Can ReputationDefender Help Your Hotel? (Interview with CEO Michael Fertik)

Today I had the opportunity to ask ReputationDefender CEO Michael Fertik how his company can help your hotel maintain a great reputation online.

“ReputationDefender is sort of like a ‘hyper Google alerts.’ It crawls the deep web of content that may not be indexed by Google.” This can include review sites and message boards not indexed by Google and other search engines, but still play an important role in an organization’s online reputation. “Often, problems, start here before they are even picked up with a service such as Google alerts.”

Although ReputationDefender manages brand reputation, its specialty is in monitoring and defending the personal brands of individuals. Today, a search engine is one of the first places people go to find information about people, and so having a good presence is very important. “We can help hotel executives establish their personal brand as they establish their careers,” said Michael. In the hotel industry, your employees are part of your brand. For this reason, several hotel chains are using ReputationDefender’s service for their executives.

ReputationDefender is probably most famous for their work and dealing with unwarranted or negative rumors online. I asked Michael how this process works.

“First, it’s important to understand what we do not do. We do not create fake reviews, and we do not pretend to be customers of our customers.” Instead, they work with existing information online to cast you in a positive light. We use search optimization to “hide” information they do not want to appear, and instead deliver good content to people who are searching.

“80% of clicks are on the top three results in a search engine. If you are on page 2 or beyond those results are practically invisible. So we can take a positive article on Condé Nast is currently in position number 15, a move that up to position number three … for example.” Moving this content to the top of search engine results can avoid the likelihood of people finding out dated or inaccurate information about your hotel.

Last week, the company launched NameGrab, another service to help individuals and organizations manage their online identity. “It’s an online real estate land grab right now” said Michael. In the past, squatters have purchased domain names in hopes of reselling them at a large profit to companies. ICANN, the organization that oversees domains, have usually intervened and given ownership to the brand owner. But on social media sites such as Twitter this is not the case. Anyone can reserve a brand name, and use it for inappropriate purposes. “Often the most dangerous situation is where someone else impersonates a brand or employee of an organization.” This is dangerous because the person can send updates that seem believable, but tarnish a hotel’s online reputation.

“It’s really a no-brainer. For $99, organizations can grab their name on the top 100 social media websites worldwide.”

You can learn more at reputationdefender.com.