1. 97% of consumers turn to a search engine when they are buying a product vs. 15% who turn to social media. (Conductor)
2. 96% of consumers have searched for product information from their mobile device. (Google)
3. 95% of Millennials expect brands to have a Facebook presence. (Social Media Examiner)
4. 94% of B2B buyers research online for purchase decisions. (State of Procurement Study)
5. 89% of shoppers do online research before purchasing an item in-store. (Interbrand)
6. 79% of shoppers feel empowered by technology because it provides access to information. (GE Capitol)

Still, if you ask me “What is Online Reputation Management?”

Here you go!
Online Brand Management (OBM) means taking charge of all the online conversations related to your brand. It means creating the right techniques and strategy to make sure that people find the right material about your brand when they look for it. It means influencing the thought process of your audience. It means creating a positive aura of your brand. It means making your brand appear great and real on online platforms. ORM is about monitoring and guiding the way your brand is perceived online. You need to centralize your communication and content strategy. Streamline your communication.
ORM DETERMINES THE FATE OR FORTUNE OF YOUR BUSINESS
Google yourself. See how you have been represented on SERP results, website, social media platforms, forums, reviews, third-party articles, and so on.
Is it Great? Fair? Satisfactory? Average? Non-Satisfactory? Or Below Average?
Grade yourself and start working upon your online brand image management.
Done well, ORM empowers you to put your best foot forward, it creates your brand identity and it helps you to influence and inspire the audiences’ buying decision.
Build and maintain brand consistency

B2C content marketers are using an average of 7 social platforms. (source: Content Marketing Institute) That’s seven places to maintain a consistent look and feel – and that’s just for social media. Add in your website, emails, print materials, and all other customer touchpoints and that’s a lot of places to maintain brand consistency.

That’s where an image management tool comes in. It provides a single place for brand content. Build and maintain brand consistency in the source for your images and everywhere your brand is will follow. When your team is searching for images to use in your image library for your various channels, you’ll know it’s on the brand.
One of the ways you can look for off-brand content is while browsing through your image library. If an image sticks out, look into why it sticks out and it it’s off brand. If it’s inconsistent with your brand, remove it from your library so it can’t be used.
Quality control
Nothing says unprofessional like a pixelated or distorted image. By making the most up-to-date and high-quality content easily accessible, you prevent your teams from using other sources of content where quality may be in question. For example, instead of a sales rep going to Google search for a logo, he can download it in the right size and format from the image management tool.
You can also use your image management app as a single source of truth for your approved content. Users don’t have to worry about if they have the right image or an old duplicate because you’re giving it to them. No more “Final-final” and “Final-final-final” files. Just the right, final file.
More effective content
Image management helps you create and share more effective content in a few ways. By centralizing all of your content, users have more assets to work with than if they only have access to what’s on their desktop. This also allows users to repurpose other work that’s been done. A Powerpoint one person made can quickly be turned into snackable social shares.
Worried about photos and graphics being overused and losing their impact? Track image usage with analytics to see what’s being used and what isn’t. If a stock photo is being overused, remove access to it.
Simplify how your organization centralizes and shares your images. Try Smartimage for free for 15-days.

Online brand management
Because there are so many factors in play, managing your online brand is extremely important. A study by the market research firm Ipsos found that 78% of consumers are influenced by online research. Get a handle on how your audience perceives your brand, products and services. By managing your online brand, you can leave a positive lasting impression and drive brand growth and customer reach.
Begin your online brand management strategies by optimizing or creating a solid foundation. Here are five tips to help you get started:
1. Create brand guidelines.
Inconsistency can negatively impact your branding. At best, inconsistency makes your brand unmemorable. At worst, it can create a reputation of confusion and apathy. Clear brand guidelines reinforce your company’s differentiators and identity, allowing you to voice what sets you apart from your competition. Define guidelines regarding messaging, design elements, fonts, colours, logos, imagery, etc. when developing and enforcing your brand.
2. Educate brand representatives.
Brand guidelines are imperative for strengthening your brand, but they go nowhere unless utilized. That means that anyone representing your brand – from employees to contractors – needs access to the most up-to-date version of this guide for consistency. It goes beyond direct customer interaction; every employee must realize that even their social networks have a huge impact on the brand, and they must be mindful about how the company brand is represented across all social channels.
3. Monitor your online brand.
Social media, forums, articles and all sorts of other online discussion venues – your brand can become the topic of conversation in many different places. What’s being said about your brand? More importantly, how is it affecting your reputation?

By digging up where your brand is being discussed, you’ll be able to monitor your company’s online mentions. In addition, it’s a good idea to find sites related to your industry and target audience, then establish a presence in the discussion. Finally, it never hurts to peek in on the competition to see how they are handling their online brand and what is working (or not working) for them.
4. Respond to and lead discussions.
Once you find where your people are discussing your brand, it’s time to join in. The goal is to positively interact to comments and questions while constructively responding to criticism. Negative feedback can turn into something positive if you demonstrate that your team is willing to promptly respond and make it right for the customer.
Quality service reflects well on your online brand, and you’ll find that making that extra effort can often smooth over any bumps in the road. In addition, actively contribute to the community by leading discussions about trends, challenges and solutions, thus showing that your brand offers both thought leadership and customer care.
5. Utilize online brand management tools.
So where do you get started? The above points may seem overwhelming, but tools are available to make it all easier. Something as simple as Google Alerts (email notifications when Google comes across a designated name or phrase) can build the foundation for your monitoring.
In addition, specialized applications such as Hootsuite, Social Mention and Sprout Social provide various monitoring tools across social media to track brand mentions and analyze social media traffic.
Finally, an online brand portal like Brand Connect enables quick distribution of digital files, provides access to vital brand materials and improves consistency with branding and messaging across marketing, sales, customer service and PR teams.

By starting with these key tips and using the tools available to you, you can easily ramp up effective online brand management strategies. When combined with an understanding of your target audience and industry needs, it all comes together to effectively ensure that your online brand stays true to your message and identity.