You should never underestimate the cost of a poor reputation. – Forbes.com
If you’re not worried about digital reputation management, you’re about to receive a HUGE wake-up call. In the healthcare industry, reputation is everything, and to ignore it is to cost your practice in unimaginable ways.
Don’t get caught off-guard by a poor review on Yelp or a nasty comment on Facebook. At Quaintise, we encourage positive reputation management on all levels so that when a bad review or comment does come through, which it no doubtedly will at some point, you have the tools to respond professionally and uphold your strong, positive reputation.
1. Keeping a Positive Online Reputation – As mentioned, even though you and your staff are the best in the business, focused on customer service and creating the best brand experience for your patients, there will be that one person who you just can’t please. The key to managing your online reputation is to continuously and consistently get those positive reviews.
2. Push Positive Reviews – If positive reviews consistently poor in, it will be a wonderful counteract should a bad review come in. Ask your happy patients to leave reviews as often as you can. You’ll need that wealth of positive reviews to outweigh any negatives ones that might get published.
3. Monitor Your Online Reputation – One of the best practices of reputation management is to have someone, like the professionals at Quaintise, dedicated to monitoring your brand online. Another one of your greatest resources in reputation management is timeliness. If a poor review comes in and you don’t see it for another two days, you’re failing. Reviews, both negative and positive, MUST be responded to immediately.
4. Control Your SERP – Do not simply be satisfied with two or three links on the Search Engine Results Page. Take over the entire first page, even second page, with your voice. We talk about promoting your own voice quite often here at Quaintise, and for good reason. The last thing you want to happen is for everyone else to create a brand voice for you. So, fill that SERP page with your website, blog, social media accounts, news articles, and anything else. Take complete control of that first page.
5. Have a Strategy – Should a poor review come in, make sure that your team has a strategy in place to handle the situation. I can’t tell you how many times we’ve seen a single bad review turn into a terrible situation simply because physicians did not have a plan of attack. Minutes can quickly turn into hours, which can quickly turn into days without a response. By the time the bad review works up the ladder to the board or owner of your practice, three days have passed and hundreds, if not thousands, of patients and potential patients have seen that bad review go unanswered. It can be devastating.
Get with the professionals at Quaintise for more information on managing your online reputation.