Nearly all businesses and individuals can benefit from actively managing their search reputation. However, not everyone can have enough money to invest the endeavor. This investment will be in terms of time and money. The consideration will be financial; therefore it requires some ROI consideration. Since not everyone has the same revenues at stake, the amount of money potentially lost must be a part of this equation. So here it is important to breakdown the loss in terms of primary order effect and secondary order effect.
Primary order effect is the loss that happens immediately after the search reputation problem. If you’re a dentist who shot a lion called Cecile, you might be out of your practice for a few months. But when you announce to the world that your going back, despite the backlash, your world will not be the same. Your loyal customers will come back, of course, but you will certainly experience a drop in your “new business”. This drop in business is most acute in the weeks and months following the blow up. This drop in business has been as high as 50% for some clients serviced by us and others in the ORM industry. Hopefully, and in most cases, the ratio will drop as things boil over. This is because people need new things to get angry about. It’s also because people focus will change and they will forget. This declining drop however, is also part of the cost; the secondary order effect, if you will.
Some of the methodologies used with ORM clients who are trying to figure out what the damage of search reputation might be involve a worse case scenario of 50% new business decline along with a straight line reduction over a period of time, but this is assuming that the search reputation problem organically disappears.
In most cases however, the calculations need to be more specific, involving the actual decline in organic search result click thru ratios (CTR) and accumulations of all potential conversions that happen on a monthly basis, while the problem persists. The client will then figure out what kind of customer lifetime value is being lost over a number of months or even perpetuity.
The ORM provider then, can provide a timeline by which the problem would be remediated and a budget. The party with the reputation problem can then calculate what is the ROI of having the problem fixed and perhaps even maintained against future attacks!
That’s right, in some cases, reputation problems do come up again. Whether the search reputation problem is handled legally or technically the problem can resurface. Increasingly, companies are finding that they need to hire reputation experts both on the legal side and technical side in a more permanent matter. Much like a PR agency.
Finally there is personal stigma that stays with the company or the individual for years and perpetually. This has a cost that cannot be measured so easily.
In general, the ROI works positively for most companies that have a high reliance on search engines for leads and who fall in either one of these categories.
Small busineses with $1MM + in sales but with a net margin in the teens or greater. Few businesses make that much margin. This often limits this first category to businesses involving high-end professionals. There are many groups of professionals like law, medical and accounting practices however fall in that category.
The second group are companies that have over $10MM in sales with a narrower margin, up to a point.
If your business is lucky enough to fall in both categories, say for example mid size to large medical clinics, law firms, outpatient/inpatient treatment etc… then the ROI of prevention should be on your mind. This is because most ORM companies, including those specializing in search engine reputation problems, charge between $1,000-$5,000 a month. A typical file can be completed in six months. So the mid point of such a file could be $15,000 all in. This represents a fraction of one years profit. In more elaborate cases where a firm has to be retained, clearly a discount will be provided, but worse case scenario, your firm is looking at $60,000 a year for a typical problem. In such cases, the expense still works our to be a less than the incremental revenue loss than can be more of a burden. Successful businesses can also have several files going on at once, often businesses who are suffering search reputation problems will also have an owner who has such a problem for example. Or several product or service lines are being attacked at once. The author has experienced such a case.
It would be fair to state that a serious problem will likely be correlated to high profit and so the damage repair may be par for the course, as crooked as this may sound. But all this to say that the involvement of search reputation professionals and lawyers will almost always be a reconcilable part of doing business online for many high profit business or high net worth people, as has been the role of PR in traditional settings.
In general, the more your target customers use search engines to research you, your brands or products and services prior to dealing with you, the greater the ROI of search engine reputation management.
Like business companies, non-commercial organizations will also benefit from maintaining a good reputation in search engines. Often, their goal is political or charitable rather than financial. But down the line, there is still a financial consideration. The negative impact on a brand will result in less influences, less donations and less power to accomplish the goals of such organizations. The ROI of search reputation will be tied to the depreciation prevention of the underlying asset. While less tangible, it can be more important. The scenarios involving the past costs put into the organizations brand and it’s mission might need to be examined.
Finally, the hardest item on the ROI menu is the personal search engine reputation problem. We all need to have a good reputation both at work and in our social circles. Once in a while, we may run into someone that decides to Google us before engaging with us in a personal matter. To illustrate this point, think about all the eligible bachelors and bachelorettes, for example. Consider how, a negative search might affect their matting prospects. While at first, it might seem difficult to broach the subject of cost related to matting game.
Let’s face it, having a bad search reputation hurts. If our individual reputation in search is negative, then we risk not getting the job we want, the business deal we expect, the bank loan we apply for, or even the date we were hoping for.
For most individuals any financial loss caused by negative search results is likely limited to our pride. For, others however, the effects can be much more serious. If you’re a celebrity, or a spokesperson, if your livelihood depends largely on your image, there may be a huge financial impact. Often, individuals are attacked on cheater sites like Bad Boy Report or Cheaterville which appear high on search results.