An online brand can be compared to a tree falling in a forest. If you don’t know it’s there, then how do you know it’s crashing fast or standing proud?
As professional content writers will tell you, it’s nothing these days to find your online content stolen, blog comments crashed by hackers, or photos snatched with Grinch-like precision.
Yet, it’s so 2005 to go out and Google yourself, Paris Hilton style. Instead of looking like a schmutz, track your online reputation incognito using these nifty devices.
1. Monitoring With Mention
When it comes to accessible, comprehensive ways to keep track of your branding campaign and online reputation, it doesn’t get much better than Mention. It takes the guesswork out of keeping track of over a billion different signal sources, including social media posts, countless blogs, web forums, and more.
Setting Up Mention
You can vet Mention free for two weeks by signing up for a free trial. You don’t have to submit a credit card number, just your email address.
- Decide which type of Mention account is the right fit for you – Solo, Pro, or Pro Plus.
- Set up your first alert by selecting “add a new alert” from the left-hand column.
- Select the type of alert you want.
- Leverage the easy-to-use interface to enter keywords, create a search block, or build a query. (You can change or edit any of this at any time.)
Analyzing Results With Mention
Mention makes it really easy to track your online reputation and analyze your data via such features as a comprehensive dashboard and insight center. You can also create and schedule reports to streamline the process even further.
Analysis is fairly straightforward, as Mention does a great job of assessing and clarifying your results for you, as well as recommending actions. Consider exporting your data and comparing it with data related to each of your brand-building campaigns to assess the success of each.
2. Reputation Tracking Using Brand24
Brand24 is an AI-powered brand reputation management tool that crawls the entire internet in search of ongoing conversations about your brand, as opposed to only monitoring social media signals like some platforms. It features a project-based interface that allows you to follow multiple brands, maintain multiple ongoing projects, and more.
Getting Started With Brand24
You can sign up for Brand24 for free and vet the service for up to two weeks. After that, you can choose from four service tier subscriptions, ranging from Individual to Enterprise.
- Sign up by providing Brand24 with your business email and creating a password.
- Set up your first project by clicking the “Add new project” button.
- Add the topics you want Brand24 to monitor – brand names, competitors’ names, etc.
- Add your keywords and choose the language for your project. That’s it!
Utilizing Brand24’s Insights
Brand24 leverages the amazing power of AI to access, monitor, and compile a wide variety of mentions and conversations across the entire internet, including podcasts, reviews, news articles, and more. It then combines that data to come up with user-friendly sentiment analysis that takes some of the guesswork out of online reputation assessment.
Its interface organizes information via simple tabs for mentions, analysis, summary, influencers, quotes, and so forth. Keep track of the summary tab for the most comprehensive look at your overall reputation, including at-a-glance charts and top mentions.
Use the other tabs to gain deeper insight into anything you’re curious about, including social monitoring. Leverage what you learn to tweak your brand reputation management campaigns, content marketing efforts, etc.
3. Monitoring With BuzzSumo
BuzzSumo helps you monitor your online reputation a bit differently from how the above tools do, as it allows users to scour the internet for any and all content related to a provided search term. You can then enhance your searches by filtering for domain, date, content type, word count, and so forth.
One feature BuzzSumo brings to the table that many tools don’t is a built-in engagement assessment alongside each result. You can also set up customized alerts for selected brands and terms.
Setting Up BuzzSumo
BuzzSumo allows new users to try the service free for a full 30 days, so you have plenty of time to determine whether it’s for you before pulling the trigger on a purchase.
- Follow the simple prompts to create a new BuzzSumo account.
- Research your brand, keywords, etc. by entering them into the search bar and filtering the results accordingly.
- Tap the “Create alert” button to generate future alerts related to competitor mentions, backlinks, brand mentions, and more.
- Specify whether there are exclusions, how often you’d like to receive alerts, etc.
Analyzing Results With BuzzSumo
One of the best online reputation management tools you have at your disposal with BuzzSumo is its engagement analyzer. Use it to assess how much weight each result carries when it comes to conversations about your brand.
Keep track of the rest of your results via your comprehensive BuzzSumo dashboard, compare and contrast with results associated with your branding campaigns, and adjust accordingly.
Online Reputation Management Tips
Of course, keeping track of your online reputation is one thing. Enacting a solid brand reputation management strategy is another matter entirely. Here are some crucial tips to keep in mind when putting your data to good use.
Responding to Negative Mentions
People pay close attention to online reviews when making purchasing decisions, so you can trust that they really sit up and take notice when they see a negative one. In fact, 94 percent of consumers say even one negative review can make them think twice about buying from a brand at all.
That said, responding to negative reviews promptly and professionally is a key part of taking care of your reputation. Be courteous, own up to mistakes, and do your best to resolve the conflict publicly where other consumers can see it. And if service improvements are in order, implement them quickly.
Showcasing Positive Engagements
The power of social proof can definitely work in your favor, as well, so don’t be afraid to use positive feedback to your advantage. Ask your best and happiest customers to review your products and services or provide testimonials, offering incentives where possible.
Show off your best ones on your website, via a dedicated testimonial page, on advertising material, in marketing emails, on packaging, or wherever else makes sense for your brand.
Consistency in Online Branding
Modern consumers like to deal with brands that feel personal – brands that have their own unique voices, values, and personalities. For that reason, it’s crucial to keep your brand voice consistent across all of your online assets, from your social media posts to your best marketing content.
Taking care to define branding factors like mission statements, buyer personas, brand values, etc. is crucial. Finding the right writers, SEO professionals, and content creators is also important for creating the content.
Sign up for a top-tier freelance marketplace like WriterAccess to ensure you’ve always got the best content creators and copywriters on the job. It’s a solid way to ensure your brand voice is not only consistent, but powerful in every way it needs to be. Sign up for your free 14-day WriterAccess trial today and get started!
