Marketing can do amazing things for a company, but a negative reputation can definitely hinder any progress. However, just a little bit of reputation management will make a big difference.

#1 – Create a Large Online Presence

While creating a page on the internet is helpful in a lot of ways, reputation management is just about the most critical things a business can do. When a possible client is searching for a local business by name or industry, you will not want them to see web pages with bad reviews. This can be minimized by starting pages on Facebook, Twitter, Google, and Yahoo Local. Since less than 10 percent of Google users progress to the second page of results, having numerous relevant corners of the web assists in bumping negative sites to the dark recesses of Page 2.

#2 – Monitor the Company Name and Products

One of the biggest factors of reputation management is what people are finding online. The good news is, a business owner can sometimes track this just as easily as people are discovering it. By simply heading over to Google and doing a search on the company name or its branded product, a business person can see what exactly others are seeing regarding their company. Additionally, it is easy to set up Google Alerts which notifies you of new mentions with certain keywords, such as the company name. If something negative appears, corrective actions can be started.

#3 – Be Transparent on Social Media

A number of companies make the slip-up of eliminating negative mentions from their social media pages. The truth is, they should be talking with the angry customer in whole view of the public. When others experience a company trying to right a wrong they know that the company actually cares about its customers. Marketing is only able to do so much after a company's reputation is tarnished. Reputation management, however, can turn your business in the right direction.