The Demolition Derby On The Information Highway

The Wild West (sort of)

The internet information superhighway may not be a pile-up, but it certainly can be something of a demolition derby. Whether we are talking internet viruses, gratuitous voyeurism, cyber-bullying, or flame wars, (to name a few), there are all sorts of destructive elements online. Set against this of course there are all sorts of productive and worthwhile online pursuits, from the simply social and interest based, through to the business end of the spectrum.

Tarnished, dented and damaged? Your reputation that is.......

The problem for the internet of course is that it can be a force for good or bad in extreme measure. Just as at one end of the spectrum Facebook can be used to trigger mass rioting, at the other end it can be leveraged to find a missing child. Just as the internet itself can allow businesses to flourish spectacularly, at the other end of the spectrum it can allow something like the Stuxnet virus to literally send a nuclear plant into total meltdown. The underlying issue here of course is that policing the internet is extremely thorny for all sorts of reasons, and this has a ton of implications, of which the ones I wish to talk about are those affecting the world of commerce, because, notwithstanding that things are belatedly starting to tighten up, it still remains a pretty lawless place.
 
 

Its Dangerous Out There

Managing your brand these days, whether it be a Corporate entity, or your own person, is very fraught with hazards and obstacles. The list of potential stumbling blocks is extensive; at one level it can be about getting sacked from a job for an off-colour remark on Facebook, (or even just being on Facebook when you are feeling off-colour), or not getting a job because your employer is one of the 70% who vets social media properties to get an insight into your personality. At another level, it can be a matter of a few negative comments about your Company on someone’s blog, or it can be an orchestrated all-out assault by a competitor. There is just so much that can go wrong online; leaving aside the comment or picture on Facebook from 3 years ago that somehow surfaces to indict you, there is just so much traffic out there jostling about, and very little in the way of a traffic control officer. That means people can say pretty much what they want about you, usually under the cloak of anonymity, and with very little in the way of repercussions. All businesses are essentially soft targets. There is nothing to stop a disgruntled customer or slighted ex-employee going online and waging war; let’s face it, all they need to do is create a few pseudonyms, and then create a trial of mayhem. The opportunities afforded online are simply much greater, and one of the biggest obstacles faced by a victim of such an attack is in actually unmasking the perpetrator. Yes, it is possible to get a court order, but then that requires the perpetrator to be promulgating lies and slander, and the victim to have the means and the determination to end it. In most cases, the attacks will be stealthy, and can take a number of forms, many of them hard to really pin down. All in all it can turn into a demolition derby out there – that is if there are no rules of the road, or if people chose to drive aggressively recklessly.

It’s not complete anarchy (but it’s probably best to view it as such)

Now in mitigation of all this, it is quite clear that Google are trying to create a white web, (as white web is to white hat), through Google+ by creating a deeply contextual, stratified and hierarchical web, with a much greater level of personal accountability through their recently implemented authorship controls, and this could partially alleviate some of the wild wild west aspects of the online world. How things develop over the next five years will certainly be interesting. It may even be in time that for any statement to have any online authenticity, it must link back to a person’s online ID card, their Google author page. That is a distinct possibility, but in the meantime, the web is still pretty fast and loose.

For that reason, all companies need a proper brand management strategy, and the corollary to that is that they may also need a reputation management campaign if things start to go awry. Brand Management is essentially about monitoring everything that is said about you on the web. Reputation Management is essentially all about defusing and dismantling any online bombs that strafe your path….

There are all sorts of online attack that can beset a business; a typical one is where a competitor sets out to besmirch your name, and a worst case scenario might be when you Google your business name, and the first page of Google has multiple results referring to some kind of mischief; e.g. Company Name Ltd + fraud, or Company Name Ltd + useless. Those kinds of results will of course seriously impact the health and well-being of your business…….

The solution in such an instance would be to debunk the offending items to at least the second page of Google by promoting some other material through the use of seo, over and above the offending material. That is just one example of what a reputation management campaign could look like. Of course, prevention is better than cure, so having a good brand management strategy from the outset is a significant step that any business ought to consider taking.

What are your reputation management experiences?

Do you have any experiences of online hate campaigns designed to discredit a person or business? If so, how did they play out? What actions did the victims take? We would love to hear your stories, so feel free to comment below.

Orange Whale Ltd are seo specialists who can help in any brand or reputation management campaign.