Social Media and Your Online Reputation

Which Social Media Site Should You Use to Market Your Business Online?

Social media is a great way to locally market your business online. You can interact with your current and potential clients over things of mutual interest, promote upcoming deals, offer special online savings, or even highlight your role in the community. 

There are MANY social media websites to choose from, but you do not have to be on all of them. Plan on choosing one or two that on which you feel you can remain active and focus on those. 

Different businesses will do better on different social media platforms - to help you choose, let's look at the characteristics of some of the major sites:

• Facebook - Using a Facebook page allows you to post comments or pictures, share articles of interest, promotional deals, and to show upcoming events or activities of your business or staff. If you choose to use a Facebook business page, plan on posting an average of twice each week and to read and respond to any comments you get from others viewing your page. You can expand your Facebook marketing by offering deals or having contests to get the most "likes" on a page or post. 
• Google+ - Similar to Facebook, Google+ is a place to connect with current clients, but it is also directly linked to your Google My Business listing which displays in search results anytime a potential client is looking for products or services related to what you offer. Having your Google My Business listing up to date is important whether or not you choose to be active on your Google+ page. People visiting your Google+ page will be able to see your posts and pictures, read reviews of your business, and even write a review of their own. 
• Twitter - Unlike Facebook and Google, Twitter is a faster paced social media site. Posts are required to be short (no more than 140 characters in length) and are meant to convey something currently taking place. People active on Twitter often post multiple times each day. If you decide to have both a Facebook and Twitter page, you can link your Facebook to automatically post on Twitter, but it is not recommended to have your Twitter feed post automatically to Facebook as there are usually too many Tweets which Facebook users tend to find annoying. 
• Pinterest - This social media website operates on a more visual level. Pinners post pictures they have found across the web with a link for more information. Your business can use a Pinterest account to post a picture from your website that may give tips or interesting information for people. The link to your website will drive traffic your direction while promoting your business' offerings. 

Obviously, there are many more social media websites to consider and you will want to find the ones that work best for you.

Remember, Impressions Review Managing is here to help!  Check more of our blog articles, our website, or contact our friendly team today!

SEO - Not Hide and Seek

Search Engine Optimization: "Dressing" Up Your Website

Have you ever dressed your child in a bright or wild color so you could find them on the playground? We do something similar when we develop your website - dress it up just right - so that the major search engines can find and display it to people looking for your business services and products. 

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is meant to help the major search engines, (Google, Yahoo, and Bing) to find and display your website when people are searching for the kind of information your site provides. After all, what good is a website if no-one can find it?

Back to our example... Think of the internet as a massive playground with trees, swings, climbing spaces, teeter totters, slides, and kids. Kids of every shape and size running, skipping, jumping, and playing everywhere. How do you go about finding your child?

• Physical appearance - You would likely start by looking for physical characteristics like size, shape, hair color, clothes... all of these are your way of optimizing your search. Search engine optimization looks at the physical appearance of your website too - how long are the pages (not too long, not too short), are there links on the pages, headings, pictures, navigation tools. 
• Searching - To find your child, you may have to crawl through the play equipment looking for your child's characteristics. Search engines crawl through your website looking for keywords and phrases that identify your written content, your business services, and your physical location. 
• Calling out - As you search for your child, you will probably call out and listen for their familiar voice in response knowing that, even if you can't see your child, you will be able to hone in on their location by their voice. The search engines call out and look for information on the backside of your website - page titles, meta tags, meta descriptions - that help them hone in on just the right results to provide to searching customers. 

As parents, we prepare for playground situations by paying attention to the way we dress our children. If you set up your website with SEO in mind, your business will be highly visible online and the search engines will find it easy to match you with prospective clients. 

Remember, Impressions Review Managing is here to help whether you need to build or rework your website or enhance your online reputation. Contact our friendly team today!

Writing Your Website Content: Marketing Tips for SEO

Website Content Written for SEO​

Writing content for websites seems like it should be a simple thing. Focus on local marketing, provide the best information for your clients, make it professional but inviting, and you should be good to go. 

There was a time when that was enough, but then the major search engines were developed. To help the masses of people wanting to use the internet, they had to find a way to sift through the content on websites to provide the best search results. Writing content to fit what the search engines want is part of what is commonly called, SEO or Search Engine Optimization.

Many articles can and have been written on SEO and there are many pieces to the search engine algorithms, but some of the most important to keep in mind as you write your web content include:

• Page Length - Search engines look for average length web pages to rank highest in their results. Typically between 250 to 500 words is the optimum length.
• Headings - Knowing that headings often give a good summary of content, take care to write your headings with common search words included. Don't sacrifice the quality or readability of the page though!
• Links - The quality of a website in the eyes of the search engines also includes where you link to and who is linking to you. Provide both internal and external links on your webpages to increase your search engine standing.
• Readability - With many people using smart phones and tablets to search the Web, content written in short chunks is much easier to navigate than long paragraphs. Break up your work and use bullet points to help people skim your pages. 

Search Engine Optimization takes a lot of attention to detail, but the payoff can be significant. Remember that IRM is here to help!

Creating Your Own Website: Things to Consider

Can you create your own website? Sure you can - there are lots of programs (many of them free) and with a little tech knowledge and lot of time, you can put together a website that will give people your basic information. However, if you are creating your website for a business, there are some critical elements that you want to be able to address:

1. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) - Having a great website won't do you any good if the search engines cannot find it. SEO is the technical description of how a website is designed to match what Google, Yahoo, and Bing are looking for when their systems "crawl" through your website. A lot of SEO rides on the actual writing of the website, but there are coding and behind-the-scenes issues to be considered as well. Thankfully, much information is available online to help you with SEO too including articles that come straight from the horses' mouths - that is, written by Google, Bing, and Yahoo experts. 
2. Web-friendly content - In order for search engines to be "happy" with your page, your content has to be written in a very specific way. Google prefers a certain number of words per page depending on the page type, the content should have specific keywords included, headings need to be of the right type and style, the writing should be at about an 8th grade reading level, your location should be included, links are necessary, and the list goes on. 
3. Pictures and graphics - Your website will be much more attractive if you include pictures - just make sure you have permission to use them! If you have taken the pictures yourself, you are just fine, but just because you found the picture online doesn't mean that you can use it on your website - many copyright suits are based on this mistake. 
4. Business listings - Each of the three major search engines and all of the major online review websites create a business listing page specific for your business. You will want to take control of your your listings and ensure all of the information is up to date and includes the link to your website. There are many ways to use reviews to market your business, so be sure to read up on Online Reputation Managing (ORM) too.

Depending on your level of comfort with technology, you may be able to put together your own website with minimal support, but if you need more guidance, IRM would be happy to help you either with your website, your SEO, or your ORM. 

Digital Marketing for Dentists: WDA Conference

November is fast approaching and dentists in the Midwest will be gathering at the Wisconsin Dental Association's InSession Conference. In addition to learning about all of the latest research, techniques, services and products available to cutting-edge dental practices, participants will have the opportunity to advance their digital marketing impact.

Bring your laptops as we will be taking time to discuss how to evaluate your practice's current online presence, respond to reviews, build your reputation, and get your business listing up on Google+ and other major search engines and review sites. 

www.impressionsrm.com

Negative Reviews: An Inherited Mess

Negative reviews are tough enough to swallow, but harder still when they weren't your reviews - they belong to the previous business owner!

Negative Reviews Compliments of the Previous Business Owner

You were bright-eyed and idealistic as you bought a business that was struggling and you were determined to turn it around. Unfortunately, the business also had a reputation that you have inherited and it's hurting your online reputation and impacting the number of new customers willing to come through your doors. 

What should you do?

• Claim all of your review website pages - You need to have control over what is being displayed on these sites so that you can direct the conversation and reveal the changes and improvements you've made.
• Post a note on every one of the review websites that the business is under new ownership.
• Reply to the existing negative reviews - Express that you are sorry they had the experience that they did and let them know that you have purchased the business with the intent of improving the service and products offered. Let them know you don't approve of the treatment they received either and that you hope they will give you a chance to show how different the business will be. 
• Read ALL of the negative comments and use that feedback to guide your plans for improvement. 
• Start building your new reputation - As you have new happy clients, ask them to write reviews for you so that, when people go online, they see new comments and evidence that the new owners have turned the place around. 
• Monitor your review websites daily - Be sure to publicly thank the people who leave positive notes for you and to address any comments that voice concerns by offering to speak with the customer offline. 

Grow Your Reputation

As time goes on, your reputation will stand on its own and the memory of the previous business owner will fade. You have the choice of growing a solid reputation both online and off, but as is true with anything worth doing, it will take diligence. 

Claim your business listings, monitor for new reviews, and interact with customers who take the time to write reviews for you. Listen to your customers and use their feedback to positively impact your local online advertising!

www.impressionsrm.com 

Fake Reviews: Fooling Only Yourself

Writing fake reviews is not only unethical and illegal, it also hurts your reputation even worse than simply ignoring your online reviews.

Writing Fake Reviews

I just had an interaction with one of the nastiest business owners with whom I have had the misfortune to meet. He has numerous negative reviews on the web and refuses to accept what is being said by his clients on social media sites which really are not that bad of comments and could give him the tools he needs to make business improvements and significantly impact his influx of new customers. He is rude to those he deems beneath him and it shows in the interactions I have experienced and it is echoed in his online reviews.

Instead of making changes and using the feedback he is receiving, it appears he is writing and having others write fake reviews for him. The more I work with reviews, the easier it becomes to spot the fakes and his simply scream FAKE.

Obviously it's unethical. It's also been the subject of court cases by Yelp - cases they have won and that have resulted in hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines.

Recognizing Fake Reviews

How can you tell if a review is fake? Sometimes you can't, but when you see multiple reviews using language that's not common to everyone, it's a pretty good sign that the reviews are being written by someone or a few people who have insider knowledge about the industry for which they are writing. 

For example, when you see several reviews all posted in close time frame of each other and every one of them mentions a specific service or product being offered by that business, you could be seeing fake reviews:

• I love that this place has flexible hours.
• Isn't it great that the hours are so flexible?
• Their hours are way more flexible than ABC Business.
• Their flexible hours make it easy for me to visit them!

Handling Fake Reviews

So, if you think a series of reviews are fake, what should you do? 

Several of the review websites like Google+ and Yelp allow you to "flag" a review. You can click a button that looks like a flag and then you will be given some options on why you are flagging the review. It doesn't necessarily mean that the reviews will be removed, but the website is more likely to take a look and investigate further. They are also pretty good about letting you know if they agree with you and will remove the reviews or if they think there is not enough evidence to warrant removal. 

What's a Small Business To Do?

It IS frustrating when negative reviews are posted on websites and social media about your business. You pour your life into this business and oftentimes the review is not entirely based in fact. Negative reviews have a huge impact on sales and the temptation is to cheat a bit. 

Just like your offline reputation though, your online reputation will be in jeopardy if you choose to try to cheat your way to the top. Instead, you can take control of your online reputation and build it ethically into a solid representation of your quality products and services. 

Don't sell yourself short. Take control and use online reviews to advertise your excellence. No amount of fake reviews will overcome a true strong online presence.