But what is reputation management? How can you control what people see when they search for you? Let’s begin by looking at Domino’s Pizza for an example of online reputation management gone wrong.
What Is An Online Reputation?
Simply put, it’s what’s visible when somebody searches for your business online. When it comes to your online reputation, the two biggest factors that determine its strength are:
- Do people see positive or negative content about your business?
- Do you control the information that people see when they search for you?
For the most part, Domino’s Pizza does pretty well in search results as a large business focused on how they look online. When you search “domino’s pizza,” you’ll see their main website and stores near you (I’m searching from Washington, DC so I get DC SEO results).
This single search returning strong results doesn’t show the whole picture. Domino’s is still in need of some serious reputation management.
What’s Wrong With Their Online Reputation?
Entering one set of search terms doesn’t reveal the negative comments that exist online. Check out this video, along with everything that shows up when you search “domino’s pizza complaints.”
This video has more than 900,000 views – that’s most likely over a million viewers who have watched. While many may be laughing, these viewers may think twice before actually placing an order from Domino’s.
Additionally, thousands of people are searching for complaints about Domino’s on Google every month. This video and other negative comments are visible on the first page of search results, meaning many are likely ordering from another local pizza parlor.
To put this into perspective, if everyone who had watched the Domino’s Pizza Complaints video had ordered a medium, two topping pizza for $7.99, Domino’s would have brought in $7,258,379.67 in additional revenue.
When it comes to their online reputation, Domino’s is struggling when it comes to searches regarding customer complaints. Not only is the information that’s visible when you search “domino’s pizza complaints” negative, but it’s also not controlled by Domino’s. This means they cannot have that content removed from search.
To make matter worse, their online reputation is suffering because the pages and videos received enough traffic that Google now considers them valuable for searchers. All of the revenue that Domino’s has already lost to people ordering from other restaurants after seeing this content will only continue to increase.
Now let’s talk about how to remedy this situation (or better yet, proactively fight it) with reputation management.
What Is Online Reputation Management?
Reputation management is controlling search engine results for searches related to your business, and it’s essential to appeal to customers, clients, or patients. How you are presented when people look you up will affect your bottom line. When people see negative reviews or unfavorable comments online, they won’t think twice before going somewhere else. If your business manages its online reputation well, you’ll effectively bring in new business from trusting Internet searchers.
Online reputation management entails the following:
- Regular monitoring of search results for your business name.
- Development of “minisites” to help you control search results.
- Implementation of a review posting campaign to get your authentic testimonials posted.
To take this even one step further, a search engine optimization campaign will help you promote your online reputation once it’s ready to be visible to the masses.
What is reputation management? Now you can answer that question. More importantly, you can now see how a negative online reputation can lose you business. This doesn’t have to happen to you – be proactive about your online reputation and make it bulletproof before an issue does appear.
