Picture this: A dissatisfied customer circulates negative comments about your company on the World Wide Web. Why? The reasons could be anything – your after-sales service is lousy or your customer care executive was impolite. When an irate customer (who might also be wearing the cloak of anonymity) has the ability to express himself through blogs, forums and social media networks, you are in for a tough time. This is where Online Reputation Management (ORM) comes in.

You need to constantly monitor the Internet on what is being said about your company. It could be good, bad or outright ugly. And what you need to be concerned about is the bad and the ugly. Here’s what could be done:

•    Reach out: Make an effort to communicate with the dissatisfied customer. Do some damage control. An offer to make good the bad is usually well-received.
•    Make your presence felt: Circulate positive content about your company on the web. This dissuades any negative comments or posts that might crop up in the future.
•    Build your Brand: It is essential to showcase what your company has to offer. Have a page dedicated to your company on social networks such as Twitter and Facebook, or better yet, start a blog. Do all of this keeping your target audience in mind.
•    Have a plan: Don’t wait until it’s too late. Always prepare for the worst-case scenario. For instance, what do you do when a there is a comment against your brand on the first page of Google search?
Negative comments will always make their rounds on the web. You can’t please everybody. You need to push away these negative comments (and they can’t be deleted!) as existing and potential customers might come across them. Defending your brand online is of paramount importance. News spreads ten times faster on the Internet. Take Twitter for instance, it is one of the most viral platforms on the web. The most sought after place to find information about a company/brand is its corporate website. So, put in your best effort to make the website friendly and informative.
Online Reputation Management is not an easy task. You need to monitor the web 24 hours a day. One needs to go through customer review sites, blogs, groups and pages (on social networking sites), forums, etc. and see what is being talked about your company. Various tools such as Social Mention will give you a peek into what the web says about your brand.
On the Internet, customer dissatisfaction is like a virus, it spreads! Hence, ORM & Brand Defense is indispensable. It is all about making the Internet work.

Contributed by Jade D’costa

Every brand needs inputs from its customers, it helps understand their need, address their concerns and provide products/ services based on the feedback. As more and more netizens are storming the web to vent out their frustrations, ask for suggestions or just researching, it becomes all the more necessary for any brand to actively participate in this space. In this post I talk about the elements you should consider to manage your brand using Social media.

Explore
You can have as many consumer surveys you want, but tapping into social media communities provides you interesting discussion topics which your consumers discuss and influence other probable customers. Be proactive, research in blogs, forums, social networks, video sites etc. Record the types of complaints / suggestions. Make sure you keep looking.

Analyze your research. Now ask yourself!
• Does your audience know your product?

• Have they got it wrong?

• Do you need to educate them?

Establish Contact & Empathize
The secret to every successful brand management strategy is to make sure that you reach out and respond to the consumer. The key is to listen and participate, I follow a simple methodology.
• Listen
• Understand
• Respond
• Correct
To make it simpler, analyze the complaints. Make sure that that you understand the consumers feedback. Classify your complaints and build messaging strategies for each classification. Place your response and monitor feedback.

Engage
Now that you have got the attention and probably even addressed his concern, it is necessary you still engage the customer and participate in his conversations. A happy consumer always recommends the product/ service to his friends.

Evangelize
Finally, don’t just stop at ‘Engage’. To run an effective brand management campaign make sure you’re constantly educating the target audience of on your product/ service. Create that buzz and make sure you’re visible
• Choose the media vehicles your target audience frequents.
• Provide information to them through these channels.

Brand management can be done anytime; you need not wait for a crisis situation. Start embracing social media today, so even if a crisis hits you are better equipped to manage the situation effectively.