Google is the most popular search engine on the planet, and for good reason. With over 8.5 billion searches every day, Google’s algorithm works tirelessly to ensure users can find what they’re looking for as quickly as possible. However, that doesn’t mean your Google reputation will always be positive.
Even the most reputable brands can suffer from a tarnished online reputation, and when that happens it can make it challenging or even impossible to grow your brand organically within the search results.
However, this doesn’t mean you need to give up hope just yet!
There are plenty of ways you can get a second chance with Google and repair your online reputation. Keep reading to discover how you can take control of your online presence and begin repairing any damage done to your brand.
What Your Online Reputation Means To Your Business?
Online reputation is one of the most important factors in attracting customers. It’s one of the first things that potential clients will search for when looking for a business to hire, and it can have a huge impact on whether they decide to do business with you or not.
You need to make sure your online reputation is managed well if you want more customers and clients. It’s important to manage your online reputation properly because:
- 86% of people say they would not do business with a company with negative reviews;
- 60% of people have stopped doing business with companies due to bad reviews.
If you’re a business owner, the first question you should be asking yourself is: where do buyers go to check out a brand’s reputation? The answer? Google. That’s because Google search is the most popular way to find information online, and it’s also the first stop for many buyers looking for product reviews or other consumer insights.
Google search results are therefore critical in determining your online reputation—and they can make or break your business.
Your reputation is important to buyers. Your customers pay attention to reviews and articles about your company that you didn’t write. What can you do to keep the story under your control?
1. Create A Digital Identity For Your Brand
Your brand is in good hands if you take the time to create a digital identity for your business. Having a strong presence online is crucial, especially when it comes to competing with other companies in your industry. To do this successfully, you need to have multiple profiles that represent your company online and help people find you easily.
Why should I claim my business profile?
You should claim all of your business profiles because it helps people find out who you are and what services/products or expertise (etc.) that you offer them. This will help them decide whether or not they want to work with you based upon what information is available about each company on the Internet; especially since Google doesn’t always show accurate results for those searching through their search engine algorithms but instead relies heavily upon third party sites such as Yelp instead.
2. Don’t Be Afraid To Ask For Reviews
Don’t be afraid to ask for reviews. If you’re looking to improve your online reputation, don’t hesitate to reach out and ask people for feedback. It’s better to be proactive than reactive and have negative reviews pop up after a negative experience.
Don’t take down negative reviews. This seems counterintuitive, but if you constantly remove legitimate complaints from your page, it will only make things worse in the long run—and Google knows it! In fact, removing these complaints could lead to more problems with Google’s algorithm because it will see that you’re trying too hard and not taking customer concerns seriously enough.
3. Push Down Negative Content That Can’t Be Removed
The complaints come from consumers across multiple channels: on blogs, forums, social networks – Facebook and LinkedIn, on Twitter, and in YouTube videos. You’re receiving reviews on Citysearch, Yelp, Zagat.com, as well as the local business listings on Google, Bing, and Yahoo. Your products are being reviewed on Amazon and other e-commerce sites.
Producing and sharing quality content is one of the most effective ways to ensure good search results outperform bad ones.
While you can’t always remove negative reviews that have already been written, you can push down any unethical content that is likely to receive negative feedback.
4. Include Reputation Management in Your Content Strategy
As you work to repair your online reputation, you should also be using content marketing to build trust and establish credibility because an effective online reputation management strategy starts with content marketing.
The creation of positive content can help offset any negative news. If your company does have negative commentary, as many do, give people something positive to learn about you as well. Make sure you keep track of your content assets and implement reputation management tactics.
Content marketing is a great way to do this because it allows you to engage with your audience through social media and other platforms where people are already looking for information related to what you’re discussing.
Conversion rates for content marketing adopters are six times higher than those for non-adopters, according to the Content Marketing Institute. Having high-quality content is also essential to improving your search engine “trust factor.”
You control the story with content marketing. Whether it is blogs, videos, social media posts, or anything else related to content marketing, you have complete control over it.
It’s impossible to control everything online about your brand, but you can manage your online reputation using content marketing.
5. Ensure Your Content Is Consistent, Compelling, And Customer-Focused
If you’re hoping to repair your Google reputation, it’s important to remember that you can’t do it with one single strategy. From recovering from negative reviews to pushing down any unethical content, it’s important to be consistent and use a variety of strategies from content marketing to social media posting. You’ll gain the most value out of any efforts made to repair your Google reputation if you’re consistent and persistent in your efforts.
It doesn’t matter whether it’s optimizing search results, posting customer stories on social media, or creating content to push down negative reviews, one thing is clear: it will be necessary for you to create more compelling and consistent content, and our team can assist you in doing so.
Book an appointment to learn more about our platform and how you can use AmpiFire to consistently publish quality content to drive traffic to your site.
