Top Reputation Management Tips
The online or offline reputation of a business is as important as the services or products that the business offers, and business owners or managers must do everything to protect the reputation of the business.
The reputation of a business is as fragile as an infant even if the business has been in existence for a century. One spark of fire that is not properly managed can blossom into a full fire that will burn the reputation of the business to the ground and ultimately destroy any chance the business has to keep staying alive.
So, when you hear people rushing off to make an adjustment to a challenge while screaming that their reputation is at stake, you can have a better understanding of what they actually mean.
Whether you choose to hire a business brand manager or you are opting to manage the business’ brand yourself, you must do everything within your power to protect it and have a good reputation online or offline. This makes it super easy for businesses to connect with their target audience, build trust and brand loyalty. If you would like to find out how you can establish, build and manage your brand’s reputation online, it would be a good idea to get in touch with a content marketing agency to help you out.
In the meantime, consider some of these helpful tips that you can start using and ultimately build the reputation of the business online.
1. Do not make false claims
It is very tempting to say that a product or service does something that will attract the attention of the consumer just for the sake of advertising. Sometimes, brands put certain words that claim that their business does certain things because it would boost more clicks or drive more traffic to their website and hopefully lead to more sales. While is most definitely a smart marketing trick, it can also turn out to be the dagger that will harm the reputation of the business when consumers by the product or service only to discover that those claims were false. And we all know that bad news spreads faster than good news. So, even if you are still working on what you claim the business can do, to be on the safe side, don’t put it in your advertising copies until you are certain that those claims are real.
2. Do not make promises you cannot keep
A lot of small businesses that are struggling to grow big make this fatal error. In a bid to get more customers or increase their popularity that make some extravagant promises, probably without calculating the cost implications, and then struggle to keep it. This is very bad and can hurt the reputation of the business. Make only promises you know you can afford to keep, or don’t make promises at all.
3. Always keep customers satisfied
The customer of a business is always never wrong, even when it is glaring that something errors where their fault, as business owners, you’d have to learn to turn a blind eye to such errors and do whatever is necessary to keep your customers satisfied. Someone once said that one satisfied customer is equal to five to ten potential referrals that you might get through that one customer.
4. Respond promptly to complaints
No matter how perfect the product or service of the business might be, you must have it at the back of your mind that there will be someone out there who will some sort of complains about it, sometimes it might be genuine and other times it might be out of spite. Whatever it is, be ready to receive such complaints and properly address each timely.
5. Promptly respond to negative social media trends
There was a recent uprising by consumers of Always sanitary pad in Kenya, where women took to social media, using the hashtag #myalwaysexperience, to share horrifying personal stories of their experience using the version of the sanitary pads sold in Kenya and apparently other countries in Africa which was totally different from the ones sold in the UK and US. What started out as an ordinary hashtag became a concern around the continent where the government had to step in. The brand, of course, was not prompt to address the issue and even when they did they took a different route which was not in favor of what the online community demanded. The outcome of that negative social media trend led to a new type of sanitary pad which addressed the concerns and needs raised. Social media is a very powerful tool for businesses and it can also be a trick lane to walk on, especially if the brand is trending negatively. It is always important to keep track of what the brand is trending for online, this can be done by using several available free to paid social media management tools. By doing this, businesses can know when they are trending for negative reasons and quickly respond appropriately before it escalates into something that will harm the reputation of the brand.
6. Treat your employees well
There was once a rumor that the workers of the famed Disney Land themed parks were put under all forms of pressures to look and talk a certain way in a bid to portray that happy ever after idea behind the brand. Of course, that alone was not enough to stop people from visiting these parks, but if that rumor had been followed with various allegations from more of their workers, especially with proofs to show to the online community, mostly via social media, it would have been a different story entirely for Disney’s theme parks. The employees of the business are also as important as the customers. They are the first point of contact the customer has with the business. Through the employees working either as customer representatives, marketers or even a front desk officer customers are able to interact with the business. And it is through their experience with such interactions that they determine if the business is responsible, respectful of business protocols, respectful of customers, attentive to details and other important qualities customers often look out for. By treating your employees right, you are showing them how they should treat your customers. The company culture that you want to perceive must first start internally and then extend to outsiders.