optimized to display key details
about your business. This typically includes a
description about your business along with the
name, address, contact information, hours and
website. It is also a good practice to link to your
other profiles and any prominent pages on your
website.
Add Social Sharing Buttons to Your Website
Installing common social buttons on your
website near product listings, services, blog

20. other useful content is a good way to promote
your business. This can include buttons such as
Twitter’s “tweet” or Pinterest’s “Pin It” along with
Facebook, Google +, LinkedIn and buttons from
other relevant channels.
Employ a User-Friendly Design
Customersvisitsocialmediapagestogainaccess
to information that is useful and interesting. If your
company pages are overloaded with information
or are too cluttered they will discourage users
from visiting again. Focus on displaying important
information and maintain a clean design.
Link Back to Your Website
Making the information on your website
accessible is vital for a sound online presence.
Providing links to your website on your social
media profiles is one way to achieve this. Narrow
the links down to pages that supply significant
information about your business.
Align Your Strategy to Work with the Platform
Each social channel functions a little bit
differently and can be suited to certain strategies.
Familiarizing yourself with the unique offerings
of each network will allow you to optimize your
approach to gain the best advantage. You should
also make sure to tailor your content to meet
the guidelines of individual social channels and
fulfill the expectation of visitors.
Showcase Diverse Forms of Content
The effectiveness of your social media posts
will be enhanced if you diversify your content.
High quality text and visual content such as
video and graphics will enhance the appeal of
your profile and encourage user engagement.