Business Edge

Can you remove malicious reputation-harming content from the Internet?

Even lawyers can't prevent people from writing unflattering comments about you or your firm on the Internet. Even if you knew the source, it's nearly impossible to remove negative textual content from a public and global web that prides itself on freedom of speech. So what can you do if your business is being adversely affected by a multitude of articles painting you or your business in a negative light? Even ONE article or web page can have serious consequences, never mind several. While it's difficult to have negative content removed, you can do the next best thing: make sure no one can find it.

Business Edge can help you to fix negative online web site content with a strategic corporate reputation management initiative

We have a three-step proprietary approach to solving your online reputation situation which we call Reputation Remediation ©. The steps resemble when your car has a fender bender; the first step is to find where all the damage is. Once the assessment is done, we recommend a course of action. Often if involves things you can do yourself, but this is optional; if the client wishes we will handle every facet of the reconstruction. Our repair work will restore your online reputation to its original shiny condition.

Does Reputation Remediation only consist of negative comments from customers?>

The most difficult online reputation damage to remediate generally comes from legitimate sources

Negative customer comments are a common theme in reputation remediation, but this is the easiest online reputation damage to remedy. Much more difficult to remedy are negative web content pages that are not published with the absolute intention to damage, but that do damage regardless. Web sites that publish public information on court cases, for instance, can often rank high enough in the search engines to come up near the top when people type your name or your business name. If it's on the first results page of Google, you can be sure it's being read, and you can be sure its causing you harm.

Reputation Remediation © will differentiate between customers or others trying to harm your reputation purposely (in which case they will often continue to do so, necessitating a longer-term effort) and those web pages that are simply stating known facts and are not doing purposeful harm.

How long will this Reputation Remediation © take?

Be patient. It usually takes longer to fix the damage than it took to create it.

Reputation Remediation © is a process that is partially dependant upon the major search engines, and unfortunately search sites like Google and Yahoo react slowly to changes. Often, however, we can remediate most of the reputation damage within weeks or even days, while some aspects could take longer. Every case is different, but we will consider your reputation damage as seriously as if it were our own.

What about filing a lawsuit?

We work with attorneys and law firms whose clients are considering this route
While legal action may be appropriate in certain cases, even if your case is successful your client will still suffer negative consequences during this process; damage to your client's reputation will continue unabated as a legal battle is waged to remove the offending web page or web site. In the meantime, we can work with you to remediate the damaging information while you follow legal recourse.