Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Every startup fears that one angry and unfair customer who can jeopardize the business by a SCREAMING post on Ripoff Report, Yelp, or one of the hundreds of other consumer complaint and review sites on the Internet. Most entrepreneurs don’t even know how to keep track of what people are saying about them on the web, much less how to respond or remove it.

Web reputation management, both business and personal, has become a top priority requirement. On the personal side, these items can kill your career, as I discussed in a prior article “Google Yourself to See How Other People See You.” Luckily, the basic principles for reputation management are the same for both business and personal environments:

1. Your reputation is your responsibility. The first step is to recognize that...Read more at http://www.soldlab.com/news/2011/6/14/six-keys-to-managing-your-reputation-on-the-web-to-read.html

I constantly search for what people are saying about me.  If I don't find it in a general search I will tag the word 'review' at the end.  There is always going to be nay-sayers out there, it's just a matter of learning from what they have to say, make any realistic changes and move forward.  Heck, I'd even thank them or invite them back for a second opinion if they had something really worthwhile to complain about :)

You can sign up for Google Alerts, and every time your name or business is mentioned online you will get an email alert from Google with the results.

Type yourself into the search box will always be the easiest & most reliable way to find out what people are talking about you. In my opinion, the most important thing is not if there's someone who's screaming about how much you've let him down, but if there's anyone who will stand out to defense you on his own. It's just impossible to satisfy every single customer all the time, the thing we have to do here is to offer satisfying products/services to as many customers as we can. And when you have a certain group of loyal customers, you wouldn't need to stick to the search box all day long because you know you have got supporters. 

I never use Google Alerts but it good to know

It is good to know what others talking about you or your business. If you know what you doing wrong you can fix it

If you do find someone that is unhappy with you, try you very best to satisfy them even if their complaint is not valid. You might then ask them to let people know that you responded.

Also consider ways to avoid the same situation with others in the future. Don't overlook the possibility that you may have some shortcomings.

Good Luck

I constantly search for what people are saying about me.  If I don't find it in a general search I will tag the word 'review' at the end.  There is always going to be nay-sayers out there, it's just a matter of learning from what they have to say, make any realistic changes and move forward.  Heck, I'd even thank them or invite them back for a second opinion if they had something really worthwhile to complain about :)

I constantly search for what people are saying about me.  If I don't find it in a general search I will tag the word 'review' at the end.  There is always going to be nay-sayers out there, it's just a matter of learning from what they have to say, make any realistic changes and move forward.  Heck, I'd even thank them or invite them back for a second opinion if they had something really worthwhile to complain about :)

I would definitely recommend trying out Google Alerts for your key business terms.

And I agree, it's a good way to get quick customer feedback, but I know that most people who are inclined to review things via the internet are usually inclined to do so for really negative or really positive reasons - so most reviews tend to be extremely biased in that respect.