Erik Qualman's Blog, page 629

Social Media Tips and Tricks for Professionals

Today’s social media is not just about keeping in touch with friends and family. It can also be an efficient way to market you as a professional. There are very real benefits to tying your professional persona to social media, and here we provide some helpful hints for doing so.

Facebook as a Vehicle for Your Professional Information

Many of us have heard of LinkedIn, a social media website catering to the business professional. If you are using LinkedIn, you are one of approximately 44 million people who do so.  But Facebook, with more than 250 million active users, can also be a vital platform for your professional information.

As Boris Epstein notes in his article on Facebook and professional networking, a smart approach to maintaining a professional profile on Facebook is to split your account so that you can reap the personal benefits of the social media giant while also connecting with your professional peers. Epstein goes into detail as to how this can be accomplished.  But it is as simple as creating a list of professional contacts and manipulating your privacy settings and restricting access to various parts of your profile.

Put Your Real Self Out There

Whether you use that laptop to access Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn, you want to make sure that you are using your real name – or at least a version as close as possible to your real name.  This way, those in your professional circle can easily find you without having to determine if some cutesy nickname is, indeed, you.  On Twitter, in particular, avoid using underscores in your name, such as John_Smith.  This makes it easier for individuals using mobile devices to search for you.

Update, Update, Update

Whatever platform you choose to use to market yourself professionally, you want to ensure that your most current information is provided.  This means using that trusty laptop of yours to actively maintain and update your profiles often so as not to let them go stagnant.  Let the profile speak to and echo your professional growth. Stop by regularly to also see what is new with your peers.  Take cues from them as to how to best optimize the use of your particular favorite social media platform.

Be Part of the Group

They say, and by “they” we mean other business professionals, that success isn’t about what you know but who you know. Both Facebook and LinkedIn provide the opportunity to join user groups made up of individuals with like interests or backgrounds. Being a part of one of these groups is a great way to network and can put you in contact with others you share in your professional pursuits.

Understand the Conventions of the Social Media Platform(s) You Use

With the use of #s, @ symbols, and the 140 character limit, Twitter users, in particular, have created a language all their own. For instance, in his “10 Twitter Tips for Professionals,” Bill Sweetman advises that it is imperative to understand the difference between direct messages and public replies. The former is a means to exchange ideas in a protected fashion while the latter is a reply that is open to the community as a whole.

Twitter is also about sharing and not marketing yourself. Contribute information that reflects your professional interests and pursuits and attracts and entices followers to learn more about you.

The social media phenomenon can be a powerful means for endorsing your professional self.  Whether it is on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter or some other site, use these tips to more effectively promote and grow your professional persona.

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Five Ways to Generate Content for Your Social Pages

Photo Credit: Hannes Treichl

Social media managers have to keep up with the latest news in their client’s genre. While at first this task may seem easy to find statistics, quotes and other news related to their industry, over time information can seem sparse or overdone. Social media fans want to follow brands who will give them unique, entertaining and applicable information. But how do you find that content for them?

If you’ve ever found yourself asking that question, here are five strategies you can implement to get the content you’re looking for. Keep in mind that generating content is like building with Legos. You’ll find different pieces from a variety of places. But in order to have great content you have to use those different pieces to create something altogether different and appealing to your specific audience.

1.    Utilize social bookmarking sites, alerts and subscriptions

Websites like Pinterest, Reddit, and StumbleUpon are great ways to explore the web.  With StumbleUpon in particular, you can even personalize your search results by signing up and telling the site exactly what interests you.

Use TalkWalker or Google alerts to keep an eye on your client’s industry and surrounding topics. To save time going to several different sites, add various blogs and news sites to your Feedly to easily keep track of industry news.

Having a good understanding of what’s going on in your client’s industry will help you create informative content for fans.

2.    Connect with the right crowd on social media

Use Google+ to look for people who post 5-10 pieces of notably engaging and insightful content each day.  These people can provide you with inspiration for new blog posts or Pinterest images.

Find influencers within your client’s niche by using Followerwonk or Twellow. While it can be tempting, don’t copy directly the content you find. Instead, create a spin or draw on a certain angle that relates to your client.

3.    Be aware of trending topics

If you want to find out what’s hot in regard to certain topics, Topsy gives you the means to do just that. Find what’s being talked about in real-time on twitter, through photos, videos or even by influencers.

You can also access the site Google Trends to get up to the moment feedback on what’s currently trending in the search engine results page, with results ranked in order of popularity.

4.    Peruse online libraries

Online libraries offer high quality content in the form of a vast supply of books, journals, and publications that are full of information on almost any subject. Once you know of a topic or idea you want to generate content about on your social pages, go deeper and get a unique piece of information found through online libraries.

Getting access to this information is simple: all you have to do is subscribe.  Some great examples of online libraries include: Public Library Online, Internet Public Library, and Questia.

5.    Apply the data

Data is essential to measuring effort. If you want to know what’s effective with your audience and what isn’t, you have to rely on data. Use Google Analytics to examine the performance of your site and identify which posts have been the most popular. In addition, you can use a social media analytics platform tool to keep track of which posts accrue the most engagement. Based on what you discover to be effective, you can find and create similar content for future use.

You can also get valuable feedback directly from users by implementing the following tactics:

Conduct polls and surveys
Use Google+ Hangouts to host an online focus group

If you want to reap the maximum benefits from your social pages, finding and generating engaging content is key. It’s the x-factor that’s crucial to taking your site to the next level, and following the suggestions listed above could be just the game-changer you need to score the results you want.

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Five Affordable Social Analytics & Customer Service Tools

We all know that social media is not free especially when it comes to community management, creating content, and boosting posts to be promoted (ex.Twitter). Social media analytics are another cost that entails some investment when it comes to your marketing strategy and overall marketing goals. Of course there are always the free tools like Google Analytics and Facebook Insights. Google Analytics help you determine what social sites are helping to drive traffic to your site and what campaigns are working versus those that need to be dumped or optimized. Facebook Insights is constantly evolving but overall it allows you to see what content your fans engage with, when and how often.
Here are 5 more to consider for your social toolbox: 
1. Topsy- Simple, easy to use tool that comes in a free (or paid) version in order to let brands monitor Twitter. One of my favorite parts about it is that you can see what hashtags are being used – how often, by who, and what the conversation is around that hashtag. This is a crucial step to take before using hashtags in your tweets, in order to ensure it is the proper conversation for your brand, your tone/voice, and of course your audience.
2. Hootsuite- I think we all know Hootsuite, but it is sometimes overlooked. It’s a great community management tool (free or very cheap) that enables a community manager to monitor, schedule posts, and manage multiple channels from one location. And it comes with an analytics portion which allows you to customize reports for easy analysis and sharing with management. 
3. Twitalyzer- Quick, easy to use tool that allows you to monitor your competition (specifically for Twitter). Obviously not the only tool to use, but a nice tool to add on to your arsenal when needed.
4. Bottlenose –  Great visual of conversation going on around your brand in real time. It helps you visualize what your brand is connected to or who the influencers are and what they are influential about. Great for monitoring, targeting, and being able to engage in real time and not losing out.
5. Social Flow – Not free, but gives your brands an edge up when scheduling posts and tweets, to see when is the best time for your brand to hop into a conversation for your particular audience. It helps to ensure that you are using the write phrasing, and taking advantage of the best time and day for that particular social engagement – whether it’s during a live event or otherwise.

Bonus: If you have the budget to spend a little more money

Radian6 - Great listening tool to see what is being said about your brand, the competition, what’s occurring in real time, and of course the ability to hop into conversations with your customers and be a part of the community. This tool is perfect for finding your influencers, and engaging with them organically as it streamlines the process for your brand and makes the process way less manual and less cumbersome.

Not sure which one you want to use? TIP: Many tools will allow a free trial before you jump in with the fee, so always see if you can test out the tools first.

 

 

 

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Can Social Media Help Me Drive Off With an Electric Car?

Social media is a great way to keep in touch with your friends and family, and even a way to follow some of your favorite companies. But it can also help you find a great deal on an electric car, if you do a little research.

From tapping your network for recommendations and reviews, to finding insurance for your new electric vehicle, social media can be an essential part of the process.

Reviews

The first way social media can help you with your electric car purchase is if you look for reviews and comments from current owners.

On Twitter, for example, you can run a search for the names of the cars you’re considering.

You can also ask your various networks if anyone has an electric car, and what their opinion is of its range, features, and other important information.

Social media is also a good way to find links to professional reviews, which are more likely to address technical details like the car’s battery or horsepower.

News

Next, you can keep track of news from electric car manufacturers and dealers.

This can help you stay updated on current technology, new features to look for, and potential issues with certain models.

Following automotive magazines (such as Car and Driver) on Twitter and Facebook can also be a great way to keep up with current electric car trends. Reviews from these magazines can help you decide which cars to look for — and which ones to avoid.

Deals

Another great reason to follow dealers on social media is that you can be the first to know if there’s a sale or special financing offer. Many companies, including auto retailers, also run special promotions on their Facebook pages or other social media accounts.

Following the dealer’s social media accounts can also give you an idea of what kind of customer service they offer. If you see a lot of negative feedback that never receives a dealer reply, it can be an indication of how they deal with customers in general.

Insurance

You should also consider following car insurance companies on social media, to look for deals and discounts on your new car’s premiums. Some insurers offer special rates or discount for EV drivers, as they start competing more for the relatively new, but growing, electric vehicle market.

And, just as with your initial electric car purchase, you can check out reviews of various car insurance providers on social media. This can help you uncover customer service issues (or companies who offer great customer service), as well as which companies offer reasonable rates and discounts.

Social media can be a powerful tool for consumers looking for information on just about any product, and electric cars are no exception.

As long as you are willing to do a little research and keep an eye on dealer, reviewer, and insurance company profiles, you may find a great deal you wouldn’t have known about otherwise.

Photo credit: the expiredmeter.com

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Use Social Media to Clean Up Your Online Profile

If you did not already know it, your online profile can haunt you in many ways.

More and more employers are now checking prospective employees’ online reputations, and negative or inappropriate information can eliminate your chances at a job.

On the other side of the coin, a high-profile blowup on a company’s social media page can create a lot of bad press and headaches.

But it doesn’t have to stay that way.

There are several things you can do to clean up your online presence using your various social media accounts.

Start with an online audit

Your first step should be to run a Google search on your name or your business name.

This search can turn up potentially inappropriate posts on your own profiles, as well as negative comments made by other people about you.

Run your search once while logged in to Google, and once while logged out. The first will let you see what your friends and colleagues can see, while the other shows what strangers (and prospective employers or customers) will see when they search for your name.

Don’t stop with Google.

Check Bing, Yahoo, Ripoff Report, and other sites where your name might come up. Any of these could hold information that could damage your reputation.

Make a cleanup checklist based on your audit

Once you’ve performed your searches and identified any potential problems, it’s time to come up with a comprehensive checklist of everything that needs to be cleaned up.

This could include old social media accounts you no longer use, negative reviews, photos of you that show drinking or other inappropriate behavior, or any number of other harmful posts. Make a note of what sites they’re on, and where they showed up in search results (first page? Above your own website?).

Start the cleanup (or assign someone to do it)

This may be the most time consuming part of the process.

If you’re an individual, you’ll need to adjust your privacy settings on your various social media profiles to hide your more unsavory posts. You’ll also need to try to contact friends or family who have tagged you in inappropriate photos.

In the event you’re cleaning up your business profile, you may also have to contact customer service at various social media sites to remove old, unused profiles or remove reviews with false information.

Start rebuilding your online presence

Once you’ve completed the cleanup process (and even during the process), start rebuilding your online reputation via your social network profiles.

Come up with a strategy and goals for what you want your online presence to do for you, whether that’s landing a big job or improving customer relations.

Another great way to start rebuilding your social presence is through Google Plus.

Because Google gives special consideration to users of its own social network, you may find your own posts starting to rise through the search rankings — and negative information getting pushed down where fewer people will stumble across it.

Taking the time to remove personal information from your online profile can seem like a daunting task.

By forming a strategy for finding and eliminating negative information, you can make the process far less painful.

Photo credit: technewsworld.com

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Get Social When It Comes to Auto Body Repairs

Sometimes a fender bender can turn into a financial blunder if you don’t know where to find the best priced, most dependable auto body shop in town.

Luckily, social media is here to help body shops get the word out about their services and to help customers solve all of their repair needs. Besides, body shops that have an online social presence not only keep current customers informed, they also have an easier time finding new clients.

So, with socially savvy auto repair in mind, here are just a few reasons body shops should turn to social media:

Posting Deals

People turn to social media for just about everything in life, so it only makes sense that auto body repair shops join sites like Facebook and Twitter to post promotions and other deals.

Considering the majority of social net-workers are driving age, posting discounts for dent removals and paint jobs will surely turn some heads. And, current customers who are pleased with a repair shop’s work will socially spread the word too.

Socially Inspired Forums

Auto body shops can also use social media sites as an online forum to answer any auto body questions. Likewise, encouraging customers to ask questions via Facebook fan pages is a great way to get an online conversation going.

Discussion topics ranging from “What to do About a Fender Dent” to “My Hood is Scratched: What Next?” are perfect examples of how any auto body shop can not only have a social presence, but also help others while drawing attention to their shop.

Posting Auto Body Care Tips

In terms of care and maintenance, social media sites like Facebook and Twitter are a perfect avenue for auto body repair shops wanting to inform customers and the general public on everything from which wax is best for dark paint to rim cleaning techniques.

Customers appreciate it when auto body shops aren’t in it just for the money and actually want to help – even after a customer’s car has left the shop. And, considering social media and video go hand-in-hand, body shops that post how-to videos on buffing and scratch removal will surely gain traffic via an online audience.

Sharing Before and After Photos

Social media is an opportunity for auto body shops to share before and after photos of vehicle repairs.

Posting before and after photos is a visually compelling way for repair shops to provide excellent examples of their quality work. And, with photo-friendly social sites like Instagram, the photo sharing possibilities are endless.

Creating a Customer Testimonial Page

Auto body repair shops that do consistently good work might as well let their customers speak for them, which is exactly why social media testimonial pages are so effective. Tweeting and posting positive reviews helps gain customer trust and speaks directly to how well any given body shop treats its customers.

Whether it’s by way of Facebook, Twitter, or any social site in between, auto body repair shops that use social media are a win-win for everyone involved.

Photo credit: sanjose.olx.com

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How to Build up a Successful Global Brand

Pursuing a global brand offers a vast opportunity to expand your business coverage but it essentially entails a lot of hardwork in order to make yourself successful in this endeavor. The internet allows for a far reaching success whenever you market your brand successfully in the global online community. There is in fact no limit on how far you are willing to go global with your business but the challenge always begin on how you can build a successful global brand in a highly competitive global market. For startup marketers, this is quite a challenge and it takes learning from the basics down to the most intricate part of marketing your brand in the online global arena. No matter how challenging this can be, the good news is it can be done. Here are some tips on how to build a successful global brand for your business with a better opportunity of marketing them in the international market.

Begin with a brand name

Your brand name carries your business reputation and it delivers the message that you want to communicate to your prospect clients. It is a name that you want the global consumers to trust. It is worth spending quite some time to think deeply about the word that you want to carry your global brand, something that you want your target consumers to remember easily. It is best to choose a word that will not require a translation if you want to pursue global positioning for your brand. Try to find a single word or a compound word that is not clothed with an inherent meaning. In case a particular word appeals you but it is one that will need a translation, take time to ponder on the fact that it will require more effort to market multiple brand names in the global market. However, you should be able to weigh on its benefits when you think that such word is highly favorable to your business despite the need of translating your brand name into multiple languages. An important consideration is to research how your brand name is translated in a different language and know what the word means. Just think about it, your brand name in French may have a good connotation but it has a negative meaning when translated in Chinese.

Blend universal similarities

 Building your own brand in the global community would mean that you will be catering to consumers with different cultures, gender, race, and religion. However, despite these differences every person shares common similarities that you can use to your advantage. Love, inspiration, hope and friendship are common positive grounds that you can use as a strategy in promoting your global brand. These are generic inspirations that you can use in order to market your brand with a global value and meaning. Take the marketing strategy of McDonald’s for instance. Its brand tag line “I’m Lovin’ It” is a phenomenal example of marketing your brand name in the global community. Blending generic similarities to your brand will allow your global prospect customers to relate to your brand easily.

Understand your market and competitors

 Because you will be catering to different countries as you launch your global brand promotion, it is essential to understand how this implicates in your market positioning. Just because your brand has a good market impact in one country doesn’t mean that it will produce similar results in other countries. Every consumer with a different consumer behavior or preferences will not exhibit similar response to your brand or products. It is best to study your target market whether your brand will be feasible to the consumer and learn how to overcome the barrier that could prevent you from launching your global brand successfully in a particular market. Learning from your competitor is a good step to take. Understand how they do their branding campaign and learn how yours can be different from them. Launching your brand from domestic to the global market is a big leap that you have to take for your business and doing it right at the early stage of your global brand marketing campaign can significantly affect your progress. Being globally competitive means learning about how to make your brand different from your competitors and to offer the consumers something that your competitors haven’t provided them yet.

Promote your brand globally online

The internet is a powerful medium that transgresses over geographic boundaries. With the majority of the global internet users searching for products and services online, you can have a better global branding positioning when you increase your brand name visibility in the internet community. You can use a unique logo in promoting your brand but make sure that the design will not cause cultural sensitivities. You can also start building your global brand in various social media network sites where you can promote the benefits about your products and services as you start building your brand reputation online. Through social shares you can increase the growth of your brand popularity online, helping you spread the word about your business brand. Promoting your brand through press releases is another way you can build your brand name in the global community. These are good means by which you can make internet users become familiar with your brand gradually with better visibility to the global consumers.

Remember to maintain your domestic marketing strategy

Do not be too engrossed with the globalization approach in building your brand name. You should likewise maintain a good domestic marketing stance when promoting your business. Localization of your marketing strategy remains to be an important aspect of your efforts such as ensuring that you market your brand according to the local dialect or language of your target market location. You need to approach each market location differently in consideration of the culture and consumer trends on a particular market area. This will require you to collaborate your efforts with other specialists who are experts in marketing your brand within a local target market and who can help in managing the launching of your product brand within a domestic area as Netspy Mobile. As you launch your own website to gain better online brand positioning, make sure that your website provides a translation support in order to cater to your international customers better online.

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6 Trends in the Gadget World

Technology is advancing at an alarming rate. It seems like someone thinks up something new every day, but even though that device serves a different purpose, the features remain the same.

Here are a few of the latest trends in the gadget world.

Bluetooth Everywhere

Image via Flickr by husin.sani

Bluetooth, originally used as a hands-free way to talk on your cell phone, is showing up in everything from cell phones to refrigerators. It has multiple purposes, ranging from file transfers to music streaming. It’s being used in many innovative ways, as well. For example, the crowd-funded Pebble recently launched, allowing you to customize your watch. It connects to your phone via Bluetooth and sends notifications of messages or emails, allowing you to change the music you’re listening to and more. It also accesses the GPS function of your phone, allowing you to run or cycle while the phone records the distance.

Internet Everywhere

We rely on the Internet. Two decades ago, the Internet was a barely affordable technology, allowing you to connect and access a virtual world through a dial-up modem. Now, it’s in everything, from our phone to the locks on our front door. Always being connected isn’t necessarily a bad thing, though. For example, if your camera and printer both have Internet connectivity, you can print pictures from anywhere in the world. If you have a security camera that’s connected to the Internet via a secure connection, you can monitor that feed directly as long as you have an Internet Connection. Some devices, such as light timers and security systems, can be accessed with an Internet connection. If you’re on-the-go, you can control them with your laptop. Or if you’re just feeling a little lazy, you can control them from your tablet. If you don’t have either device, you should check out Lenovo convertible laptops and get the best of both worlds.

Touchscreens

Over the past five years or so, touchscreens have dominated our life. They initially made their mainstream debut with Nintendo’s DS system. The system, which featured a small touchscreen, has sold more than 150 million units worldwide since its debut nearly a decade ago, and it continues to climb each day. Since then, tablets have taken over. The touchscreen craze has spread to PCs and smartphones. The Playstation Vita features touchable front and rear screens. Touchscreens are part of our daily life.

The Cloud

Over the past two or three years, there has been a huge push to store data in the cloud. The cloud refers to data that’s stored on the Internet on a remote server. If something happens to a user’s device, they don’t have to worry, the data is stored remotely and is retrievable. This is a great way to create a backup of everything that you need before purchasing a new smartphone or computer. There’s also cloud computing, which essentially outsources all the computing to other computers. This allows a program to run on multiple computers at the same time.

Social Networks

It seems like everyone is on Facebook or Twitter these days. We’re all too willing to share every personal detail of our life. Whether we’re updating friends on our life, confessing a personal secret, or just sharing a picture of the food we made, we’re addicted to social networking. For those of you that are into a specific thing, there’s probably a social network dedicated to it. The number of social networks increases each day, as does the number of devices we can access them from.

Continuity

With all the devices in our lives, it’s frustrating to try to keep them all up to date. Companies are trying to make the user experience seamless by utilizing cloud storage so everything can be the same, no matter what device you connect from. This is especially useful in a business setting. You no longer have to worry about losing files in the confusion of things. Simply upload a file to a cloud server and re-download it on another device to continue working. Some companies are utilizing management software to keep the user experience the same across the board.

The goal in the technology world is to create a unique, creative experience for the user that’s simple and frustration-free. With many in the past complaining about the difficulty of using technology, it’s no wonder that there’s a push toward touchscreen technology. These trends show how a bunch of different devices can integrate the same technology to create a similar experience for the user. Have you noticed any popular trends lately?

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Why Big Data Will Drive the Next Big Boost in Productivity Gains

The Big Data argument speaks quite clearly for itself: the better a brand knows its customers, its interaction with those customers becomes more meaningful, ultimately increasing the likelihood that the customer takes some sort of action whether it be a purchase, a positive review, a recommendation or otherwise, and repeat that action in the future. However, the tech landscape provides a backdrop that basically changes with the seasons, so as the hardware changes, so does the consumer.

Moore’s law suggests rapid obsolescence in technology thereby driving down costs of goods which, in turn, expands the ubiquity of them. As a result, more and more folks are using devices that transmit information and build personal profiles for themselves self-identifying their habits, tastes and behaviors. Creating, in effect, the essence of Big Data.

With the information created through social sharing, GPS, and consumers essentially foregoing privacy to provide facts about themselves to their social network and “friends,” brands can know exactly who is most likely to purchase their product and where – nearly eliminating the chance that their words may fall on deaf ears or their resources misallocated. These identities are what businesses use to reach prospective customers and better serve their current customers.

The paradigm has shifted much more heavily in favor of consumers telling companies what they want, not the other way around. Armed with this knowledge, companies have a much clearer picture of who could be a potential customer and can therefore focus their time and energy to reaching those prospective customers and not trying to figure out who they are thereby making businesses far more productive in customer acquisition. This cycle continues in perpetuity so that brands are constantly gathering research, processing that research, and taking action on the findings.

As a result of the rapid turnover in technology, most of us can be considered early adopters in one way or another. However, what makes Big Data valuable is not only its propensity to attract new customers, but to instill loyalty in those customers. As a company becomes more productive due to the successes that knowledge of Big Data will bring, it allows the company to better manage their customer base, and keep those customers longer – thus running their business much more efficiently.

Because of the affordability and ubiquity of technology, brand interaction is happening across many different platforms making Big Data increasingly resourceful and accurate and most importantly — actionable. Advancements in the cloud make data storage nearly endless so consumers can basically keep a running history of their interactions with brands.

So now that more people have these devices, more data is being created all the time as the majority of phones are now smart phones. So the percentage increase in data is in direct correlation with the product life cycle of Moore’s Law. This cycle will ultimately drive the next big push in productivity gains as companies acquire and retain customers much more efficiently as they are infinitely more targeted and nimble in communicating with their customers, making Big Data an invaluable resource in a company achieving its end goal: profit.

How do you thing Big Data will play out in terms of productivity?

David Steinberg is CEO of XL Marketing.

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Reputation Management Is Becoming Increasingly Important For Businesses & Individuals

Reputation management is a hot topic at the moment as recent articles covered by the Guardian and the Telegraph highlight the importance of controlling business and individual’s online reputation. The reputation and image of any business is significantly important to the success of the company due to the impact this can have upon sales. In recent years the use of the internet has exploded as more and more people share their opinions and experiences online. The increased use of social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter and review sites such as Trip Advisor have created a platform for users to share positive and negative experiences online.

 

Many businesses have been quick to harness the potential of social media sites to promote positive images of their businesses online, however reputations can quickly be ruined by only a few negative reviews. This has led to many businesses to understand the importance of reputation management. Many businesses and individuals use the internet on a frequent basis; however until recently very few have stopped to consider the impact which their opinions could have upon their personal relationships, job prospects or their businesses. Bad publicity can be very damaging for individuals and businesses however until recently any negative publicity could quickly be forgotten. The growth of the internet as a method of communication has created new problems as information shared online is much more permanent. To ensure that individuals and businesses have a positive digital footprint it has become much more important to consistently portray a positive online reputation. A bad review, critical blog post, unflattering link or an out of control rant from an ex-employee  which shows on the first page of Google search results can have devastating effects for a business, as this can cause click-through rates to plummet and business sales to drop and can often affect search results for years to come.

 

Businesses and individuals are beginning to consider reputation management companies to control their digital footprint and remove negative online impressions due to negative comments by ex-girlfriends, negative court cases and confusion with similar search terms which can in some cases portray unfair or outdated reflections. Google’s search algorithm can often portray certain websites to be more relevant than they are. Some industries have been badly affected by negative online reputations, in 2008 after the financial meltdown apparently some top bankers were paying over $10 000 a month to ensure that their digital footprints remained positive. Eric Schmidt the executive chairman of Google has predicted that in the future prominent individuals will employ an identity or reputation manager to maintain their online image.

 

94% of people never click on a link past the first page meaning that it is important to ensure that the search results on the first page of search engines is positive. It is possible to get negative content removed from sites and search engines however this can often be difficult and may need to be significantly defamatory to be removed; this is why many people hire reputation management companies to help with this. Reputation management companies use many techniques to affect Google search results such as reverse SEO which improves results by pushing negative pages further down the search results and push positive or neutral results higher up the page.

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