Reputation management has taken a step forward. A quality approach to work is not only to clean up the search results as soon as the reputation is already in trouble.
Companies must be aware that all their actions must lead to well-established testimonials, which can significantly impact the perception of their brand.
This article will analyze how to work on the site’s reputation, namely SERM.
What is SERM?
SERM (Search Engine Reputation Management) is reputation management in search engine results (Bing, Google, and others). It is a set of measures aimed at creating a positive image of the company/brand/personality/product at the TOP of the issue. It includes increasing the volume of positive content and pushing harmful content out of the first positions of search results (usually outside the TOP 20 — on the third pages of search engines).
In other words, SERM reputation management studies the first pages of search engines.
Sites with a positive are displayed at the top of the search results, and pages and sites with a negative are forced out. As a result, people do not see negative reviews and defamatory information when searching for targeted queries. It is achieved through competent PR campaigns, hidden marketing, SEO promotion, and ORM activity.
Features of the SERM system
Reputation management SERM involves the control of mentions of the company with an emphasis on the sites of the first pages of search results.
As a rule, managed platforms move to the first positions — it is easier for discussions in them to set the desired tone and vector.
As in the case of ORM, the effectiveness of SERM activities only makes sense in conjunction with problem-solving “on the ground.”
Even if SERM specialists work out with high quality and push the negative about your company out of the TOPs, it will return over time if you do not eliminate the causes of its appearance.
Quality online reputation management is much more than replacing negative posts with positive ones.
For example, suppose you want to increase the number of sales using SERM management. In that case, MANGO OFFICE call tracking will help you analyze your advertising campaigns’ effectiveness and understand why you need to change your marketing strategy and why something works and doesn’t.
It will allow you to understand at what stage customers are “lost” when switching from which sources they call with complaints, up to the entered request at the beginning of the session. You will be able to act pointwise in “problem” areas and neutralize the causes, increasing the effectiveness of SERM and ORM marketing.
SERM management also forms the image of specific services or products. Call recording will come to the rescue if people call you about a promotion, but you still can’t close the deal — an option provided in the MANGO OFFICE PBX.
Listening to the conversations of your managers with “fallen off” clients, you will understand what exactly stops them, what worries them, and what is incomprehensible. Using this data, you can effectively adjust the marketing strategy of a particular product, resegment the audience and increase sales. It will also make SERM and ORM events more effective.
Another feature of SERM marketing is multi-directionality. Search results are checked in several directions — not only for pure branded queries but also for many target combinations.
This approach gives greater control over the reputational field of the company in the TOP 20.
Pros of SERMs
Pros of Searching Engine Reputation Management:
- the formation of a favorable reputation of the company in the first positions of search results — the first thing a potential client sees when searching for you on the Internet;
- neutralization of the negative about the brand in the issue;
- identification of problems with the service/product.
A separate advantage of SERM management is that actions are aimed at users at the last stage of the sales funnel.
The person is specifically interested in you, your product. And if you have an impeccable reputation on the first pages of Google and Yandex, this client is yours.
Cons of SERMs
- SERM is more effective when a bad brand background is replaced by a good one. It is possible to encourage real customers to write positive reviews, but this is a long process. And custom reviews can repel potential customers.
- SERM is effective only in combination with ORM. Separately working out the TOP of search results while ignoring other aspects of online reputation management is a road to nowhere. Therefore, SERM should be considered only as one of the elements of creating a company’s image within the framework of ORM; this technology is not a panacea.
- The first pages of search results are dynamic — even if you have worked through “today’s” Top 20, harmful sites can seep into the leading positions after a while. Perhaps tomorrow. Therefore, SERM requires constant analysis of Sereputation; this is not a one-time event like ORM.
Who is SERM suitable for?
- Brands
- Products
- Companies
- Websites
- Public people (singers, actors, football players, politicians, etc.)
Conclusion
Turning to specialized agencies to remove the negative from all sites will not be difficult. But you need to understand that people believe more in the negative and have a very peculiar attitude towards positive reviews, but they are stingy on this score.
If there are too many positive reviews about your company/product, people will immediately understand that they are custom-made.
That is why SERM is a massive effort to improve the reputation of your business.
If you want to learn about your reputation and improve it, you can’t do without the help of qualified companies.
Creating a successful image of your company, monitoring and improving search results, and communicating with users are needed to keep the information field clean.
