Reputation Management: Q&A With Professionals

Today we have a question and answer to help educate the general public about the online reputation management in 2020, the affects the industry is seeing as a result of COVID-19, and how the ORM industry has changed over the last 10 years. We have Nick Cuttonaro and Richart Ruddie providing helpful information.

How Is COVID-19 Affecting the Online Reputation Management Industry?

Nick: I’ve seen a lot of instances where CEO’s and companies have needed to make difficult decisions to let employees and vendors go as a result of COVID-19 impacting their businesses. As a result of not approaching the matter with dignity and leadership, they’ve negativity impacted their own reputation and brand.

Those CEO’s and brands may find it difficult to re-hire or reengage previous relationships as a result of how they approached COVID-19 related challenges and those stories may still be on search and social for years after returning to back to a cycle where it’s business as usual.

Richart: You would think as the world slows down so would the reputation management industry. The tech industry is resilient as we’re used to being mobile and all employees have transitioned to working remotely. Surprisingly though business is picking up. Everything from major players wanting our help on how they have responded and acted in the face of the Corona Virus Pandemic to law firms and leaders wanting our help to market themselves to stand out from the competition. Fortunately, at this time we have not seen any signs of slowing.

So is the Reputation Management Industry Recession Proof?

Nick:

As long as people are utilizing the Internet (search and social) to obtain information about individuals and companies, there will be a need to consider online reputation management and how people and brands are perceived online.

Richart:

We transition and roll with the changes in industry. Think of a
hurricane coming. Who benefits from this? The Weather Channel, Home Depot, Grocery Stores, Tree Trimmers, and Landscaping companies. So what’s the correlation with reputation management? We shift with the times. As one industry goes away another industry sprouts up. As Nick said above those not acting in the best interest of their employees health at this time are seeing backlash and are coming to us for help to straighten out their message and guide them for best PR practices.

In 2011 we were assisting companies in the foreclosure defense industry something that was nearly non-existent 4 years earlier. Every year we see new businesses pop up that have a need for our services as online reviews has continued to grow in importance.

What is the biggest change you’re seeing in search in 2020 compared to 5 and 10 years ago?

Nick:

Personalized search results and location-based search have improved tremendously over the years. For example, if you’re searching for a particular law firm in Eugene, Oregon from that locale there’s a strong likelihood you’ll see different search results if you were located in Miami and looking to engage an attorney in that area to work on a case.

Also, depending on the previous queries you’ve made and your behavior when interacting with previous SERP results there might be some degree of variance where particular search results would or would not appear on Page 1 results depending on the search locale.

Richart:

Every year search continues to change and it’s important in reputation management that we follow those changes and react to keep our clients best interests in mind. The biggest changes today are the Google Accordion and the Rich Snippets that appear for queries. Resolving these sometimes troubling results for clients wasn’t even possible 10 years ago because it didn’t exist.

Today if an accordion pops up you can battle that content with more enhanced content or a trick that worked recently for a big client was getting the content removed and it immediately removed the negative accordion result.

Do you Remember How Depending Clients Used To be on the Yellow Pages?

Nick:

Yes. The world has changed so much since those days and discoverability is much better today.

Richart:

When business was expanding in 2011 I remember the bulk of clients saying how back in their day they used to just pay for placement in the Yellow Pages and today that’s starting to become Google as the digital phone book.

Most millennials don’t know what a phone book is and just showcases how rapidly things move from once dominant players in local advertising.

What’s The Newest Trend That’s Discouraging

Nick:

While many campaigns are positive in nature and genuinely helpful, there’s been an overwhelming amount of people utilizing charitable crowdfunding websites such as GoFundMe.com for questionable personal campaigns.

Richart:

Definitely these spammy phone calls I get all day with these alleged “Google Approved Advertisers”. Outside of those annoying calls our agency finds that these cheater and complaint sites are becoming more and more prominent while the Mugshot and arrest record websites are becoming less prominent in the search results. It feels like a game of whack a mole in removing some negatives as there are so many copy cat websites and it’s like spinning plates working to remove them all because of a few bad actors over seas.

What’s The Biggest Change in Costs Over the last decade?

Nick:

Quality content (video production, especially) has increased in terms of price (editing) and the amount of time to produce. Over the past decade, the camera equipment that’s now used to film didn’t exist so that’s all new costs to consider when trying to compete on video platforms today where both content quality and production value matter.

Richart:

We continue to thrive by delivering Google users a high quality user experience by creating relevant and authoritative content and ranking that above unwanted search results. What’s deterring is the cost to deliver high quality writing and placements. A decade ago we could take any spam and social media results and fire off blog comments and xrumer links.

Wait a few weeks and then it would rank. Now the methods that worked then don’t and automation isn’t going to deliver that high quality user experience which all costs more and the clients tend to also absorb those costs.

Why is Online Reputation Management More Important Now Than it Was 10 years Ago?

Nick:

There are more screens and devices everywhere you look which are connected to the Internet. With phones, tablets, televisions, laptops, desktops, voice commanded search, etc. there are more pieces of technology today which can share information about you and your business to anyone seeking information.

Also, people have been conditioned on how to utilize the technology for optimal search results and more people across all age groups utilizing elements of search and social media to make more informed decisions. Fake news is a serious issue and search engines often prioritize controversial content as people are inclined to click.

Online reputation management is more important than ever before as reputation should be considered an asset which requires care, attention, energy, and effort to maintain and project.

Richart:

Simple. How much time do you spend on your smart phone now than you did before? We’re addicted to our phones and we’re constantly researching any business that we’re dealing with. We obsess over our clients success and that’s why we have an incredibly strong referral network of satisfied clients from all over the world. 

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