The document discusses reputation management and provides information on: - Defining online reputation management as shaping public perception, especially digital presence. - Explaining "Google Truth" as accepting Google results as reality and how Google works through algorithms. - Detailing steps to establish a reputation management plan including regularly searching yourself online, monitoring privacy settings, and proactively posting positive content. - Emphasizing the importance of reputation by citing studies showing high ratings correlate with better business outcomes and more patient choices.

1. C
UNDERSTANDING
REPUTATION MANAGEMENT
Kimberley R. Barker, MLIS
Librarian for Digital Life

2. My Perspective
•Reputation management is not for:
– erasing the deeds of convicted
criminals (Brock Turner)
– erasing institutional history (UC Davis
Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi)
– erasing negative business reviews

3. In this presentation:
•Defining the “reputation economy”
•What is “Google Truth”?
•How does Google work?
•Defining online reputation management services
–Individual
–Corporate
•Establishing a reputation management plan
•Understanding the real-life ramifications of reputation damage
•Reputation restoration
•Further resources

4. Incidentally…
•2011 report on Yelp ratings by Harvard Business
School assistant professor Michael Luca:
a one-star increase in the rating of an independent
restaurant leads to a 5 to 9 percent increase in
revenue.
•http://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Publication%20Files/1
2-016.pdf

5. What is online reputation management?
•The practice of shaping public perception of an individual
or institutional reputation, particularly with regard to
digital presence
• The digital equivalent of interview preparation and personal
hygiene

6. •Why Google?

8. “Google Truth”
•the automatic acceptance of Google
results as an accurate representation of
reality

9. How Google works (1 of 7)
• Google is comprised of three distinct parts
• Googlebot
• Indexer
• Query processor
• Each part has its own specific and unique function.

10. How Google works (2 of 7)
• Googlebot
• Composed of 1000’s of computers engaged
in parallel processing:
• Requests & retrieves 1000’s of different
pages simultaneously; does this two ways
• “Add URL” forms
• Find links via web crawling
• Fresh crawls
• Deep crawls

11. How Google works (3 of 7)
• Indexer
• Receives full texts of pages from Googlebot; stores them in
databases
• Index sorts search terms alphabetically
• Ignores “stop words”
• Converts all text to lower-case
• Each entry in index stores list of documents with that search
term and also the location within the text of that search term

12. How Google works (4 of 7)
•Query processor
Multiple parts
•Search box
•“engine” that evaluates
searches & matches to
relevant documents
•Results formatter

13. How Google works (5 of 7)

14. How Google works (6 of 7)
(It’s a popularity contest… sort
of)
• PageRank
• Link analysis algorithm
• Page with higher rank displays higher in results list
• Google uses over 100 factors to determine rank
• How is PR calculated?
• Basically, the more times that a page is linked to determines its PR
• Built from this algorithm, which is used iteratively:
• PR(A) = (1-d) + d (PR(T1)/C(T1) + … +
PR(Tn)/C(Tn))

15. How Google works (7 of 7)

16. Hummingbird
• Google replaced its algorithm in August, 2013
• The preceding seven slides are still valid
• Hummingbird is semantic; i.e., based on natural
language queries
• Conversational search technology
• Uses Google’s Knowledge Graph
• Google is looking towards future
• 60% of Americans access Internet on mobile device
• Spoken searches

17. Mobile-Friendly Update
•April 21, 2015
–Mobile-friendliness
•Tappablebuttons
•Easy to navigate from a small screen
•Important information front & center
–Mobile speed
–Desktop

18. Why did I just spend 8 slides on Google?
• If you understand how Google works, you will understand
how to:
• Positively increase your online presence
• Monitor your reputation
• Formulate a basic reputation restoration plan
• Understand when you need to seek professional help

19. Why should you care?
• Only 3% of people DON’T use
social media
*Across 34 countries, among people aged
16-64.

20. 2012

22. Yelp again
•Study shows high Yelp rating correlates with better Hospital
outcomes
–BardachNS, Asteria-peñalozaR, BoscardinWJ, Adams Dudley, R.
The relationship between commercial website ratings and
traditional hospital performance measures in the USA. BMJ
QualSaf. 2012.
•http://www.imedicalapps.com/2013/02/yelp-hospital-
outcomes/

23. Establishing a reputation management plan
•Begin monitoring your online presence
–Good
•Search for your name at least once per month
–Best
•Create a search alert for your name
•Check your privacy settings on all social media
•Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc
•Feed your online presence with positive content
•Blogging, Tweeting, profile sites, YouTube, professional directories,
newsletters, etc.

24. Be aware of who might be looking for information about
you
•Think about to what sites Google will direct searchers
•E.g., those searching for information on professors will be
directed to sites such as HealthGrades, etc
•Accept the fact that no information does NOT equal a
positive image and, in fact, can be viewed with suspicion
Establishing a reputation management plan

25. Establishing a reputation management plan (TL; DR)
•“6 Steps To Managing Your Online Reputation”
–Search yourself
–Buy your domain name
–Put all of your content in one place
–Join social networks
–Optimize your presence on those sites
–Keep private things private; assume nothing is private

26. Reputation Restoration
•First steps
–Take time to process your emotions.
–You will need the support of family and friends.
–Realize that you are not the first person whose reputation
has been damaged-you are not alone.

27. Why should you care?
• Forty percent reported that physician rating sites were “very important” when choosing a physician,
although rating sites were endorsed less frequently than other factors, including word of mouth from
family and friends
• Awareness of online physician ratings (65 percent) was lower than for consumer goods such as cars (87
percent) and non-health care service providers (71 percent)
• Among those who sought online physician ratings in the past year, 35 percent reported selecting a
physician based on good ratings and 37 percent had avoided a physician with bad ratings
• For those who had not sought online physician ratings, 43 percent reported a lack of trust in the
information on the sites.
Study Examines Public Awareness, Use of Online Physician Rating Sites: https://media.jamanetwork.com/new
item/study-examines-public-awareness-use-of-online-physician-rating-sites/ (2012; 2014)

28. Why should you care?
• “… 77 percent of patients conduct an online search before making an appointment with a physician,
meaning most prospective patients' first impression of a provider or healthcare organization occurs
online, before they even step foot inside the facility.”
• “According to Mr. Rainey, 47 percent of patients are willing to go out of network based on reviews.
‘When doctors are missing star ratings and reviews, more than 50 percent of people searching for
doctors will not choose those providers,’ he added.”
“How first impressions online affect patient acquisition and hospital revenue” (2017)
https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/hospital-management-administration/how-first-impressions-
online-affect-patient-acquisition-and-hospital-revenue.html

29. Reputation management: the basics
• Accept
• It’s necessary, and no one else will do it for you
• Discover
• Search for yourself on physician rating sites
• Set search alerts for your name
• Be proactive
• Create a reputation restoration plan BEFORE one is needed
• Manage
• Check your social media privacy settings once/month
• Feed your reputation with positive/neutral content; post regularly (80/20 rule)