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Blog
Have A Bad Online Reputation? Manage It
July 23, 2008
I'm not entirely sold on the ethics of this, but it may be worth some consideration if your hotel has a bad online reputation. A cottage industry has sprouted up in recent years to combat the not-so-flattering parts of Web 2.0. Known as online reputation management, it involves hiring people to do a sort of reverse search engine optimization—instead of getting a certain Web page to the top of Google, the goal is to bury sites that make your company look bad.
One of the leaders in this space is ReputationHawk, which charges about US$2,000 up front for its services, plus another optional US$500 monthly monitoring fee. There's dozens of other companies out there charging varying amounts.
This is not a cheap fix, but it might be worth it to the someone like the owner of Bremerton Hotel, Washington, which currently comes up second in a Google search for "Worst Hotel." Then again, judging by the property's unbelievably awful TripAdvisor reviews, it's probably a lost cause anyway. But I digress.
Personally, I think it's far nobler to respond to a negative Web posting with a dignified response and an air of contrition, whether the negativity was initially warranted or not, than to engage the sort of glorified Google bombing that is professional online reputation management. There's something to be said for being the bigger man, so to speak.
Then again, if you Google your hotel and the first thing that pops up is a negative review ... well, it's hard to argue that you shouldn't do everything you can to change that. On some level, it comes down to smart business, even if it feels a little icky.
Posted by Adam Kirby on July 23, 2008 | Comments (2)
In response to: Have A Bad Online Reputation? Manage It
Scottv commented:
Interesting post Adam. To me this comes down to accountability. We have always been accountable to our owners and bosses, to our bottom line and to our employees to a degree. But how were hotels accountable to travelers? Hotels that rip off their customers, dont keep their property in good condition etc are going to have to pay the price now. And it wont be $2000...it will be losing their business. And so it should be...good operators will rise to the top and bad ones will die.
In response to: Have A Bad Online Reputation? Manage It
Marek commented:
Certainly it's no question that relevent response to a negative comment is a must. To manage the bad comments is about fighiting unfair and often outdated comments that do the harm to our business. And surprisingly to the clients that are missled by the "not valid" comments