45% of business owners aren't satisfied with their online presence, according to study. Unfortunately, most people who feel this way do not know how to cope with the implications of a public customer dispute or a disgruntled employee's behavior.

In the eyes of customers, your brand is who you are & the most important thing is your brand safety. It's your greatest asset and, when it comes to how it's treated, the most intangible one. Your social facts, power and resources in the marketplace suffer if you do not protect your credibility and brand image.

Note that social media is not without its barbs, which we will explore in more detail below, as you go about the task of creating social evidence as a business strategy. If you're not being careful, it can destroy your reputation in minutes and take months to recover from a simple phishing hack.

Up to 97 percent of companies are found by an online search, and 90 percent of surveyed individuals say they are affected by consumer feedback and word of mouth, regardless of whether they are positive or negative.

What is reputation management in a nutshell?

Business trends will come and go, but you will be haunted forever by what is posted online about your company. This is why you need to follow the best practices of reputation management and take constructive action to show the best possible public face.

Brand reputation management means communicating in a constructive way with the public, deleting misleading or incorrect data, and addressing head-on negative feedback or comments in a way that facilitates a win-win relationship. Transparency, genuine relationships and a certain amount of retroactive PR are involved.

Keep your employees and associates happy:

Disgruntled staff, suppliers, and even rivals who try to torpedo your image are a big source of online negativity. By doing business fairly and with as much honesty and integrity as possible, this can be avoided.

Google your company once a week at least:

When was the last time your company was Googled? All sorts of stuff you didn't know can be discovered by the simple act of typing your business or technical name into a search bar once a week.

You can find online feedback you didn't know about when you browse the internet through a customer's eyes, someone gossiping about your business on social media, and a whole host of other public comments that pop up anytime someone mentions you or your company by name.

Generate positive press on your own:

Most of what is known about you online comes straight from you, outside of customer feedback and comments. Heck, by participating online and remaining active in the forums, you can also monitor feedback and comments to some degree.

Secure the networks and privacy:

Nothing, particularly when it involves a security breach that puts consumer data at risk, can sink a brand faster than negative news. By training staff on protection to reduce human error events, you can avoid network infiltration. Although one of the first suggestions security experts make is a virtual private network, this technology is not without its share of scams.

Gather social proof:

Consumers are more likely than they are to trust paid spokespersons or commercials to listen to advice or warnings about goods and services from friends. This is called social evidence, and in order to build trust, it is necessary to build social evidence for your brand or business.

Design with user experience in mind:

The first contact that you have with your audience is also your website. Make sure it's built to put security and user experience (UX) first. Not only does this attract more tourists to your website, but it also keeps them longer there and makes a return trip more probable.

To tarnish your name needs only one bad interaction. Trying to clean up misinformation or negative feedback could become a full-time activity with so much online competition and so many platforms available.

By practicing constructive interaction, securing your computer network and hiring a reputable reputation management firm to track your brand image, you will make this job simpler.