How a Single Google Search Result Can Ruin Your Business

An untrue hit to your reputation can be hard, or impossible, to recover from.

Search engines may reveal surprising misinformation as well as factual. It's worth watching your own reputation.

(SALEM, Ore.) - Many businesses have gotten dragged into the digital age kicking and screaming. The web is the center of our lives, even for those who don’t consider themselves terribly technologically literate.

The problem for many business owners is that the web can be harmful to a business reputation, just as it can help if used properly. The problem occurs when Google search results bring up accusations of wrongdoing, often high in the results or even at the very top.

Whether or not such allegations are true, the public can start to associate your business with words like “Scam” or “Ripoff”. Fortunately there are ways to combat this practice.

There is a class of site which functions by blackmailing businesses. These sites are aggregators of consumer complaint. They attract angry consumers and amplify their isolated voices. Even though these complaints are usually one negative moment out of thousands of positive consumer experiences, when these complaints are allowed to rise to the top of Google search, they become the headline.

Not all complaint aggregators are in the business to hold businesses hostage - but some clearly are. It usually isn’t enough to petition these sites for removal of the hastily assembled smear campaign. These sites usually want money.

Because the issues at hand are often relatively small, it usually isn’t worth it for businesses to sue for their reputations. Some businesses simply grin and bear it, allowing “ripoff reports” to stay in place, poisoning future business growth and damaging the brand over the long term.

When a business is large enough to be able to afford legal action, the material is usually removed with no problem at all, because the site owner wants to avoid lawsuit and doesn’t have a legal leg to stand on. But this path is expensive.

This Catch-22 has yielded another class of service, in place to help businesses and individuals suffering the consequences of negative press and trolling amplified to an unreasonable volume.

If you Google “How to remove a ripoff report from Google”, you’ll start to see companies whose sole mission is to do just that. More affordable, and faster, than hiring and internet lawyer, these services can have a ripoff report or similar reputation killer removed in short order.

They can also help you create a plan for building a better reputation in the future, and keeping this problem from cropping up again.

For businesses who see these negative materials written about them, it’s important not to ignore the problem.

While most of your business may occur in a brick and mortar facility, online is the place where your reputation lives. Because of the way people use the web, the materials that people see on Google probably have a lot more bearing on your business’s future than all of your marketing dollars combined.

Dealing with complaint aggregation is part of doing business in the 21st century, and can be compared to a yearly tooth cleaning or doctor’s checkup. It’s the way brands preserve their integrity, and a little goes a long way.

Source: Special Features Dept./ Salem-News.com