Reputation management

The word "reputation management," which was first used in the context of public relations, describes the process of influencing, managing, promoting, or hiding the reputation of a person, a group, or an organisation. Search engine results are an essential component of a customer's overall reputation, which contributed to the expansion of reputation management businesses as the internet and other social media platforms gained popularity. The control of a company's product and service listings inside search engines is the primary emphasis of online reputation management, often known as ORM (also abbreviated as ORM). The practise of removing mug shots from the internet, astroturfing customer review sites, suppressing complaints, and using search engine optimization strategies to affect results are all examples of grey zones in the ethical realm. In some situations, the ethical boundaries are quite evident; for example, certain organisations that manage people's reputations have strong ties to websites that broadcast untrue and defamatory remarks about individuals. These dishonest businesses demand a payment of several thousand dollars in order to temporarily delete the offending postings from their websites.

Because of developments in areas such as the internet, social media, and the rise of reputation management firms, the public relations industry has seen significant expansion in recent years. The general appearance of search results has become an essential component of what constitutes "reputation," and the maintenance of one's reputation now falls into two distinct categories: online reputation management and offline reputation management.

The control of product and service search results inside the digital environment is the primary emphasis of online reputation management. As a consequence, it is not uncommon to see the same recommended links on the first page of a Google search because of this concentration. Many online communities and electronic marketplaces, such as e-Bay and Amazon, have ORM systems built in. By using efficient control nodes, these systems may reduce the danger and safeguard systems from potential misuses and abuses caused by hostile nodes in decentralised overlay networks.

The goal of offline reputation management is to achieve a desired result that ideally reflects how stakeholders think and feel about an organisation by shaping the public's perception of that organisation outside of the realm of digital technology using a select number of controls and measures that have been clearly defined. In the realm of off-line reputation management, the most often used controls are social responsibility, media exposure, press releases in print media, and sponsorship, amongst other instruments in the same category.

In the 2010s, marketing a firm and promoting their goods online have both become significant components of successful business plans. Companies are making efforts to be more conscious of how their audiences, both inside and outside of their target market, have the tendency to view them. One issue that often develops as a result of this is deceptive marketing. In the past, the majority of businesses and their customers would have found the idea that customers might contribute to a firm via online postings and blogs to be unfathomable. However, because of the way the algorithms on social media function, it is becoming more difficult to be seen and become successful within the domain of online business or among influencers. This is due to the increased number of rivals as well as the increased amount of clutter.

Management of a company's reputation is a kind of marketing strategy that may be used to either generate a new reputation for a business or to rebuild one that has been damaged.