Less than a decade ago people used to think of PR and brand reputation as things which only big companies and celebrity personas cared about. Small businesses did not care much about this as there was little room for customer feedback.
The only feedback that a business used to get was that it was ignored and this had little impact on the brand’s perception.
Fast forward to today, almost every business is now being talked about either over the web or on social media platforms. People like to express their feelings and opinions about brands online.
No business wants to risk showing bad reviews to its customers either in the SERPs or over social media.
Therefore, we have compiled a list of 7 benefits of online brand reputation management to explain to you in-depth why every brand needs to maintain it.
Let’s dive right in!
What is online brand reputation management?
Online brand reputation management is the process of creating a positive public perception of a brand or business. It involves monitoring how people perceive your brand and taking strategic actions in order to improve your brand’s image.
ORM is a continuous process as it allows you to address any possible damaging situation which might occur. When done correctly it can lead to positive feedback and customer loyalty.
On the other hand, a negative reputation might lead to a decrease in sales and customer retention.
Benefits of online brand reputation management
After learning about what online brand reputation management is, let us explore how it can benefit your business.
1. Impacts on buying decisions
Taking your online brand management efforts lightly can seriously harm your business. It can actually lead you to lose your customer base.
Nearly 81% of people do online research and 71% conduct some kind of Google search before making a purchase, the way your brand’s image is maintained online can affect their final decision.
Add to that the fact that close to 88% of customers read online reviews to determine if a product is reliable or not.
Therefore maintaining a good review profile online can lead to positive buying decisions from your potential customers.
2. Provides feedback
The best part about brand reputation is that it provides you with an opportunity to monitor the feedback of customers. As soon as you start an ORM campaign you can start collecting insight on customer satisfaction and feedback.
You can then convert these insights into actionable tips for your product and sales team.
Therefore, before conducting pools, and surveys and going haywire in order to collect customer feedback, you can pay attention to what your existing customers are saying about your brand. Use it to your benefit and make decisions to further satisfy their needs.
3. Builds credibility
One of the most important benefits of ORM is that it builds trust and credibility with the customers. Sometimes, negative comments can spread faster than positive ones.
This is the reason why any negative comments said about a brand needs to be addressed immediately before they can wreak havoc.
Therefore having a crisp ORM strategy in place is important for a business as it can fix the issue before it gets out of hand and reaches a wider set of audiences.
4. Attracts employees
People tend to send job applications to companies that have a good reputation. Companies which take care of their employees often have a good online presence and practice an excellent brand reputation.
Potential employees first conduct proper research of the company before they accept the job offers. This is the reason why having a good online brand reputation is important to hiring top-notch talent.
5. Increases chance of higher ranking
Do you know social signals and online reviews affect your SEO ranking? A company with positive reviews and good customer satisfaction has better potential to rank higher on Google as compared to one with bad reviews.
This increase in ranking leads to more customer traffic which in turn leads to more increase in sales.
6. Its cost-effective marketing tactic
A brand with a well-maintained online reputation attracts positive recommendations from people. This is more like word-of-mouth marketing which is done free for your business by your existing customer base.
These new customers will then search online for your business and read reviews and feedback. Therefore maintaining a good profile online is key to attracting more customers.
7. Increases positive returns
Before doing business with a company, most organisations go online and research the company well in advance. The single most important thing which they will look at is how the customers are reacting to your products and services.
In addition to that, they will look at how the company handles customer feedback.
This is the reason why having a clean online presence is good if you want to get into business with other organisations.
Conclusion
ORM is the most important post-sales task that a company has to take care of in order to get repeat customers and acquire new ones. Businesses should make sure that they satisfy all their stakeholders and the best way to do that in the digital age is through online brand reputation management.
While the benefits of ORM might vary from industry to industry, the basic advantages are almost the same: increase in sales, higher ranking, improved credibility, feedback for product or service, employee retention and attraction.
Therefore always make sure that your brand is perceived as in a good shape online.