In the internet age where anyone can post anything they like about you, your business, your brand or anything else for that matter, perception has never been more important.
If your business is perceived to be a good, helpful, ethical one, it will get lots of praise and positive attention on social media and review sites, but if it is deemed to be bad or wrong in some way, then you are likely to get a much harder time online, and your sales could end up suffering as a result.
Thankfully, there are lots of simple things you can do to create a positive perception of your brand and avoid being badmouthed online…
1. Offer excellent customer service
From updating your business website so that it is easy to use to hiring more customer service staff so queries can be answered quickly and effectively anything you can do to ensure that your customers have a good experience when interacting with you, will help to give consumers a positive perception of your brand. If you want to keep bad reviews at bay, this is possibly the best way to do that.
2. Give back
A real good way to encourage people to see your business in a positive light is to give back in any way you can. This could mean donating school playground equipment to children in your community or holding a sponsored silence in the office – it doesn’t matter as long as it involves your business taking time out to do something good for the benefit of others it should have the desired effect.
3. Treat your employees well
How well you treat your employees will reflect on how well you are perceived by just about everyone else. If you treat your employees right, they will always talk about you in glowing terms, which will encourage consumers to give you a go, but if you treat them badly, they will always be complaining about you, not to mention leaving bad reviews on sites like Glassdoor, and that will turn a lot of people off ever buying anything from you.
So, be fair, be nice and ensure that you make a real effort to foster a positive workplace culture right now.
4. Improve your ethical credentials
Right now, ethical consumerism is big news. Customers everywhere are becoming switched on to the issues surrounding climate change and fair pay, amongst other things, so anything you can do to boost your company’s ethical credentials will help to foster a positive perception of your brand in the public.
Whether you switch to using recycled materials in the manufacturing of your product, only serve vegan food in your canteens or pay a fair living wage to your employees, if you make the effort to be better as a business, it will absolutely not go unappreciated by the very people you are looking to impress – the customer.
Making people think kindly towards your brand can take time, and you will definitely need to put the effort in, but it is totally possible and the above ideas are all excellent places to start.