Building a strong brand? Start with monitoring!
Reputation management starts with monitoring in any case. What is being said about you? By whom? How influential are these people? And in which online places is your brand being talked about? By setting alerts when something threatens to get out of hand, you can prevent a crisis.
And don't get me wrong: keep doing it. Improving your reputation is just as important as protecting it and is still too often forgotten. After all, strong brands didn't become strong by protecting their reputation alone.
It is therefore time to lay a foundation on which you can build a strong brand. The following five tips will help you further.
1. Dare to express yourself
As a company, you have a certain identity. You stand for something, something that makes you unique in the market. Dare to convey those values. Take a stand in a social discussion. Make a statement. For example, the NS has chosen to start its announcements with 'Dear travellers', because they want everyone to feel welcome. Has that led to discussion? Absolutely. But that is also reputation management: sticking to your position. Even if it meets with resistance. In this case, the NS also conveyed its position on social media.
2. Listen to positive sounds and respond to them
Don't just monitor the negative sentiment. Also listen to the positive sound and respond to it. For example, think of customers who are satisfied with a product. Who leave a 5-star review on your webshop. Or who are just happy that you are there. Therefore, respond to compliments, hook into positive tweets and give your customers recognition when they leave a good review. Also keep an eye on influential people and possibly set an alert when they post something positive. That gives you the opportunity to strike while the iron is hot.
3. Celebrate successes – and not just internally
An enthusiastic customer or a complimentary tweet: you don't have to keep the positive sounds from the previous tip to yourself. Show that you are achieving success. This can be a success story from a customer, but also a good review. Coolblue has even come up with a format to stimulate customers to write high-quality reviews. They regularly highlight the best or nicest review on the website.
Being proactive, such as responding to positive messages that don’t directly mention you, is one thing, but industry email list being proactive is actually just as important. Take control and share knowledge about your market by creating your own content, such as blogs, whitepapers, videos or infographics. Not only a positive way to get into the spotlight (“Hey, he knows his stuff!”), but also a strong move to position yourself as a thought leader.
5. The employees as brand takers
Employees are the best brand ambassadors. They give the company behind the brand a face and can convey your brand message in a transparent and credible way. This employee advocacy is therefore of great value to your reputation. It goes much further than just sharing corporate content. Authentic tweets or posts turn an employee into a brand taker. For example, Bol.com has given its employees their own hashtag. With #bijbolcom, employees post all kinds of content that contribute to the branding of the company. And that strengthens Bol.com's reputation.
Protect and strengthen your reputation
Good reputation management therefore has two objectives: protecting and strengthening your reputation. Objectives that always go hand in hand and must fit seamlessly within your communication strategy.
And if the reinforcement doesn't work for a while? Or something goes wrong? Then you can always switch to damage control .
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