Blog, ORM, SEM

Online Reputation Management Prevents Public Relations Catastrophes20 Nov

Online reputation management is a multi-faceted strategy that helps you preserve the integrity of your name online. It includes monitoring every mention of your company and evaluating whether any mention poses a potential problem. ORM also includes having a plan in place to address issues before they can escalate and impact your public relations online.

This article will explain the reasons online reputation management is a critical component of your overall SEM campaign. You’ll learn the basics of ORM and how reverse search engine optimization plays a key role in suppressing bad publicity. We’ll also describe the process of determining whether a given negative comment or blog post requires a response. Lastly, we’ll provide a short list of important tools should you decide to do online reputation management on your own.

Why You Need Online Reputation Management

Twenty years ago, negative press rarely gained traction. If a disgruntled customer or an irritated employee wanted to vent their frustrations, they were limited to writing letters to newspapers and magazines. Both were forgotten by the time new editions hit the store shelves. The internet changed everything.

Today, social media profiles, blog and forum posts, and entire websites devoted to publishing negative commentary about others, remain online. They gain traction in Google, Yahoo, and Bing. Once they do, they can gain momentum in your market. This is the core reason to maintain an ongoing online reputation management program.

By vigilantly monitoring every mention of your company’s name, you can identify issues that threaten to tarnish your reputation. If you discover a public relations disaster in the making, you can immediately respond. You might decide to open a dialogue to present the facts. Or, you might launch a reverse SEO campaign to remove bad press from the search engines. The goal of online reputation management is to prevent negative commentary from gaining momentum.

Basics Of Online Reputation Management

Your online reputation management program should include several tactics to prevent public relations problems. Reverse search engine optimization can remove damaging press from the first page of the natural listings. Once that negative commentary has been pushed onto the second, third, and fourth pages, few people will see it.

Online reputation SEO will help you control the top listings for keywords that are directly related to you and your company. This strategy dovetails with your reverse SEO campaign. As damaging publicity is pushed from Google’s first page, online reputation SEO places the top position in your control. That prevents negative press from gaining exposure in the future.

Consistent monitoring is critical to your online reputation management program. You should track mentions of your name and that of key employees, your company, brand, and products. This is the most effective way to quell potential problems before they can gain traction in the search engines within your market.

Online Reputation Management: Addressing Problems

So, what should you do in the event that someone posts a damaging account about you or your company? It’s important to realize that not every occurrence of negative press requires a personal response. For example, if you enjoy a stellar reputation within your market, others may come to your defense. In some cases, it will be impossible to satisfy the disgruntled party; a response will only ignite the spark, giving momentum to something that was best left ignored.

Your online reputation management campaign should include a process through which you determine if the accusation or bad press in question is accurate. If so, is there an opportunity to engage the accuser and present the facts in a way that avoids exacerbating the situation? If that is not possible, using reverse SEO and online reputation SEO may offer the best solution.

Important Tools For Online Reputation Management

There are dozens of tools that you can use to handle your own online reputation management campaign. For monitoring forums, blogs, social media sites, and other properties, you can use Google and Yahoo alerts. You should also subscribe to RSS feeds from Technorati, BlogPulse, and FeedBurner (currently in Google’s stable of tools). Because Twitter is so popular, you should also subscribe to tools that monitor Tweets (e.g. TweetBleep, TweetLater, etc.).

Search engine optimization is an essential part of online reputation management. To that end, you should incorporate tools for content syndication, keyword analysis, and link-building. While you can perform SEO on your own, be aware that the ranking algorithms used by Google, Yahoo, and Bing are continually growing in complexity.

Protect Yourself With Online Reputation Management

There has never been a greater need for online reputation management. Angry customers, annoyed employees, and even disingenuous competitors can spread damaging rumors about you and your company with a few clicks. If the bad publicity gains traction in the search engines, it can spread quickly. Online reputation management is the most effective solution for controlling the message. The question is, are you using it?

Blog, ORM, SEM, SEO, Social Marketing, search engine marketing

Search Engine Marketing: A Perfect Blend Of SEO, SEM, & Social Media12 Oct

Search engine marketing (SEM) has evolved to become the most reliable strategy for reaching a target audience,driving sales, & managing public relations online.. It boosts your company’s
exposure within your space; it compels your market to visit your website; it
positions your product as the solution to their problems. As a result, your sales
increase. Your revenue and profit swell. Your ROI rises. And your business enjoys
stronger branding and customer loyalty in the process.

Many of your competitors are already using SEM in an attempt to capture a larger
portion of your market. There has never been a better time to protect and expand
your territory. This article will explain why search engine marketing should be a
critical piece of your online marketing strategy. You’ll discover the value of
hiring an SEM expert versus forging a path on your own. We’ll also describe how SEM
PR and SEM social media tactics converge with SEO and PPC to produce a groundswell
of momentum.

Why Search Engine Marketing Is Critical

Search engine marketing blends SEO, pay-per-click advertising, and social media
strategies to give your company a higher level of visibility within the search
engines’ listings. But, visibility without sales is useless. And therein lies the
true value of SEM.

Your online marketing efforts must generate conversions in order to justify the
investment. Conversions might include a prospect buying your product, signing up for
your newsletter, or becoming your affiliate. It might include subscribing to a
continuity program that generates monthly revenue. Search engine marketing not only
allows your company to approach your audience, but it engages the conversation that
is already occurring in their mind. It compels action, which lifts your conversion
rate.

Is Hiring A Search Engine Marketing (SEM) Expert Necessary?

Every tactic that is leveraged within a comprehensive search engine marketing
deployment can be learned. The problem is, doing so is incredibly time-consuming.
The algorithms that govern the search engine’s organic rankings change constantly.
The major PPC platforms endure a seemingly endless string of upheavals. Social media
sites are still in their infancy; as they mature, so too, will the tactics required
to leverage them. Developing proficiency in each area of search engine marketing
takes an enormous amount of time.

An SEM expert will design a search engine optimization campaign that pushes your
website to the top rankings for your chosen keywords. They can also launch a
pay-per-click advertising campaign that further improves your exposure. Social media
marketing tactics can be integrated to dovetail with the rest of your search engine
marketing deployment. Even though you could launch these strategies on your own, do
you have the time to learn and apply them?

SEM PR: Melding Search Engine Marketing With Public Relations

SEM PR has its roots in search engine optimization. Years ago, online public
relations was managed largely through the creation and distribution of online press
releases. This is still effective today. These press releases gain traction in the
search engines’ organic listings. That builds your company’s brand while helping to
push negative publicity off the first page of results.

Today, online PR has been incorporated within a broader search engine marketing
context that includes SEO, PPC, and online reputation management (ORM). For example,
a press release can be distributed online in order to gain traction within the
natural listings. Then, a PPC campaign can be launched to direct your audience to
the press release on your website. Links can be placed throughout the page to other
positive coverage. The more points of exposure, the less likely negative press will
penetrate the top rankings in the search engines. This is a core element of ORM and
by extension, search engine marketing.

Leveraging SEM Social Media Optimization For A Competitive Edge

Social media sites began to enjoy ranking authority in the major search engines a
few years ago. That authority has only increased over time, making social media an
important cog in search engine marketing. This is the reason SEM social media
optimization has become critical for companies that need to reach niche markets.

By establishing a presence on the top social media sites, a search engine marketing
agency can develop multiple entry points in the organic listings. That increases
your exposure to your audience. It also prevents bad press from infiltrating the top
listings for your keywords. These advantages converge to deliver a competitive edge
for your company.

The Value Of Hiring A Professional SEO Marketing Consultant

Time is the most valuable commodity of all. Once it expires, it cannot be retrieved.
This is why a growing number of companies - including your competitors - are opting
to hire a professional SEO marketing consultant. They realize that search engine
marketing strategies are complex. The learning curve is steep. What’s more,
deploying SEO, PPC, and SMO tactics poorly can do far more harm than good. Precision
in execution is critical.

If you have already mastered each of the strategies that make up search engine
marketing, and have a refined system through which to deploy them, you may not need
an SEM expert. Otherwise, you might be fighting an uphill struggle. Consider
contacting a search engine marketing specialist today.

ORM, SEO

Online Reputation Management Protects Your Reputation And Suppresses Negative Feedback25 Sep

Online reputation management (ORM) was created to help business owners and professionals deal with bad press. Countless companies - large and small - have found themselves on the receiving end of negative publicity. When it is posted online, it can spread quickly. The size of your business has little influence on the devastating effect of such feedback. Multinational leviathans have struggled under the assault of bad publicity that first gained momentum in the search engines. Online reputation management curbs the impact. It lets you control the message that your target audience sees.

In this post, we describe how reverse SEO is an important piece of your broader online reputation management campaign. You’ll also discover how ORM works within the framework of your SEM strategy. We’ll then explore the difference between public relations online and ORM before explaining how the latter insulates your business from negative feedback.

How Reverse SEO Supports Online Reputation Management

Most companies turn to online reputation management as a reactive approach to existing negative feedback in the search engines. In effect, the damaging press has already gained a foothold in Google’s listings. While a preventative ORM strategy is a better approach, a reverse SEO campaign can help remove negative publicity from the first page of organic rankings. Consigned to the second and third pages, the bad press lacks exposure. Without exposure, it cannot gain significant traction.

Having said that, you should take a proactive approach to online reputation management. Every piece of content you produce should be carefully optimized to help your company dominate its top positions in the search engines. That reduces the likelihood that you’ll be forced to react after your brand has received negative publicity.

Online Reputation Management: An Irreplaceable Component Of SEM

Your search engine marketing (SEM) strategy can only be as successful as the level of trust your audience has in your company. If bad press has crept into the top positions of the search engines, it will tarnish that trust. Keep in mind that the social networking sites have gained enormous authority in the search engines. Negative feedback posted to these sites can rank in Google and become difficult to displace.

This is the reason online reputation management is an irreplaceable component of your SEM campaign. It is too easy to lose control of your brand and message through bad press that infiltrates the search engines.

Public Relations Online Versus Online Reputation Management

Public relations online is different than online reputation management, though both fulfill a similar function. In fact, each strategy includes elements of the other. Public relations attempts to control the message you deliver to your audience. It also forms the mechanism through which you can learn what others think of you and your business.

Online reputation management is a set of strategies that help to displace negative press in the search engines while monitoring every mention of your company. By continuously monitoring comments made by customers, employees, and even competitors, you can respond and control the message. Both public relations and online reputation management should have a place in your marketing strategy.

What Is Online Reputation SEO?

Online reputation SEO is a strategic counterpart to reverse search engine optimization. A reverse SEO campaign can be launched to remove bad publicity from the top positions in the search engines. By contrast, online reputation SEO takes a proactive approach to control that territory in advance. In the same way that negative press can gain traction and become difficult to remove, so too, can your own content. By controlling the top positions, the strategy prevents bad publicity from gaining exposure.

Protect Your Business With Online Reputation Management

Online reputation management plays an important role in your SEM efforts. It incorporates multiple strategies to insulate your company from the effects of negative publicity. Reverse SEO displaces bad press that has already climbed to the first page of Google. Online reputation SEO prevents future bad press from gaining similar traction. By monitoring every mention of your company, brand, and executives, you’ll be able to quickly identify potential publicity problems. That allows you to craft an immediate response, if necessary.

Most companies launch an online reputation management campaign after the damage of bad press has already spread. That is a mistake. Take a preventative approach to protect your business with an SEO campaign designed for public relations online.

Blog, ORM, SEM, SEO, seo consulting

Reverse SEO Is A Core Element Of Online Reputation Management14 Sep

Reverse SEO has become critical for all types of organizations. It has never been
easier for your customers, competitors, and employees to publish items online that
can have a damaging impact upon your business. If those items gain exposure in
Google, Yahoo!, and other major search engines, their effects can last for years.
Regardless of whether you operate a small firm with less than ten employees or a
multi-billion dollar company, bad publicity can decimate your business.

This post will introduce you to the fundamentals of reverse SEO. We’ll explain
how it works and the advantages of using it. We’ll also describe a seldom talked
about strategy of leveraging reverse SEO as a preventative approach to online
reputation management (ORM). You’ll discover why many companies are rushing to
search engine optimization specialists to enlist their help for damage control. If
you are not currently using reverse SEO to limit the effects of bad publicity, your
company may be vulnerable.

How Reverse Search Engine Optimization Works

Google ranks pages based on several criteria. One of its organic algorithm’s ranking
parameters is a website’s authority within its space. The more authority a site has,
the easier it is for a page on that site to rank well and control its position. When
an authoritative page carries bad publicity about your company, it can gain exposure
to a wide audience. This is the problem that reverse search engine optimization
resolves.

Reverse SEO specialists have a number of tools at their disposal they can use to
suppress bad publicity in the search engines. First, they’ll analyze the authority
of high-ranking pages that speak negatively of your business. Then, they’ll
formulate a strategy to push those pages into the depths of the search engines’
organic listings, limiting their visibility.

Long-Term Advantages Of Reverse SEO

A single unsatisfied customer can create havoc for your company by spreading
deceptive stories of poor service or shoddy workmanship. Similarly, one resentful
employee can anonymously unfurl a string of damaging diatribes. If such stories and
diatribes are merely told to another person, their effects are limited and
temporary. By contrast, if they are published online and gain exposure in Google,
they can have disastrous results for your business.

This type of negative press tends to gain a groundswell of momentum, regardless of
its accuracy. By suppressing these pages in the search engines, reverse SEO allows
you to control the effects of bad publicity. It helps you to smother the flames
before they grow out of control.

Reverse SEO: The Preemptive Strike

Most companies launch a reverse SEO campaign after bad publicity has already crept
toward the top of Google’s organic listings. That is a reactive approach. The
problem is that high-ranking pages with negative press tend to generate inbound
links. Those links further strengthen the pages’ positions. As a result, they become
more difficult to suppress.

You can use reverse SEO as a preventative measure. By launching a campaign that
controls the top organic positions, you can prevent negative publicity from gaining
exposure in the first place. In effect, you can insulate your company from the whims
and machinations of frustrated customers, unhappy employees, and deceitful
competitors.

Is Reverse SEO An Essential Cog Of Search Engine Marketing?

Search engine marketing (SEM) increases your company’s exposure within your space.
On its own, an SEM campaign can deliver staggering results that translate directly
to your business’s bottom line. However, bad publicity can disrupt even the most
formidable of search engine marketing campaigns.

Reverse SEO is a vital component of any SEM effort. It protects the integrity of
your search engine marketing campaign and supports its growth. The same tools that
can be used to control the top positions in Google and prevent negative press from
gaining traction can seed inbound links to your website. This creates a well-rounded
SEM campaign that is potent on multiple fronts.

Damage Control And Online Reputation Management

If your company enjoys exposure on the internet, whether from social networking
sites, professional online trade journals, or broad media, online reputation
management is important. The number of authoritative websites that your customers,
employees, and competitors can use to spread negative press about your business is
increasing. Making matters worse, many journalists have become lax in sourcing their
stories. ORM and reverse SEO can work seamlessly together to control the spread of
bad publicity.

Negative press does not need to be accurate in order to rank well in Google. That makes reverse SEO more critical for your company than ever.

Receive a free reverse SEO evaluation and begin to take control of your company’s online reputation today.

Blog, ORM, SEO, search engine optimization, seo consulting

The Importance of Backlinks in Search Engine Optimization09 Sep

Read any article on search engine optimization, and all the search engine consulting experts will talk about the importance of backlinks for achieving higher search engine ranking. That’s because the more one-way backlinks you have leading to your website, the more important the search engines believe your page is.

There are two types of backlinks: one-way links and reciprocal links.

One-Way Links are basically backlinks that only go one direction. Maybe it’s a link that goes from your website to another website. Or maybe it’s a link that goes from another site to yours. Either way, it’s only going one way.

Reciprocal Links are backlinks that go from one website to another, and then back to the original website.

It’s important to differentiate between one-way backlinks versus reciprocal links. Many search engine optimization experts believe that one-way backlinks are more valuable than reciprocal links because they’re much harder to earn. The thinking is that since they’re harder to earn, they must be more valuable, which means other people think very highly of your site. And if people think very highly of your site, it must be an important site, which means the search engines will give it a higher rank than those sites that don’t have a lot of one-way backlinks.

As search engines like Google grow and improve, they’re putting more emphasis on how popular a website is, not whether they use all the right keywords. This popularity is measured through one-way backlinks. They’re like votes to Google, and search engine ranking is more like a popularity contest: have a lot of backlinks, your site achieves a high ranking.

The easiest way to find the number of backlinks that lead to your site are to visit Google or Yahoo! and type in the following command:

link:www.yourwebsite.com

You will be shown a list of all the websites that have backlinks to your own domain. If you want to see who has backlinks to a particular page on your site, then put in the full URL to that individual page.

Although no one can be sure of the exact algorithm Google and Yahoo use to rank sites, it’s commonly believed that if a website has more backlinks, it will achieve a higher search engine ranking. There are other factors that go into the whole search engine ranking, but backlinks are one of the more important ones.

But it’s important you have good quality backlinks, not just backlinks that appear on any page you can find, like a link farm or sticking a comment on a page that has nothing to do with your website at all. That is, if you sell hammers, don’t put any backlinks on a page that sells women’s shoes.

That’s because search engines like Google have started cracking down on link farms and backlinks spammers. The search engine spiders know how to tell the difference between backlinks on a link farm and links on a quality website. And if you’re caught spamming, you’ll be dropped in the ranks, or possibly even dropped completely from Google’s index.

So you need to pay attention to the quality of your backlinks, now more than ever. One way to do this is to make sure you use the proper anchor text in your backlinks. For example, don’t ever hot link the words “click here.” What you’re basically telling the search engine spiders is that the website is about Click Here. Instead, use the keywords about the site that the backlinks are leading to. If you’re creating backlinks to a site about hammers, put the word hammers in your links. “Click here” is not about hammers.

In short, if you want some great search engine results, be sure to include backlinks as part of your search engine optimization strategy. You’ll see it pay off with improved search engine rankings.

Blog, ORM, SEO, search engine optimization, seo consulting

Reverse SEO to Suppress Negative Public Relations Online06 Jul

Reverse SEO has become one of the most effective strategies for pushing down bad publicity within the search engines’ organic listings.  It is an online reputation management tool of SEO consultants who manage public relations online.  Too often, companies become targets for negative press online. Angered customers start blogs to take businesses to task for grievances suffered, real or imagined. Dishonest competitors will often go to great lengths to distribute fraudulent reports online. Still others post untruthful reports about companies simply to cause mischief. The problem is that these blogs, pages, and reports can start ranking well in Google and Yahoo.

Reverse SEO can be used to suppress any negative publicity that targets your company in the organic listings. By pushing bad press onto the second, third, and fourth pages of Google, those pages will be prevented from gaining traction or attention. In today’s article, we’ll explain the potentially devastating effects of negative press and how reverse SEO can help you manage your company’s public relations online. We’ll also describe what you can expect when you work with an experienced SEO consulting service.

Why Reverse SEO Tactics Are Used

The reason to use reverse SEO is based upon current societal trends. Many of your customers are likely to research your company on Google, Yahoo, or Bing before purchasing a product or service from you. When they find reviews, they tend to believe them. Unfortunately, there are few barriers that prevent people from posting negative reports online about your business.

For example, a disgruntled employee can start an anonymous blog vilifying your company. An unsatisfied customer can post a less-than-honest story about your business on ripoffreport.com. Your competitors can do the same. The reputations of more than a few companies have been decimated in this way.

When prospective customers find these pages on the search engines, they give them unwarranted credibility. Reverse SEO minimizes the damage. Studies have shown that a large majority of searchers never venture onto the second page of listings. Of those who do, a small fraction progress to the third page. By pushing negative publicity off the first page of Google’s listings, a reverse SEO strategy removes them from sight.

Reverse Search Engine Optimization Curbs Negative Publicity

Negative publicity, if left unchecked, gains momentum in the search engines. Highly-ranked pages attract links. As inbound links increase to these pages, they become harder to remove. This is why it is important to launch a reverse SEO campaign as soon as bad press emerges, if not beforehand. By suppressing negative pages quickly, you can prevent them from gaining traction. Cut off from a supply of links, they will eventually submerge into the depths of the search engines’ listings.

The Basic Strategy Of Reverse SEO

In the same way that a search engine optimization project requires a refined approach, a reverse SEO campaign should also follow a rigid formula. The basic strategy relies upon a network of authoritative sites to control the first page of organic listings for your company’s name. That includes article and press release syndication, capturing keyword-rich subdomains on authoritative blog sites, and carefully using social networking properties. There are also a number of formidable online tools that can be used to further support your reverse SEO efforts.

By leveraging the ranking ability of these authoritative sites for your company’s name, you can control the first page of organic listings. That pushes negative press downward beyond your customers’ field of view.

The Positive Effects Of Reverse SEO Require Time

It’s worth emphasizing that a reverse SEO campaign takes time to gain momentum. Even though you will be leveraging authoritative sites that rank more quickly than other properties, controlling the first page of Google is not an overnight process. However, once these sites climb to the top positions, they are incredibly difficult to remove. Their ranking ability does not guarantee immediate results, but results tend to last over the long run. That means future attempts to attack your company with negative publicity will be forced to climb a much higher wall to do so. In effect, your business will be insulated.

Working With A Reverse SEO Consulting Service

The full-service SEO agency with whom your company works will already have a honed strategy for deploying a reverse SEO campaign. They will maintain a list of authoritative sites that are groomed for your circumstances. They’ll research your website’s position in the search engines as well as the positions of any negative press that currently populates the organic listings. Rather than pursuing reverse SEO methods that are unethical and thus, have only short-term results, they will use principled tactics that prevent bad publicity from gaining traction in the future.

Reverse SEO is becoming a popular method for minimizing the damage from complaints and negative reports, whether they are valid or not. In fact, a growing number of companies are relying upon reverse SEO tactics as a preemptive strategy for managing their public relations online.

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Blog, ORM, SEM, internet marketing, seo consulting

Social Media Marketing is Engaging Sponsored Conversation of SEO Consulting Firms05 Jun

SEM SEO experts of today have modified the practices of SEO Consulting firms of yesterday to offer techniques to their clients which are ranking higher with the search engines.  These new techniques are providing higher search engine ranking because they offer search engine users the quality content for which they are requesting information.  We are not only learning from the mistakes of our industry’s past, but the evolution of these new practices of SEO consulting professionals is providing a higher quality online experience.

Rostin Reagor Smith recently joined the social media debate on proposed FTC guidelines for social media content.  Companies, such as Rostin Reagor Smith are hired by brand managers and marketers to develop online brands through social media marketing efforts.   The proposed FTC guidelines on social media blog and comment posts will not affect Rostin Reagor Smith practices or results of our SEM SEO consultants.  The practices we use for management of public relations online will be enhanced by enforcement of regulations within the field of social media marketing.

Once again, the Internet Marketing industry is making strides to provide users with quality online content.  Just as news and magazine print made the evolution to mark advertisements as such within editorial content, regulations are placing guidelines within social media content.  Basically, if a company is posting blogs and comments within social media content, on behalf of another company, regulators are requesting that consumers should be made aware of the fact that the comments and blogs are not being written by other consumers, but are actual advertisements and promotional content.

These new guidelines leave room for interpretation, which is where the social media debate is established.  The FTC is interested in establishing guidelines to ensure that advertising does not make its way into online editorial content and that companies are held responsible for claims they are making which may or may not directly affect the public.  What they are attempting to regulate is known by the industry as Sponsored Conversation.

Sponsored Conversation has migrated to the online marketing space through social media content.  It is paid editorial content.  Sponsored Conversation was originally established as grass roots marketing efforts of the large corporation to the small business marketer.  It is cost effective and offers brand managers an avenue of direct communication with the consumer. It is also used in public relations online to manage online brands and increase consumer interest of products and services.  Sponsored Conversation is used in online reputation management and reverse SEO.

The migration of practices including questionable ethics in Sponsored Conversation is what initiated the new guidelines.  A few large social media marketing campaigns including political campaigns have used substandard guidelines within their efforts.  They have paid for placing mass comments within social media to divert the path of the conversation, enabling a positive spin to benefit the company or paying organization.

Company executives, brand managers, and politicians justify their practice by what guidelines offline media have also established.  We used the example of newsprint to make the analogy clear, but there are many examples which allow the lines of ethics to move.  The practice of product placement in movies and television, promotional sponsorships including celebrity clothing and product sponsorships establish some of the gray lines.  When is the last time our favorite golfer mentioned his clothing sponsorship on the 18th green or our favorite actor stopped a scene in a movie to establish that the product placed in the scene was actually a paid sponsorship?  So the debate continues, with reasonable question.

The practices used within the SEM SEO Formula include Sponsored Conversation to enable companies to directly communicate with the consumer.  Those practices are above board.  The consumer knows who is speaking to them.  Just as they do in offline sponsorships and product placement.

Social Media Marketing includes Article Marketing, Social Network Marketing, and creation of blog content, which are used to educate consumers on specific products or services. The practice also includes many bookmarking and tagging sites which allow social networking of friends, family and people of similar interests to communicate about a wide variety of products, services, concerns, and interests.

Social media marketing strategies work in every vertical market, for B2B marketing, consumer marketing and non profit organizations. In economic times we find today, social marketing applications are crucial to the overall marketing strategy and are necessary to engage customers to act in the very competitive markets.

A portion of the SEM SEO Expert Formula and what we use in best practices of search engine marketing will not be affected by the FTC guidelines.  The industry will be affected and driven to what will once again establish practices to offer the online consumer the highest quality content.

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Blog, ORM

Online Reputation Management Leveraged with Social Media Optimization28 Apr

Online Reputation Management, ORM, is the practice of managing an individual or business reputation within online media. Online media, including search engines, are managed to make positive information visible to the public and downplay any information which could negatively affect the individual or business. Reputations are earned. Years of hard work and building trust can be destroyed online, often anonymously. In this article you will learn why building, maintaining and protecting reputations has become as important online as it is offline. Learn how to manage your online reputation with online media optimization.

The advent of social media, communities, and networking sites, has been useful to many companies. They have positively affected the majority of businesses by allowing them to directly communicate with consumers about products and services they offer. However social media has also opened doors to malicious behavior of the minority, which has proven to be damaging to individual and corporate reputations. Individuals and the small business to the fortune 500 companies have been harmed by malicious online postings. Part of this pain is self inflicted and some is the handiwork of unhappy customers, disgruntled former employees or chronic complainers. There are several rules to remember while posting online, which assist with online reputation management:

  • The positioning of a company or individual within social media, communities, and network profiles and comments, is indexed by search engines. Indexed pages can be cashed in search engine files infinitely. Any text associated to your name can be found now and for years to come.

· The content and images posted become public domain. On many websites, including Facebook, when signing up, you grant the social community site the right to use your photographs. The following text is listed in Facebook Terms of Use:

“By posting User Content to any part of the Site, you automatically grant, and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant, to the Company an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, publicly perform, publicly display, reformat, translate, excerpt (in whole or in part) and distribute such User Content for any purpose, commercial, advertising, or otherwise, on or in connection with the Site or the promotion thereof, to prepare derivative works of, or incorporate into other works, such User Content, and to grant and authorize sublicenses of the foregoing.”

  • Never post photographs or content that you would not want the world to see. Remember the world includes current and future employers, parents, and current or future spouses. It is not as easy to delete this information as you would like to believe. This is also from the Terms of Use on Facebook:

“You may remove your User Content from the Site at any time. If you choose to remove your User Content, the license granted above will automatically expire, however you acknowledge that the Company may retain archived copies of your User Content.”

After interviewing prospective employees, it has become a standard practice to go online and Google the applicant. It is also the practice of individuals interviewing to research the employer. Negative information associated to an individual name or corporate entity could cause a prospective employer or employee harm. In a 2007 survey conducted by Execunet, an online community of C-level executives, 83% of recruiters used search engines to learn more about candidates. Of those, 43% were eliminated based on information found online. “For better or worse, the Internet provides recruiters and employers with a wealth of unfiltered information that’s used to help evaluate candidates,” says Dave Opton, CEO and Founder of ExecuNet. “From a candidate’s perspective, there’s no question that managing your reputation online is as important as it is offline.”

Due to the number of people who use search engines as a research tool, online reputation management is becoming a big industry. Ruthless competitors and angry clients now have open access to blogs and web sites. They can define a person or company’s online identity. Their words have far reaching effects- whether they are true or not.

This is why ORM is necessary. Because it is difficult, if not impossible, to eliminate traces of thoughtless actions or malicious attacks on the web, online reputation firms disseminate positive information on their clients. The goal in online reputation management is to bring public attention to positive blogs, articles and other online media written on behalf of the company. The positive online publicity takes the higher search engine result rankings, thus minimizing the damage of any attack.

About The SEM & SEO Experts

With over 20 years of marketing experience and 10 years of refining search engine optimization formulas, using hundreds of case studies, Rostin Reagor Smith has established an SEM and SEO formula, unique to the online marketing industry:

This search engine marketing formula establishes an effective network to drive online traffic of interested buyers. Using organic search engine ranking techniques, Rostin Reagor Smith works with hundreds of online resources, including but not limited to social marketing, social bookmarking, and online social community websites to rapidly increase search engine rankings of your website.

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Rostin Reagor Smith defines Search Engine Marketing. Unique to the world of SEO Consulting, we are strategists who understand online behavior. We apply our knowledge of the online world to reach the people who will respond and ultimately bring business, sales and profit to our clients.

Find alternatives to paid internet marketing and keyword advertising here. Contact us for Local, Regional, and National SEO Consulting and Internet Marketing Solutions. Get ranked with this unique seo consulting formula, using search engine optimization, search engine marketing, and social marketing. Drive qualified buyers and start making money online today!