Mastering Search Engine Reputation Management (SERM)

As company assets go, it’s hard to disagree that reputation is and always has been central to brand success, yet it is rapidly increasing in importance. Word spreads faster than ever, and the public perception of your business can instantaneously frame all other qualities of your brand in a positive or negative light, regardless of their individual merit. Now that 63.3% of the public tend to refer to online reviews before pulling the trigger on a purchase, what Google throws up when a consumer searches your name can be an instant dealbreaker.

What is Search Engine Reputation Management?

SERM represents a multi-pronged approach to managing a business’s online presence and achieving strong visibility in search engine results. The chief use of SERM is to give a brand more control over what potential buyers see when searching for a company’s products or services and how its content is perceived.

By enabling a business to shape the positive narrative around the r brand, SERM helps populate search engine results with genuine, favorable, and useful information for consumers. This allows consumers to become more familiar with a particular brand's products and lay the first building blocks of trust in the brand.

Place yourself in the shoes of a consumer looking for a new pair of work boots. They have seen a brand online that they like the look of and are competitively priced, but details are sparse, and online reviews and testimonials are non-existent, so they keep searching.

A second contender is found on the same page of search results. However, the search results are led by news articles about a product recall and consumer reviews complaining about poor customer service and shipping delays.

Consumers likely won’t choose any of these brands and will keep searching.

From the perspective of the work boot brands, both these situations could have been avoided through the proper use of SERM. 

Why is SEO Reputation Management Important?

SEO reputation management matters because search engine results are the number one source of information about a brand and its products. Your brand’s presence on Google is its most visible and worth mentioning free billboard, so what search results say about your business can generate exponential sales or lead to a poor reputation and diminished credibility.

According to this PissedConsumer survey, 63.3% of consumers always read reviews before making a purchase, and 55.8% use Google as their source for online reviews. Clearly, search results carry a lot of weight in forming consumer perceptions and purchasing decisions.

What’s more, search result placement has a huge impact on income traffic. The first three search results get 68.7% of all clicks on the Google Search page, and the top result gets 27.6% of clicks.

Dismissing SERM, therefore, will have a marked detrimental impact on business prospects. Mounting poor feedback will wash away any trust in a brand and, by that, ruin its reputation. Yet, whilst this may sound terminal, few cases are so far gone that they won’t benefit from the regained control that a sound SERM strategy will grant a business that’s lost its way.

Key Benefits of Search Engine Reputation Management

Online reputation management through effective use of SERM will bring your business several benefits and advantages:

Increased consumer confidence

69% of surveyed consumers say that good reviews make them feel positive about a brand. Build up trust in your brand by cultivating a large base of customer reviews that show prospective customers how important customer satisfaction is to your business. 

Bolster brand image

Drive and reinforce a positive brand image by populating search results with consistent, positive feedback and content that inspires consumer confidence.

Damage control

Minimize the impact of negative content and reviews with SERM strategies that suppress the visibility of harmful search results without censorship or removal of reviews.

Boost online visibility and brand awareness

Increase visibility and prominence across search engine results and pertinent platforms and make it easier for potential customers to find your products. A more detailed look at how to measure brand awareness can be found here.

Tips for Effective Search Engine Reputation Management

Keep a watchful eye over your online presence

Effective reputation management is built upon a keen awareness of your brand’s online interactions and mentions. This entails consistent, continuous trawling for social media mentions, online reviews of your business, and any other content that speaks of your brand.

To this end, a good reputation analysis toolkit will include staples such as setting up Google Alerts for your brand name and popular products, and utilizing monitoring services that enable you to keep up to date on what people are saying about your brand without being bogged down by endless searching.

This finger on the pulse positioning that round the clock monitoring allows enables your brand to respond to comments as they emerge and, by that, nip any potential problems in the bud before they snowball.

Check here to learn more about how to conduct a reputation analysis.

Publish positive content 

A major component of SERM is the generation and dissemination of quality, SEO optimized content that not only presents your brand in a positive light, but is genuinely informative and useful to consumers.

Through keyword research you can identify the common search terms that your target market is using, and focus your efforts on creating content that specifically concerns these terms or answers common questions. Such content could be articles, blog posts, instructional guides – anything that engages the public with the positive goals of your brand.

Always respond promptly to online reviews and comments 

Be they good or bad, online reviews and public comments about your brand are an opportunity to engage and display good customer service. SERM succeeds with a positive, proactive mindset towards online criticism that sees your customer service team respond promptly, professionally, and empathetically.

A cheery thank you followed by an invite to get in touch if they need any help is a great way to engage with positive reviews. Negative reviews on the other hand require a procedure that should generally go as follows: Thank the customer for bringing the issue to your attention, acknowledge that the issue exists, clarify in your own words, offer an immediate solution, if possible, if not, outline the action you will take to arrive at one.

Read here for a complete rundown on how to respond to reviews.

Make the most of social media and review platforms

Review platforms are authoritative websites for Google. It’s often the case when reviews are ranked higher than the company’s website. 

Second to the Google search, social media and consumer review platforms are where the public will get their first impression of your brand. Review platforms are particularly influential, as their authority often ranks higher in search than a company’s own website.

So, integral to a good SERM strategy is the active and effective use of such. Use your company’s presence on major SM and online review platforms like Facebook, PissedConsumer, LinkedIn and X to post regular updates and content on matters that will impact your customers, as well as to keep them in the loop about upcoming sales and promotions. 

Social media is also where you have the best opportunity to improve your reputation through active engagement with mentions, comments and queries concerning your brand.

Optimize your Google My Business profile

Keeping your Google My Business profile up to date and, importantly, accurate will improve your search engine rankings and thus brand visibility. Present the essential information about your business clearly and succinctly to contribute to a positive customer experience.

Monitor competitors

Insight into how the competition manages the obstacles you mutually encounter will bolster your own strategies for dealing with them. Carry out an in-depth analysis of the other players in your industry which scrutinizes their online review strategy, social media methods and other solutions to general issues that are commonplace in your field. This will also uncover any pros and cons present in your competitors’ approaches, and by that pinpoint any areas that show potential for your brand to gain a competitive advantage.

More info on applying industry benchmarks and competitor analysis can be found here.

Regularly adjust your strategy

For SERM to show its true potential, long-term investment is required, as well as consistent evaluation and re-evaluation. The best results won’t be immediate, as continuous improvement will be what builds sustainable successes and a solid reputation.

Patience is your main asset here. Proper insight into customer sentiment as well as market demands will give you the facts you need to make data driven changes to your SERM that work as well as a resilience to evolving market conditions.

Elevate Your Brand with SERM

SERM puts your business in the driving seat and hands you control over your online narrative. Get your target audience’s eyes on your business, be seen the way you want to be seen, and establish yourself as the number one brand in your industry.

Reputation management is the solution for many struggling brands. Still, it shouldn’t be seen as a quick-fix solution, however, as SERM an ongoing process that requires patience, continuous adaptation, and a commitment to learn and adapt.