Image by pollyalida via Flickr

Ready or not, here they come. If you have a business of any size online you are going have consumers, and those consumers are going to voice their opinions. Whether their experience involved satisfactory or unsatisfactory service, people want to share now more than ever.

It used to be that these reviews and complaints would go largely unnoticed, but now thanks to Google instant, what people are saying about you WILL affect the way people see your company. If those words are complaints and problems, then you are going to experience what I call the Google instant snowball.

Let me be very clear, if people say negative things about your company, those negative search predictions will begin working their way into Google instant.

The more people that see negative reviews, the more people that will follow suit and post their own negative reviews and complaints. Now we have a snowball affect, and a basic Google search for your business is followed by suggestions of “complaints”, “scam”,  or “problems”. So what do you do, and how do you stop the snowball from spinning out of control destroying every bit of your reputation online?

First things first, take consumer reviews seriously. Gone are the days when you could just shrug it off and say “what are you going to do about it”. Our society, thanks largely to the web, has shifted to one that is consumer driven. In a world where a single tweet, picture, or video can get millions of views an hour, you need to actively monitor what people are saying. Instead of having a fire drill every time you find a complaint, begin a process of actively pushing out positive content to counteract the negative.

Don’t be afraid to use those negative searches in your favor, addressing complaints and problems right there in the title of your posts. People are already going to find bad things about you on the web, why not give yourself a chance to set the record straight first?

Finally, consider reputation management a vital part of your online strategy. It’s not an afterthought anymore, consumers want to see good reviews before they make a purchasing decision.

Those thousands spent doing online advertising is useless if a simple Google search for your brand yields a tidal wave of negative content. Think like a consumer, take complaints seriously, and continue to push out positive reputation management on a regular basis. Don’t let the snowball get you too…