Programme overview
Introduction:
Prospective buyers, candidates and partners now judge a brand by its star ratings, the first page of search results and what people post about it, often before any contact with the organisation. Online reputation management (ORM) is frequently reactive: reviews go unanswered, fake ratings are disputed without evidence and search results are left to chance. This Core Concept course gives marketing, digital and customer experience teams the monitoring routines, review workflows, owned content tactics and ethical guardrails to run ORM day to day. Participants build an ORM Playbook and Reputation Dashboard for a case brand.
Course Objectives:
- Audit a brand's review profiles, branded search results and social mentions to establish an online reputation baseline
- Configure listening queries, review alerts and sentiment tagging that route each mention to the right owner
- Apply review response guidelines and flag fake or policy-violating reviews through platform dispute channels with supporting evidence
- Design a review-generation and customer advocacy programme that follows platform rules and endorsement disclosure principles
- Improve branded search results with legitimate owned, earned and profile content, including employer brand review sites
- Produce an ORM Playbook and Reputation Dashboard with KPIs, escalation thresholds and named owners
Target Audience:
- Digital marketing staff who manage brand profiles on search engines, maps, marketplaces and review platforms
- Brand and community management staff who track mentions and sentiment across social channels and forums
- SEO and content specialists who shape what appears on the first page of branded search results
- Customer experience staff who analyse ratings and feedback and pass issues to operations
- Employer branding and talent attraction staff who look after company ratings on job and employee review sites
Course Outline:
Day 1: How Online Reputation Forms and the Brand Baseline
- Online Reputation Touchpoints: Star Ratings, Branded Search, Maps Listings and Social Mentions
- Customer Journey Map of Where Buyers Read Reviews Before Purchase
- Owned, Earned, Shared and Paid Content Model for Reputation
- Branded Search Result Audit: First Page Sentiment Scoring Sheet
- Review Profile Inventory Across Marketplaces, Maps and Industry Directories
Day 2: Monitoring Systems, Listening Queries and Platform Rules
- Social Listening Query Build: Brand Names, Misspellings, Products and Executives
- Review Aggregation Feeds and Real-Time Alert Rules
- Sentiment Tagging Taxonomy and Topic Clustering of Mentions
- Review Platform Content Policies: Prohibited Content, Conflicts of Interest and Flagging
- Mention Triage Matrix: Owner, Priority and Response Window
Day 3: Review Workflows, Advocacy Programmes and Search Visibility
- Review Response Guidelines: Praise, Mixed and Critical Review Templates
- Fake and Unfair Review Evidence File and Platform Dispute Submission
- Review Request Cadence: Post-Purchase Email, SMS and QR Prompts Without Gating
- Customer Advocacy Programme: Referral, Testimonial and Case Story Pipeline
- Branded Search Content Plan: Profiles, Knowledge Panels, FAQ Pages and Press Material
Day 4: Employer Brand Ratings, Online Crises and ORM Ethics
- Employer Review Site Management: Company Profile, Candidate Feedback and Reply Etiquette
- Online Crisis Escalation Ladder: Review Bombing, Viral Posts and Misinformation
- Holding Statement and Stakeholder Alert Workflow for Online Incidents
- ORM Ethics Checklist: Astroturfing, Sockpuppets, Incentivised Reviews and Disclosure
- Legal Removal Requests Versus Platform Flags: Defamation, Privacy and Copyright Routes
Day 5: Case Study: ORM Playbook and Reputation Dashboard
- Case Brand Evidence Pack Review: Ratings, Search Page and Mention Log
- Reputation KPI Set: Average Rating, Review Velocity, Response Rate and Net Sentiment
- Reputation Dashboard Build with Share of Voice and Search Sentiment Trend
- ORM Playbook Drafting: Roles, Response Windows and Escalation Thresholds
- Peer Review Panel and Playbook Defence
Skills You Will Gain:
- Reputation Baseline Auditing
- Social Listening Configuration
- Review Response Writing
- Fake Review Dispute Handling
- Ethical Review Generation
- Branded Search Result Management
- Employer Rating Management
- Reputation KPI Reporting
Why Attend This Course:
- Leave with an ORM Playbook and Reputation Dashboard built on case brand data and challenged by peers
- Know which negative review to answer, which to flag and which to escalate, and how to document each decision
- Recognise review practices that breach platform rules or disclosure principles before they damage the brand
- Compare monitoring set-ups and review routines with peers from retail, hospitality, healthcare, technology and public services
Conclusion:
A brand's online reputation is built one rating, search result and mention at a time, and it rewards teams that monitor, respond and publish with discipline. The course moves from auditing the current baseline, through listening queries and platform rules, to review workflows, advocacy programmes and branded search content, then to employer ratings, online crisis escalation and ethics. The final day turns this into an ORM Playbook and Reputation Dashboard that teams can adapt for their own brand.