Your online reputation is how existing customers and prospects see your business on the internet. It includes reviews on Google, TrustPilot, Facebook and many other online platforms. The more platforms your business is present on, the higher its reputation score is likely to be. A positive online reputation can help your business stand out from your competition, increase customer trust and loyalty and increase revenue and profits.
You may already be running some form of digital marketing for your business e.g. SEO, social media marketing or ads on Google, LinkedIn etc.
Here’s how first creating a strong online reputation helps to improve ROI for any marketing activity.
Understanding consumer behaviour and online reviews
First, let’s see how consumer behaviour has changed over the last few years; more and more people are now using online reviews to gauge the trustworthiness of a business; they do this on the platforms where they spend their time. This could be Facebook, TrustPilot, Google Maps, TikTok etc.
Research from brightlocal in March 2024 shows that 81% of consumers use Google to evaluate a local business, and 45% use Facebook.
Likewise, more and more people are using apps like Google Maps to locate a business or service e.g. “Find a pharmacy near me”. Apps like Google Maps will display a number of results and for each result the star rating and number of reviews for that business are also displayed. As you can imagine, for any two or more similar businesses, the one with the higher rating and more positive reviews will probably win the business of the person searching.
So it makes sense that a business pays attention to building a strong online reputation.
How does a strong online reputation increase the ROI of other marketing activity?
Let’s take each of the different online marketing activities in turn:
1. Word of Mouth Marketing
Word-of-mouth marketing is when people tell others about your business Widely considered to be the best form of marketing a local business can have, recent research has shown that even those on the receiving end of a personal recommendation are now checking reviews first before engaging with the recommended business. When people see good reviews, they are more likely to recommend your business to their friends and family and this can bring in more business at no extra cost!
2. SEO (search engine optimisation)
When people search for services using a search engine like Google, they often look at the reviews of the results presented. This means that a business that appears first in the results may not get the sale if the ratings and reviews of other results are better. If you’re marketing your business using SEO then a strong online reputation can help achieve higher click-through conversions from search engine results pages.
As a side note, positive reviews can make your business look trustworthy and relevant to search engines like Google and Bing. This means your website might show up higher in search results, bringing more visitors to your site. Studies show that businesses with good reviews get more clicks and sales
3. Social Media Marketing
Social media is a powerful tool for marketing your business online. When people see posts of positive reviews for your business on their feed they are more likely to engage by liking, sharing and following your business. This increases your reach and helps you to connect with more potential customers. Happy customers often share their positive experiences on their social media accounts, which can attract new customers for your business.
4. PPC (pay per click)
PPC ads are ads you pay for when people click on them. Examples of these are Google Ads, Facebook ads and LinkedIn ads. If you’re running PPC campaigns and your business has good reviews, then people are more likely to engage with yours ads. Some ads even display your business’ star rating and number of reviews within the ad box further providing incentive for the person viewing to click on it. Both Google and Facebook have a form of this, so you can see how having a large number of positive reviews can help drive higher click-through on such ads.
When your prospect clicks through an ad and lands on your website or visits your business – and is greeted by a positive rating and review score – their trust in your business increases and helps to make a sale.
When should Reputation Marketing be considered?
Reputation Marketing should be your first step in your marketing plan. While it is perfectly fine to add Reputation Marketing later, ideally you want to ensure that your online reputation is very strong – meaning positive – before starting any other marketing campaigns. For the very simple reason that most people today will check your online reviews regardless of how they find you. If you’ve put effort and budget into driving prospects to your location or website and your reputation is weak or non-existent, the conversion rate will be lower than if your reputation was strong.
So, if you want to build up your online reputation, get in touch with us today for a free consultation.
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