5 Online Reputation Management Trends to Follow in 2020

Online reputation management is just what it sounds like - impacting the reputation of your company on online sites and managing it. By tracking the trends of your customer base and with the help of skilled online reputation management services, you can actually turn this into your advantage and stay ahead of the curve.

5 online reputation management trends to follow in 2020

Technology is moving fast and online reputation management trends are changing even quicker. Here are the 5 of those that need your special attention.

1. Make Google do outreach for you:

With a market share of 92.78% (as of October 2019), Google dominates the search engine market now. So Google has become one of the major contributors to the online reputation of any business.

1. 1. Google ratings:

Study shows that as of 2018 when looking for a product or service, more than half the people on the internet look for companies with a rating of 4 stars or more, and Google is the first place people check this on. Soon websites like Yelp or TripAdvisor might simply get devoured by Google. This essentially means it is certainly smart to put the majority of your marketing resources into getting a high rating on Google.

1. 1. Google search optimisation:

You must have noticed that lately, Google provides the most information about a search keyword on its first link itself, without having to visit any other website. 

1. 1. • Google uses a company’s website to decide how your website will be ranked as well as what information from your website will be shown in the Google search. So your page needs to be well-structured so all the topics you want to talk about on your website are easily found with just a click; but more importantly, so that search engine bots can crawl through your website quickly to find what people are searching for and directly put it in the Google search itself.

      • Instead of using Google to try to push traffic to their pages, as you used to do earlier, now you need to use your platform to fill in the different Google assets with details and start seeing Google as the primary way to communicate with customers and prospects. The work is heavy and complicated and you will be needing the help of an online marketing agency to perform this well.

2. Make the most out of social media:

The world runs on and by social media nowadays, more so after the 2020 pandemic hit the world and locked us all inside our homes. So your social media presence contributes to almost your entire online reputation. So social media reputation management should be in your highest priorities.

• Attracting complete strangers: 

Advertisements on social media let people who are complete strangers to your products/services learn about them. Online reputation management services in 2020 make your ads attractive enough so that your customers start trusting your product to be useful enough. Once you can draw in the most new customers, and keep your services up to the mark, they might just become your regular ones.

• Using social media influencers in a more creative way:

Till the beginning of 2020, social media influencers were one of the most important parts of online reputation management. However, as 2020 is coming to an end, this strategy has been too overused and reached its point of saturation. Now even though some followers of social media influencers still seem to trust their words to some extent, a certain amount of honesty and authenticity is expected. People are bonding with influencers whose products and services they like - the concept is becoming even more niche. So online marketing agencies will need to be more innovative in their approach towards these influencers. As a brand, you can use influencers who have a niche community of their own, providing value with their own products and services - making your social media influencer strategy more focused.

• Announcements:

All the social media not only contains your company profile but if you want people to know about any big news about your brand or even want to send out information about an upcoming workshop or seminar, social media is more reliable for spreading the word around than TV or newspapers today.

• Online listings: 

Nowadays, social media is not only for feedback and comments, but you can also put together social media listings for your company. For optimum exposure, it is wise to put them up on several pages.

• Niche communities: 

One very important side of social media many businesses ignore are niche communities specific to your kind of products/services. People on sites like Reddit or TechCrunch have highly technical discussions about products and services, and in order to gain their confidence, you need to have and prove deep knowledge about your kind of products. However, once you do build a respectable reputation of your brand there, people in those particular communities can become your biggest supporters, following you through high and low tides.

1. Making multi-channelled strategies that will continue for the long term:

Information in 2020 comes from a variety of channels. Review sites, your blogs, news releases, wiki pages, blog posts with your company mentions, your social accounts, and mentions all the way to the paid ads of your rival would be clicked by serious consumers. So professional online marketing agencies in Melbourne now involves all of them in their reputation management plan and diversify it as much as possible. Your earned, owned, and paid content - all will need to be tweaked and manipulated.

1. Putting the highest value on your customer:

Customers are the foundations of your business and a number of customer-wrath bringing companies down stories have made the power of the consumer very clear. Online reputation management services in 2020 are beginning to realise this and starting to embrace customer-focused reputation management strategies.

1. 1. Empathetic responses:

All responses towards your customers - may it be an answer to a review, or a complaint - need to be empathetic. You may not understand their actual reason behind the complaint, but you do need to acknowledge their frustration and understand that there surely is a genuine reason from the customer’s point of view. At the same time, keep your own response cheerful - it can change the mood of a customer. If your customers are happy with your behaviour with them, they will support you through good and bad and even recommend your product/service to their friends and relations - it’s just human nature.

1. 1. Paying proper attention to positive and negative reviews equally:

Many online marketing agencies in Melbourne advise to respond to the negative reviews by customers in a timely manner, and rightly so. If you reply to each negative review, thanking the people for their feedback as well as actually fix the issue they faced, it not only shows that you value your customers’ opinions, but also that you can take responsibility for your actions and you take initiative to correct your mistakes - this earns you respect. 

However, too much focus on negative reviews alone makes Google think your company only gets negative reviews, which is also detrimental for your online reputation. So you need to pay attention to the positive reviews as well, and equally so that you give out a balanced perspective about yourself. This brings us to our next advice.

1. 1. Shutting the trolls out:

2020 the internet is full of trolls who only spread negativity. There is a difference between a complaint and a troll, and your online reputation management services need to recognise that. Specialist online marketing agencies suggest the “Reply Only Twice” method when it comes to trolls. Your reply to a negative comment twice, fix any complaint that the customer had, and then simply move on and never turn back.

1. Make use technology:

2020 is the year of technology and the use of them is only rising. Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things (IoT) are collecting information on various levels which can be used by brands to optimise customer engagement at each touchpoint. Voice search, and 3D and 360-view videos are already some of the most popular ones. These will soon collaborate with augmented and virtual realities.

Conclusion

From big businesses to individual personal brands - everyone needs good online reputation management services to represent them. No one can have a squeaky clean online image, at least not without help. If you follow the latest trends as mentioned above and get a certified and professional online marketing agency in Melbourne to take over your brand’s reputation, you will be able to stay ahead of everyone else for sure.