Prompt's TechBlog

By now, we all know how important social media is in relation to a company's image and reputation. Consumers are now looking to bloggers as a source of honest information, so what happens when bloggers turn irate over a company's products, services, or general business practices? Well, bloggers with high readership can make enough noise that the public and, often times, the press take notice.

PressReleasePros.com thinks they've come up with a solution to hide these negative posts and it all relies on search engine optimized press releases. The founder of the company says that if the press releases are properly optimized, when the company is searched, the new results will have pushed the negative news down into a lower ranking thus hiding it from prospective customers.

While this may be true, the PR tactic implemented here could get companies into a lot more trouble with the blogging community if they discover that this is happening - and inevitably they will since smart bloggers and consumers do their homework. But what's more important here is that by merely trying to bury the bad news and opinions, the company isn't addressing the real issue of whatever was causing the negative posts in the first place.

Instead of looking at social media as the enemy, companies can actually learn from what the bloggers are saying - it really is invaluable market data on how you are viewed by consumers.

I think the best way to deal with a negative social media or press story is to face it head on because you can run from the bad publicity but you can never totally hide. And hey, you may even be able to do a complete 180 and gain the respect of the community by telling the truth.

Labels: PR, seo, social media