Reputation Marketing: What, Why, And How

From your business’ beginning, you’re cultivating a reputation to uphold. Your social media posts, website content, interactions with clients, and services provided to customers all contribute to that reputation, and the more you build upon it, the more likely it’ll stick in the minds of everyone who knows about you. All of that combines into the term reputation marketing.

What Is Reputation Marketing?

You may have heard of branding or brand marketing: developing your brand identity in personal interactions and digital presence.

Reputation marketing takes branding a step further. Rather than focusing on the overarching themes that your company wants to portray, you’ll concentrate on building a five-star reputation and marketing that reputation for conversions and customers.

You can figure out a business’ reputation from online reviews, complaints, critiques, and comments that customers will post. Review sites and social media are some of the most powerful tools you can use in reputation marketing.

Search engines like Google are acknowledging the importance of online reviews in the eyes of the general public; getting more, fresher and better reviews will help you get higher search engine rankings.

Why Use Reputation Marketing?

Your business’ reputation is already out there. Customers, satisfied and disgruntled alike, are already posting their thoughts on their experiences with your company. If you devote time to handling these interactions, you’ll merely be taking a stream of content already available and directing it to help your business prosper.

Many people don’t do all of their research on a company based solely on what the company says about themselves. Instead, they’ll look for customer experiences to determine whether the business lives up to what it claims. If you put effort into those experiences, they’ll be much more fruitful than your advertisements alone.

How Do I Use Reputation Marketing?

The exact process of cultivating your reputation and using it in marketing will differ, but some constants will help any business.

  1. Manage
    • 24/7 Reputation Monitoring – ideally with instant review alerts
    • Respond to reviews, especially to bad ones
  2. Build
    • Custom feedback pages
    • Pro-active feedback funnels
  3. Market
    • Review streaming (on web pages, in pop-ups, and onto social media)
    • Images and marketing videos showcasing positive reviews
    • Testimonial videos and audios recorded by happy customers

To elaborate on a few of these:

  • Monitor everything.
    You can allow your review forum to sit unattended and unanswered, or you can consistently check for critiques and problems. The latter will win you more sales than the former.
  • Show People That You Care.
    Keep your other marketing channels open and active, but continue to directly correspond to the requests / feedback you receive from customers. Doing so will show your customers that you care, value and are paying attention to their feedback. And an empathetic response on a negative review will make people reading that review feel better (or even good) about your business, whatever the reviewer said.
  • Collect feedback.
    Don’t just search for mentions of your company online. Create a way for your customers to review your product or service without reservation.
  • Market reviews actively.
    Don’t just rely on others to create a five-star reputation. Highlight your most positive reviews, post video testimonials, and display them on your website proudly.

If you’re ready to tap into the power of reputation marketing for your business, be sure to contact us today!