Since the dawn of the age of the search engine, companies have been concerned with their online reputations. The wrong results when potential clients and customers enter a company name into Google can destroy an enterprise, leading many to opt for what has since become known as reputation management service. In essence, it’s a professional effort at diminishing the search value of negative content about a business entity, and boosting the value of positive content.
However, this service ought to be a last resort. The best reputation management strategy is no replacement for authentically reputable business practices. Here are the major ways to boost your reputation from within, rather than seeking to manipulate it after the fact:
Cleanliness
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Spot free walls, sparkling windows, clean floors, and clutter free tabletops are all vital for maintaining a respectable reputation. It has little to do with “being proper” and everything to do with projecting a positive image. Cleanliness suggests a business is in control, focused, fresh, new, and engaging. In all, it amounts to a better reputation than companies with a dirty office or factory floor.
Organization
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One step away from cleanliness is organization. Companies with poor file tracking, data entry, and scheduling give off a bad vibe. Conversely, being on the ball with information and points of reference sends a signal of authority, experience, and trustworthiness. Services such as those provided by Kore.com aim to automate and streamline the function of reliable data tracking and communication, giving business leaders a straightforward option in getting organized. A company with evident organizational skills radiates a worthy reputation.
Productivity
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Potential clients and customers are often concerned with the rate at which results can be accomplished. While every industry is different, the bottom line is that business leaders ought to follow through when making a vow to provide product and/or service within a specific span of time. Tweak productivity through a variety of ways to help build up a solid reputation, but don’t forget the foundation rests on an accurate time frame offered to clients and customers. If the work is good, the time itself won’t matter much so far as reputation management is concerned: folks tend to want to know a realistic completion date rather than be fed ideal but ultimately unlike outcomes.
Honesty
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As previously mentioned, false narratives about future results don’t get a small business very far. Even if the product or service is inevitably delivered, clients and customers will remember it was late. In short, stick to the truth, even if it’s not what the client or customer wants to hear. The tarnishing of a business reputation is much less severe in cases where the truth albeit undesirable truth is provided than in cases where business leaders conceal realities to keep their clients and customers happy.
Integrity
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You can be the most honest business leader on the planet and not have an ounce of integrity throughout your entire being. The difference between honesty and integrity in the business world is that to have integrity; a company must be consistent in addition to being transparent. Changes in the way the chips fall ought not incite sudden changes in policy and planning; constantly adjusting a game plan because of consistently selfish reasons spells out one thing: selfishness. While all businesses are, of course, in it for themselves, they aren’t going to last long if they depend on others but simultaneously alienate them with self-centered course changes.
Business leaders are obsessed with reputation management these days. However, too much attention is paid toward the virtual image of a brand as projected by search engine results. The organic path towards building a positive business reputation are quickly being forgotten. Luckily the aforementioned list serves to be a reminder that there’s more to a business reputation than manipulating the top ten results on Google.