How Can I Check My Online Reputation?

If you’ve ever wondered “how can I check my online reputation”, our guide can help you pinpoint the details that influence others in the digital environment.

The internet today seems to be a whole new planet of its own. Each site has something new and different to offer internet users. In addition to the millions of available websites, search engines such as Google are capable of presenting us with tons of online content and data, depending on personal interests, from across the entire web. 

Given this reality, it is no surprise how businesses from any industry would like to enter the digital space and boost their online presence. 

Doing business online may work wonders for a firm or personal brand. Thanks to the digital environment, businesses get to access opportunities that simply aren’t available in a strictly physical setting. Unfortunately, there are significant challenges associated with building your professional and personal brands online. 

There is a good chance that things could work well in the online space, but things could also spiral downward. Success depends on the firm or professional brand’s overall reputation score. 

Why Does A Good Online Reputation Score Matter? 

Whether you are handling a personal brand online or a business account, your all-encompassing reputation score actually matters and affects how you will fare in the online space. It is something that you shouldn’t take for granted and turn a blind eye to.

Try thinking about a popular restaurant chain or beverage brand that you know of. Their reputation online has played a huge role in boosting their overall brand and expanding their global market. It’s not an accident that these companies were able to top the list when it comes to their product or service lines.

Similarly, when you have a good reputation score, your business or brand can stay at the top of the list as well. Aside from being the first option that pops into your customer’s mind, there are other key benefits that you may reap.

Better Customer Relationships

With a good reputation score, your business or personal brand has the ability to gain trust, loyalty, and even support from your existing and potential customers. Simply stated, your relationship with your customers could become better and your customer could even end up helping your brand or firm.

For one, when customer experience is remarkable, your clients may voluntarily go the extra mile. For example, internet users may do any of the following small but significant acts:

• Write a good review about their personal experience with your business or brand
• Post images of your product or service on social media
• Leave a good rating on the business or brand account 
• Recommend your brand to others who ask for products or services you offer 

Though all of these things may be seemingly small, they may actually work wonders for your brand or company’s reputation. Positive customer feedback is generally helpful in boosting the name of a business or brand.

Customers Can Be Your Advocates

This also goes to show that when you are able to establish trust and loyalty with your customers, your customers can even serve as your brand or company’s advocates. When they know that your business or brand is reliable and trustworthy, it isn’t difficult for them to share and speak about you in a positive light.

However, if you offer a bad experience, customers may end up advocating against you, ultimately creating a bad reputation for your firm. This is something that you should safeguard yourself against.

More Market Value

Generally, customers want products and services from businesses that are legitimate, reliable, and credible. Why would they opt for others when they know the best provider? Why would they purchase goods from a sketchy seller? Unless there is no better option, customers skip those companies that offer bad quality and that generally have bad reputations. On the contrary, if a company has a good reputation, customers may likely flock to or have that company as their first option in mind. 

With a good online reputation score, your firm or brand can stand out among competitors in the same industry. This has the effect of attracting more potential customers while retaining existing ones. As time goes by, it could even translate to more revenue, profit, and traffic.

Better Talent 

When your reputation score is good, your firm or brand may also be able to attract top talent in the industry. If applicants on the lookout for job prospects know that their potential employer has an esteemed name and good digital presence, this may create and foster morale in them. In turn, hiring managers may be able to interact with and get the best talent for the team. 

It is not surprising how the best companies attract the best talent. While there may be several other factors at work, the perceived quality of a firm highly depends on its reputation. 

Is A Poor Reputation Score An Option For You?

Depending on whether you have a good or bad reputation score, you may be able to access opportunities for the better or be faced with hurdles that can stop you from succeeding. 

No business owner or employee wants their firm to have a poor reputation. If this is the case for you, your client base may end up avoiding your business or brand altogether. This could lead to detrimental effects in the long run. 

The question is whether your business can actually afford the consequences that come with having a bad reputation. In order to avoid this, it is important for you to continually pursue a positive online reputation score. 

Keep Your Overall Reputation Score In Check

Obtaining a good online reputation score, however, should not be the end goal of your reputational pursuits. Even if your firm or brand’s reputation score is good right now, it may not go on forever. The question is how long it can last without taking proactive steps to protect it. Having a good reputation score and positive online presence right now doesn’t mean that the same could be guaranteed in the next weeks, months, or years. 

It is important to not just have a good reputation online at the moment but to also ensure that you don’t spiral down, ending up with a low reputation score over time. Thus, your company or brand should review data regarding your reputation score and actively work towards boosting and keeping a desirable online reputation score. Just because your company has a good reputation now doesn’t mean that you should lie still.

How Can I Check My Online Reputation Score? 

While evaluating your reputation online may seem hard, it does not have to be that complicated. There are basic and easy ways for you to get an idea of your business’s online reputation score. However, if you want to go deeper and gain a more in-depth understanding, there are also more advanced ways to know more and improve your firm’s digital reputation. 

The DIY Ways To Check Your Reputation Score

1. Go On Google Or Use Social Media 

For starters, you can browse through search engines like Google search or social media channels like Facebook, for example. This gives you an idea of what most people may see about your online reputation. You can view the relevant links in the search results and note both the positive and negative information. 

When evaluating your online reputation score through Google search or social media, you should pay attention to whether most of the search results are good or bad. It is important to note if there is any negative content in the search or social media results that could lead to significant damage to your firm’s reputation score. Other than that, you can also enable and manage Google alerts to inform you if any relevant data gets added. 

2. Check And Engage In Review Sites 

Aside from going on Google and browsing through social media, another easy way to check your online reputation is to visit review sites or business listings. Because of the nature of these sites, customers may easily share and give feedback about a certain business or brand.

On these sites or listings, you can see what your customers write about. Be sure to thank those customers who leave good remarks and address any negative reviews in a timely manner. 

How Professional Online Reputation Management Services Can Help You 

DIY methods may be useful for you to some extent, but opting for professional online reputation management (ORM) services can lead you to better results in the long run. These ORM services can give you an in-depth picture of your online reputation. 

One advantage of hiring professionals for reputation management help is that ORM firms don’t just help you gain insight into your existing digital reputation; they will also offer you strategies and solutions to improve and solidify your reputation online. With this, you can actually go beyond answering the question “how can I check my online reputation?” and move towards answering the question “how can I improve my reputation online?” 

As its name suggests, an ORM service typically involves a range of practices to boost a firm’s online reputation score. These may include the following: 

• Content creation 
• Public relations
• Reputation analysis 
• Content promotion
• Development of web properties
• Reputation monitoring 
• PPC (pay-per-click) management
• Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
• Social media management
• Branding
• Negative information removal
• Wikipedia page creation
• Google My Business/Google Business Profile management 

ORM offers you the ability to build trust with others as you keep on boosting your personal or professional online brand. Unless you have a specialist on board, this could not be otherwise possible with simple DIY tactics.

Crucial ORM Services That Can Help Your Business Or Brand 

ORM firms can help you with a wide range of needs. However, it is understandable that each client may have a unique set of concerns. One size may not fit all types of needs. Nevertheless, there are crucial ORM services that your business or brand may benefit from, regardless of your industry type, goals, or needs. These critical services include the following:

Reputation Repair 

Reputation repair services, specifically, focus on restoring a firm with a poor reputation score due to negative comments, negative feedback, or other types of negative content. 

If a distorted or damaged reputation is something that your company is experiencing, reputation repair may be the solution that you need. Part of repairing your brand’s online reputation would be to review, check, and analyze your reputation. ORM firms are capable of using web listening tools in order to know what people are saying about your firm. 

This repair service, however, goes beyond analyzing your bad reputation score and moves toward solving the problem. Your partner firm may do any of the following in order to repair your reputation score: 

• Reputation analysis
• Content suppression or removal
• Content creation
• Reputation monitoring

Because these ORM firms specialize in this exact field, they are experts in how this works and are able to control certain factors that lead to positive improvements. For one, they may replace your negative reviews with new content and news media that can allow for a positive online reputation to flourish. 

Reputation Management

Businesses can also let a third-party online reputation management service firm manage their reputation altogether. These firms may: 

• Create and control the online content
• Ensure that Google recognizes online content that is helpful and beneficial
• Direct focus toward good search results or links in the field of interest
• Collect relevant data to provide insights
• Identify emerging reputational threats
• Remove potential threats
• Keep track of your digital footprint 

All of these tasks and duties are important when it comes to fostering a professional and desirable reputation. Considering these duties, boosting a company’s reputation actually requires technical expertise and skill. These are foundational elements of a company’s strategy in order to build and maintain a great online presence and reputation score. 

Contact InternetReputation today

If you are a business owner or brand manager, our reputation management solutions are available to meet your needs. Our experts have the tools and experience to leverage our services in meeting your goals.

If you are interested in checking, boosting, and managing your online reputation, contact InternetReputation today at 941-259-4554 or visit our blog to learn how you can be more effective in managing your business or brand reputation.