Put Your Best Foot Forward: 3 Ways to Manage Your Online Reputation
In this day and age, a customer’s first impression of your company is formed before they even walk through the door or speak to any of your employees. Through the power of the internet, we can get to know people and their businesses with the click of a button. Businesses can take advantage of this by taking the initiative to build an online reputation for themselves and produce content that gives consumers the information they need to make an educated buying decision. Here are three ways business owners can form a good digital first impression with their target market.
1. Business Listings
Business listings appear on search engines like Google and Bing, as well as rating websites such as Yelp and YellowPages that act as information directories. They provide contact and website information, pictures, videos, reviews, and directions. They also give a customer insight into what your business looks like from the inside out and the products or services you provide. If you do not update or maintain your listings, customers could be receiving wrong or bad information and you’re missing out on a chance to provide quality customer service by responding to comments and reviews.
2. Social Media
Are you taking advantage of the variety of social media platforms that you could be using to reach your target audience? From Facebook to Instagram to Vine, you should be utilizing every opportunity to connect with consumers. Having an engaged and active social media presence breeds loyalty among your current customer base while also allowing you to reach out to new potential customers. It also gives you an inside view into what your followers are saying about your brand so that you know what to improve on or what to incorporate into your company in the future.
3. Website
Creating an easy-to-use and well-designed website is essential to making a good first impression. The layout needs to provide information clearly and concisely in a way that’s easy for customers to find what they’re looking for. For the best website combo, you should include a short “About Us” video that showcases your business, an outline of your product and service categories, and team pictures with information about your staff. This layout answers the first couple questions that we naturally have when forming an opinion on a business while eliminating some of the unknown factors that may make a customer question their buying decisions.
Creating a good digital first impression is an important step in building a strong customer following. If users can educate themselves with business listings, social media, and your website first, they will come to you ready to buy and not just look.