I. Sadiq Gill Keirin: Online Reputation Management

By I. Sadiq Gill Keirin

The best time to do online reputation management is when you don't need
online reputation management.

Whether you like it or not, people  –  customers, prospects, competitors
and haters –  are talking about your business and its products and
services on the Internet.

They're writing blogs.

They're commenting on forums.

They're writing reviews, some of which are written only to cause you harm.

They're asking their Facebook friends about you.

They're complaining about the tiniest details on Twitter.

Are you listening?

Before you are forced to react to an immediate online reputation
management (ORM) issue, you must be proactive in establishing a strong
reputation on the Internet.

If you're not actively reviewing your online reputation and you don't
have a plan in place, then you're setting yourself –  and your business
–  up for disaster.

Don't worry. It's never too late to get started. Even if some damage has
already been done (i.e., bad reviews, negative comments, etc.), you can
create a plan to begin mending a few "fences" and moving forward.

The first steps to being proactive with your online reputation are as
follows: check for current damage, make repairs if necessary, and then
take action to become more assertive and engaging with your online audience.

Step One: Check your personal and professional online history.

Begin with simple Google searches of your name. Check for previous
addresses, photos, videos, comments, etc., connected to your name.
Sources such as www.123people.com are excellent tools for reviewing your
personal history. Make sure you check your full legal name, too (e.g.,
search for “Robert A. Smith” instead of just “Bob Smith”).

Always check Facebook. Facebook is a potential source of personal and
professional disasters, such as that which may occur when someone from
your college days decides to post a picture of you getting hammered at a
toga party.

If your company has other executives (president, vice president, etc.)
or a board of directors, check their personal and professional online
history as well. One Midwestern company is currently catching some grief
from local media (and customers) because a member of its board of
directors made an unpopular move with a separate company he owned. His
online reputation has put the company he advises in an uncomfortable
situation.

Step Two: Research your company name and brand.

After performing basic searches in Google, create Google Alerts (free
service) so that you’ll be alerted via e-mail anytime someone mentions
your company name or brand online.

Be sure to conduct initial searches on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and
YouTube, as well.

You can also sign up for paid services that will monitor your company’s
online reputation activity – good or bad – and notify you of any events
within the hour.

Step Three: Repair any damage, if necessary.

As a result of your research, you may discover that your reputation has
already suffered a little damage online. This might include bad or fake
reviews, forum comments, Twitter posts about poor service, etc.

Depending on the amount of damage, you might be able to respond to each
negative comment or review   in a professional manner. In some cases, a
simple (but sincere) apology will go a long way to show that you are
willing to fix the problem. This will also give potential customers the
impression that you’re an engaged business owner who will listen and
respond to customers.

If the damage is more serious – bad press, court proceedings, lawsuits,
legal matters, etc. – then you should consider working with an online
reputation management professional or service to help you rebuild your
online reputation. Keep in mind, however, that repairing a badly damaged
reputation is a slow process, requiring a lot of time and work.

Step Four: Write awesome content for your website.

You can start improving your online reputation and online audience
engagement by writing and providing better content on your website.
Articles and white papers offer more information about your products and
services. Write and post a “Frequently Asked Questions” document that
answers some common questions about your company.

Write and share up-to-date information on your company’s blog. Plan on
posting one (or more) blog posts per week; you’re not going to seem very
engaged if you only post once a month. Here, you can share industry
news, opinions, brief overviews of articles and white papers (with links
pointing to where customers can find them on your website), and more.
Encourage and allow readers to comment on your blog. Start a conversion
with them on your blog.

Step Five: Get busy with social media.

Like it or not, you’re going to have to join the social media club.

Again, your customers and potential customers are talking about your
company and its products and services on Facebook, Twitter and other
social networks. You should be there to “listen” and engage them in
conversation.

Bad news can travel fast on social media. However, people appreciate it
when someone listens to their complaints about a product or service and
helps them solve their problems. You can regularly check on your social
media reputation management status with the help of an ORM subscription
service, or you can become more proactive by creating Twitter searches
and filters on targeted keywords.

Don’t wait for something bad to happen. Get involved now. Answer
questions on social media, even if it doesn’t result in a sale. Show
that you are willing to help and educate.

Remember, your reputation’s at stake.

Imran Sadiq Gill Keirin - Introduction to Content Marketing (Part II)

By Imran Sadiq Gill Keirin

In Part 1 of this series, we discussed why quality content is important for SEO and how to use social media as a distribution channel to get your best content out to your audience. In Part 2, we’ll outline how you’re going to produce all that great content.

The first, and easiest, way to produce content for your website is to repurpose some of your existing content. For example, you may have an article on your website that you wrote a couple years ago and maybe that article just needs to be updated. This way, you don’t need to start from scratch. 

Besides updating old articles, you can also repurpose content by converting podcasts, reports or white papers into blog posts. Say you have a white paper, for example. Maybe you can break that white paper up into ten blog posts. Genius! You can also mention in the blog post that this particular tip is from this white paper, and provide a link to download the white paper. You never know -- maybe your white papers will start getting downloaded more if you repurpose content in this way!

You also probably have content that you have that you’ve never used. Maybe you have a video on YouTube but you don’t have a link on your website to pull that video in. Or, maybe the video’s on your website but it’s not in your blog. You may have separate followings for your site and blog, so be sure to post (or link to) your best content in both.

Now, what about all the writing? Let’s say that you’ve repurposed all of your existing content and now you need some fresh content. How about starting a blog? Although blogging requires a lot of writing, it shouldn’t be hard to find guest bloggers. There are many bloggers in your industry who would be happy to write a guest blog for you in exchange for a link back to their website or blog. Now, you have free content.

You can also get your whole staff involved in writing your blog. Maybe each month, X number of people on your staff is responsible for writing one blog post. They might just enjoy it!

Need more help to produce blog posts, articles, press releases, etc.? Don’t be afraid to hire freelance writers. There are a lot of good freelance writers out there for hire. And you don’t necessarily have to pay them a lot. Find them on Elance.com, Guru.com, Craigslist, or a number of other sites that connect freelance writers with employers. You may make a good connection with a freelance writer that you can use on a regular basis.

So, start filling in your content holes. Determine what your website is missing. Is it press releases? Videos? Infographics? Podcasts? A blog? Next, determine who will write the content. You? Your staff? Freelancers? Get your team together. Then, create an editorial calendar for the next six to twelve months. 

Make sure all content is keyword-optimized and distributed via your social media channels. Once you have good content and start distributing it, monitor your analytics. See how many people are coming to look at that content. Is your strategy working? Are your rankings going up?

Imran Sadiq Gill Keirin - Introduction to Content Marketing (Part I)

By Imran Sadiq Gill Keirin

Does your firm have “sticky content” for effective content marketing? Anybody can write an article, write a blog post or make a video. But what’s going to make your web content really pop and get people’s attention? 

Great, “sticky” content is content that is unique and it solves a problem. Junk content is, well, the opposite of those things. SEO rewards great content and punishes junk content. Not too long ago, 

Google rolled out an algorithm update that was called Panda. Panda was specifically designed to 
reward websites that followed value-added content recommendations. It also punished those websites that didn’t offer any value or they published junk content. 


Examples of junk content include poorly-written content, duplicate content and content produced via software or services called “content scrapers.” These packages scour the Internet for articles on a particular topic, scrape a sentence or two out of each one, and put it together to form “an article.” 

Even if your content was keyword-optimized, if it was “scraped,” it was punished by Google Panda.


You’ve probably heard the expression, “Content is king.” But when it comes to SEO, is it really? The answer is yes. Content has an 82 percent impact on search results. So if you’re not writing great content for your website, whether it’s articles, or videos, or pictures, or graphics, or presentations, then you’re focusing on the wrong things. (After content, by the way, the most important SEO factor is link building. So, it would be true to say, “Content is king; link building is queen.”)


Consider that while social media impacts search results, it’s far less important than content when it comes to search engine marketing -- social media only has a seven percent impact on search results. 

While you should have social media profiles, you shouldn’t maintain these profiles at the expense of your website. Use them in conjunction with your website content, to promote your “stickiest” stuff.


When you write new content for your website, or upload new videos, graphics or articles, use use social media as a content distribution channel. Publish links to your best content on Twitter, Facebook, etc. If you’re regularly publishing good, useful content, i.e., newsletters, press releases, blog posts, free downloads, etc., you’ll be able to market those items on social media to earn more traffic to your website. 


Find out more content marketing tips in Part 2 of this series!