Protecting your online brand reputation

Ready or Not, Restaurants MUSTProactively ManageTheir Online Brand Reputation

WHITE PAPER - PROTECTING YOUR ONLINE BRAND

INFORM • ENGAGE • INSPIRE • MOVE PEOPLE TO ACTION

Authored By: Heather Meng – Senior Strategist

Summit Marketing | 1

K A N S A S C I T Y • S T. L O U I S • WA S H I N G TO N , D . C . • W W W. S U M M I T M A R K E T I N G . C O M

IntroductionSociety’s adoption of an “always connected” lifestyle has created a new context in which a restaurant’s online brand reputation can rise and fall as the result of a few keystrokes. This connected lifestyle has manifested itself through technological advances (mobile devices, notebooks and laptops) and the evolution of the interactive Web (rapid growth of social media; viral nature of social networks; and the search engines’ (SEs) high value of fresh content).

The paradigm of managing your restaurant’s brand and interacting with customers has changed. Socially networked and active, customers now hold a level of influence regarding how your restaurant’s brand is perceived in today’s marketplace. As a restaurant owner/operator or marketer, that means you have opportunities to Inspire Advocates to Influence your brand across the social networks. It also means, you need a strategy to protect your brand’s online reputation when negative comments are poised to make a damaging impact.

Recent news articles indicate this new phenomenon:

“Scammers are making some restaurants an offer they can’t refuse: A payoff or discount, or they’ll post a nasty rating on online review sites like Yelp or Angie’s List. There’s no real data showing how often it’s happening, but anecdotal evidence suggests cyber-extortion is on the rise: scammers know online reviews carry a lot of weight, and can affect a company’s bottom line.” (June 2012)

“The lawsuit essentially alleges that the heavily funded startup runs an “extortion scheme” and has “unscrupulous sales practices” in place to generate revenue, in which the company’s employees call businesses demanding monthly payments in the guise of advertising contracts, in exchange for removing or modifying negative reviews.” (February 2010)

“Mayugba (Restaurant Owner) said it was impossible to prove whether the man got food poisoning from the restaurant but offered to give him a $60 gift card to a restaurant of his choice. The man said he deserved $100. If the restaurant did not pay up, he said he would write a bad Yelp review and report him to health authorities.” (May 2012)

All of this points to the fact that Ready or Not, Restaurants MUST Proactively Manage Their Online Brand Reputation.


The Reality – Restaurants are Facing 3 New Burdens The reality for restaurant owners/operators/marketers is today’s interactive Web has created a platform from which customers are demanding attention. While several factors are contributing to the intensity of this environment, we will focus on three: Customer Cultural Shift, Search Engine Algorithms, and the Underbelly of Social Media.

1. Customer Cultural ShiftCustomer expectations have changed as a result of the “always connected” lifestyle. First, they prefer more than one communication channel to reach your customer service. This includes a desire to make those reaches through social media. Second, they highly regard online reviews and social media posts when deciding where to dine out.

An Oracle social media study regarding the preferred form of communication released in March 2012 titled, “Consumer Views of Live Help Online 2012: A Global Perspective” showed that those polled anticipated companies would provide customer support through the following social networks: Facebook 46% Company blog 29% Support forum 26% Twitter 17%

Additionally, when consumers post questions or concerns on a company’s social network, more than 50% of those who use Facebook and more than 80% who use Twitter expect a response within a day or less.

Search Engine Land’s 2012 Consumer Review Survey revealed a growing trust of online reviews. Of note, 72% of consumers trust an online review as much as a personal recommendation. When looking for a local business to use: 27% regularly read online reviews 49% sometimes read online reviews 24% never read online reviews

The survey also found an overall increase in the number of online reviews read by consumers – 67% read 2-10 reviews; 7% read 20+ reviews.


Customer

Cultural Shift

Search Engine

Algorithms

Underbelly of

Social Media


These studies highlight the cultural shift of consumers preferring social media communications with businesses and their reliance on online reviews in their local business decision-making process. Have you met these shifts with evolving communications strategies?

2. Search Engine Algorithms When your “always connected” customers and potential customers use search engines (SEs) to find information about your restaurant, it is important that the Page 1 search results reflect positively on your brand. In order to influence the Page 1 results, you should have a fundamental understanding of how the SEs function.

Search engines use technological algorithms commonly referred to as spiders, that “crawl” through websites, identifying website elements, determined by the latest algorithmic formula, to rank URLs. Current formulas prioritize fresh content thereby increasing the importance (rank) of recent events; regularly recurring events and frequent content updates. Because of the prioritization of fresh content, to optimize your SE rank restaurants must create their own fresh content; and engage in two-way conversations.

3. The Underbelly of Social Media With the rise of activity in social media, we are also seeing an emerging presence of online review websites. Unfortunately most of the review sites do not validate customer reviews of businesses. (A snapshot of their policies taken directly from their respective websites is included in the Addendum.) We have divided some popular review sites into two different categories:


14%

16%

5%4%

25%

30%

25%

20%

15%

10%

5%

0%0 1 2-3 4-6 7-10 11-20 21-30 31-40 41-50 50+

21%22%

18%19%

20%

8%

3% 3%

1%2% 2%

0%

3%

5%

10%

2012

2010

Customer Use of Online Reviews

Number of Reviews Read

% ofRespondents


Neutral review sites that capture both positive and negative reviews — Yelp (71 million/mo), Citysearch (7 million/mo), TripAdvisor (40 million/mo) — Neutral review example:

Negative review sites that capture only disparaging reviews

— RipoffReport, PissedConsumer, CompanyNameSucks, ComplaintsBoard

A frightening reality of negative review sites is on one hand they do not validate the accuracy oftheir content while on the other hand for a fee they offer reputation management services. Theethics of their business practices is troubling – as is their steady monthly traffic.


The food was very good! The wait staff were very friendly but the wait time on the food was very slow. We had to wait for our food for 1 hour at least or longer. This is not acceptable. We had a party of five & one of our people left because the wait was so long. A person can only eat so much bread & water or drinks lol. The food was great but the wait time has to improve.

4/23/2012

on ASU Tempe campus refused to give me a side of hot peppers. They always have in the past but now say it's "corporate policy" to not give away sides. Yeah they can put it on the sandwich, but not as a side. Well I don't like them leaking onto my sandwich, but I do like eating them. Too bad, they say. No sides. Well cram it with walnuts . I'm not coming back. Cheap jackpipes. And their sandwiches aren't as good as they pretend anyhow. I'm just mad about the peppers.

IS TOO CHEAP TO GIVE AWAY A PEPPER

Complaint by

Comments (4)

Review #: Posted by:From:Posted On:

312809

Phoenix, AZ2012-04-17

4,500,000

4,000,000

3,500,000

3,000,000

2,500,000

2,000,000

1,500,000

1,000,000

500,000

-

Estimated Monthly Website Traffic

Traffic

RipOffReport.com

PissedConsumer.com

ComplaintsBoard.com

APR2011

MAY2011

JUN2011

JUL2011

AUG2011

SEPT2011

AUG2011

NOV2011

DEC2011

JAN2012

FEB2012

MAR2012

APR2012


The review sites are sure to affect restaurant reputations one way or another in that:

The user generated content (UGC) primes them for high SE rank

Unsubstantiated customer comments are posted

They generate high monthly traffic

The Result – Restaurant Owners/Operators/Marketers Feel the PressureYour responsibilities have increased. In addition to all of the “business” responsibilities, you also have tomeet the demands of today’s interactive Web.

The result of the Customer Cultural Shift, SE Algorithms and rising Underbelly of Social Media is the generators of fresh content can impact restaurant brands and reputations. Brands are now influenced by conversations and information shared online, but largely out of their direct influence. Long gone are the days when planned annual, quarterly or monthly marketing/promotion plans set the course for a restaurant’s brand positioning and marketing strategy. Rather – to be effective – marketing strategies must include ongoing online engagement.

Where to StartKnowing all of this, where should you begin? Is there a correct approach? What if you say the wrong thing? When should you respond and when should you not respond? Should you seek legal advice as you determine your approach? How do you balance taking care of your customers and not giving comps to everyone who complains? How vulnerable are you to false complaints? How long do customer comments and your responses stay posted? You have limited time and resources to dedicate to this, so how do you prioritize?


MANAGING THE RESTAURANT TODAY'S INTERACTIVE WEB

Customer Interaction

Search Engines

Yelp

Vendor Relationships

City Search

Franchise Expectations

Trip Advisor

“The Books”

Fresh ContentPromotions

Customer Servicevia Social Media

Menu Changes

Review Sites

Inventory

EconomyFacebook

Employee Retention & Hiring

Unvalidated Reviews

Customer Cultural Shift

Sales: Daily, Weekly, Monthly

Food CostsTwitter

RestaurantOwner/

Operator/Marketer



These concerns are all legitimate and very real. This white paper serves as a starting point for you as you determine your online brand reputation strategy.

The Solution – Summit Marketing’s PerspectiveSummit Marketing recommends businesses – especially restaurants due to the high volume of user generated reviews – proactively monitor and steer your online brand reputation.

Step 1 – Know Where You StandBefore you map your online brand reputation strategy, you need to establish a baseline. The baseline should capture your current SE rankings and your current reputation on any customer review sites that show up on the Page 1 results.

Search EnginesConduct searches on the major search engines (Google, Bing and Yahoo!) using your restaurant’s name. Make a list of the Page 1 (top 10) results for each SE. For any review sites listed, read through the reviews to get a sense of your restaurants’ brand reputation on the site. Then categorize the URLs by content that is positive, neutral or negative towards your business. Look for trends across the SEs.

Analysis Combine the findings from the SE rank and customer review sites and tier the results.

Level 1 URLs are your assets (social media assets, website, blog, etc.)

Level 2 URLs are relatively neutral, where you can legitimately influence the information (local websites, neutral review sites, etc.)

Level 3 URLs are the negative review sites.

Below is an example of an analysis of Page 1 search results on Google:

Rank1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

URLClient Website: Home Page

Client Website: Blog

Yelp

Trust Link

Client Website: Contact Us

Client Twitter Page

Client Facebook Page

PissedConsumer

Yellow Pages

Client Asset: Dated Blog

PostsN/A

N/A

8

130

N/A

N/A

N/A

70

N/A

N/A

NotesSEO efforts are working

Could optimize

4 reviews in 2012; 4 in 2011

40 in 2012; reviews skew negative

SEO efforts are working



33 in 2012; several on same day; all negative

Company profile page

Forgotten outdated blog

Google Page 1 Search Results



A key component of Summit Marketing’s approach to managing online brand reputations is to deploy strategies that maximize the search rank of green and blue URLs, thereby mitigating the influence of the red URLs by pushing their search results to Page 2. Step 2 (Develop & Execute Your Action Plan) describes how to:

Optimize green URLs through search engine optimization and content creation. Maximize blue URLs through customer reviews and establishing local presence.

Step 2 – Develop & Execute Your Action PlanThe analysis from Step 1 (Know Where You Stand) will guide your brand reputation strategy, the sense of urgency, level of effort and scope. Your plan of action should be categorized by what you can directly affect, what you can influence and what you want to leave alone.

Your brand reputation plan should begin with maximizing the online assets you can directly affect.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)Strategies that organically increase website and web page ranking with the search engines are SEO strategies. Summit Marketing starts with a SEO analysis to determine if your website – the cornerstone of your online presence – is performing optimally. We conduct a Barriers Analysis that identifies issues that hinder your website’s SE ranking. Recommended solutions are provided for each identified barrier.

Summit Marketing then creates a Keyword Report listing words that align with your business. The keyword report is critical as these words should be used as you write anything that goes online, i.e. website copy, blog updates, social media updates, etc.

You will predictably notice a lift in the SE rank of your online assets by overcoming your SEO barriers and incorporating keywords in your online copy.

Content CreationYour content should take the form of planned and two-way conversations. Planned content may include press releases, blog updates or social media posts. To help guide your content, Summit Marketing recommends creating an editorial calendar with dates and content topics outlined in advance. This disciplined approach sets the tempo for your content creation.

Attention Multi-Site Restaurant ModelsA cohesive online engagement plan must be applied across all locations to maintain brand voice while also balancing local specific messaging to

engage local customers. This means providing communication processes and policies and activating social monitoring tools to minimize brand risks;

while enabling local restaurants to employ their own LSM tactics.



To engage in two-way conversations, you need to know where your customers are and what they are saying. We use a social listening platform that tracks conversations on 25+ sites. Our tool shows us who is saying what, their Klout score and where they made their comment. This knowledge allows us to immediately engage with customers to thank them, provide clarification or to mitigate a situation. A timely, friendly response shows others our commitment to our customers and to customer service. Are you “listening” in an organized and full-coverage fashion?

Review Site ParticipationAs you plan your strategy, reference the SE rankings from Step 1 (Know Where You Stand) to prioritize on which neutral review sites to focus your efforts. Now, go to the sites and read the reviews. Look at your ratings, review dates for recency, number of reviews and the reviewers’ intent (constructive or malicious). This will determine your scope and level of effort.

If the reviews are negative, but low in quantity and dated – with a focused effort, you should be able to turn the situation around by encouraging customers to post reviews that reflect current comments.

If the reviews are negative, high in quantity and fairly recent – they may have some legitimacy.

— Look for trends in the negative comments. — Consider making adjustments in the areas identified by your customers. — Once you’ve made the improvements, re-engage your customers, asking if they

could post reviews about their most recent experience.

If the reviews are positive, but low in quantity or dated – engage your customers and ask for online reviews.

How should you approach customers to encourage online reviews? Simply ask. To focus your effort, specify to your customers the desired review site for them to visit. If you already collect customer surveys or feedback, reach out to those happy customers and ask if they can post an online review about their experience. One innovative strategy to consider is making a tablet computer available to your customers during their visit. Train your front-of-house staff to inform your customers of the tablet’s availability for sharing their experience with friends, review sites and other social sites.

If This Seems OverwhelmingKnow that Summit Marketing can manage your online social presence or train you and your staff how to build relationships with your customers via social

media interactions. We teach you how to recognize and Inspire your Advocates to Influence, leading to Improved Revenue, Retention and Reputation.



Review Site ResponsesJoin in the conversations about your restaurant and respond to both negative and positivecomments. When responding to a negative review:

Be timely and concise.

Maintain a sincere, unemotional tone.

Thank them for being a customer and for their feedback.

Offer to have them contact you directly.

Here are some examples of responses to negative and positive reviews from ProfitableHospitality.com:

“Thanks for alerting us to this. We work hard to offer good food and friendly service, and I’m sorry that we didn’t meet your expectations. I hope you will give us another chance in the future. If you’d like to contact me directly, please call the restaurant and ask for Ken.’”

“It’s very disappointing to receive a comment like this. We work hard to offer good food and friendly service, and will investigate the concerns you have raised [or you may like to address the specific complaint in a non-defensive way]. I hope you will give us another chance in the future. If you’d like to contact me directly, please call the restaurant and ask for Ken.”

“Thank you very much for the positive comments. It’s always encouraging when customers acknowledge the good work of our team. We look forward to seeing you again soon.”

What Not To DoWhen responding on review sites, it is important that you do not: — Fake a review, for you or for a competitor - Site visitors are likely to

see through this, which will reflect negatively on you. — Respond negatively to a review about you - Just remember you

have no control over how long your negative comment will be live on the Web.

— Ignore the information - If the negative reviews are showing a trend, investigate the matter and adjust as necessary.



Activate Your Restaurants’ Presence on Local SitesCreate business profiles on geography-specific sites, such as Citysearch, TripAdvisor, Yellow Pages, Google or Yahoo! Local. Because SEs favor localized search results, this simple step can influence your Page 1 results. Take advantage of these opportunities.

Negative Review Sites – What To DoUltimately it is your decision how you respond to certain negative sites whose business modelsthrive on negative comments. Some suggestions we have provided our clients include:

Scan them, but largely ignore them. People will see the sites for what they are.

Address your commitment to providing excellent customer service on your website. Perhaps point to a company policy about addressing customer complaints. You may even state that it is unfortunate some review sites exist for the sole purpose of degrading company reputations – and that it is your policy to not interact with or through those types of businesses.

Actively apply for awards or accreditations that build your restaurant’s reputation, such as accreditation by the Better Business Bureau. Be sure to show those achievements on your website.

You could also respond to complaints posted on the negative review sites, but we don’t suggestthat. It creates risk as your brand could get tangled up in their web.

If you have considered taking legal action against negative review sites or against a reviewer, please consult with your legal counsel and conduct online searches regarding others who have taken this approach.

Step 3 – MeasureAs you execute your Action Plan, periodically track your search engine standings and compare them to your baseline. As you track, note which actions have resulted in a lift in SE results.

Continue listening to the social conversations and look for upward trends in positive discussions and increased levels of “passion” (observed by word choice) in the discussions. Adjust your tactics as necessary, and continue your social media engagement and proactive online brand management.

The Time Is NowIn June 2012 alone, there were two significant changes that underscore the growing trend and significance of customer reviews. First, Bing and Yelp announced a partnership. This further emphasizes the value SEs have for fresh content. Second, Foursquare announced it would soon be adding a review element to its widely used app.

In ClosingKnow that you do not need to be a social media expert. Learn what you can, do what you can do, and if you need extra bandwidth or guidance to help take your restaurant to the next level, let’s talk.



References:http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2012/07/03/scammers-threatening-restaurants-with-negative-reviews/

http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/24/yelp-class-action-lawsuit/

http://www.sacbee.com/2012/05/25/4515556/restaurants-decry-yelp-extortion.html

http://www.comscore.com/Press_Events/Press_Releases/2011/6/comScore_Releases_May_2011_U.S._Search_Engine_Rankings

http://searchengineland.com/study-72-of-consumers-trust-online-reviews-as-much-as-personalrecommendations-114152

http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?id=1009097&R=1009097

http://searchengineland.com/google-search-algorithm-change-for-freshness-to-impact-35-of-searches-99856

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2405873,00.asp

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/07/technology/in-app-overhaul-foursquare-shifts-focus-torecommendations.html?_r=1

http://profitablehospitality.com/news/index.php/social-media/how-to-write-a-quick-reply-to-a-bad-onlinereview-of-your-restaurant-or-bar

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No conclusions are drawn by ComplaintsBoard.com, as to content validity. ComplaintsBoard.com does not edit or censor posted messages or investigate them for accuracy.

IN NO EVENT WILL Company Name Sucks BE LIABLE FOR (I) ANY INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, OR INDIRECT DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF PROFITS, BUSINESS INTERRUPTION, LOSS OF PROGRAMS OR INFORMATION, AND THE LIKE) ARISING OUT OF THE USE OF OR INABILITY TO USE THE SERVICE, OR ANY INFORMATION, OR TRANSACTIONS PROVIDED ON THE SERVICE, OR DOWNLOADED FROM THE SERVICE, OR ANY DELAY OF SUCH INFORMATION OR SERVICE.

Yelp

City Search

Trip Advisor

Rip Off Report

Xcentric

Pissed Consumer

Complaints Board

Company Name Sucks

WEBSITE CONTENT POLICY

AddendumSnapshot of online review sites’ content policies.





CHIP TOLLIE

Director - Commercial Accounts

Direct: 913-562-3421

Mobile: 913-220-6636

[email protected]

HEATHER MENG, PMP

Senior Strategist

Direct: 314-447-3515

Mobile: 314-619-0857

[email protected]

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