The great thing about a reputation is that it always precedes you, for good or bad. When reputation is in the zone, it can work the room before you make the grand entrance and unleash the sales pitch. But when the your reputation gets too far out in front of you, things can get sloppy. It’s hard to keep the communication lines open when you don’t have a grip on your reputation, and as a result, there can be a disconnect between business strategy (substitute strategy for goals, mission, or vision) and the perceived business direction (a.k.a. public/consumer perception). Enter reputation management, a pivotal player according to the Washington Post.
To set the record straight, reputation management in the online sense (not to be confused with the “Paris Hilton as brand” sense) is a feedback loop consisting of actions and the opinions of those actions that generate reports on the actions and ultimately facilitate reactions to the initial actions.
Let’s look at what reputation management really is – starting with reputation. Think about reputation this way – in North America, there is a perceived notion (a form of reputation) that anything European must be cutting edge – a step above in a new way – so much so, that we use imported words to pay homage to these products, words like avant-guard. Even the word European has become synonymous with superior. This perceived notion can be taken a step further to say that anything from Germany features superior engineering. The term “German Engineered” generally means a product can get away with a substantial mark-up simply because it is engineered in Germany. Now, nothing against German engineers, I’ve worked with a few of them and they truly are good human beings, but they are just that – human beings, no better, no worse. But they have a leg up on the competition – beyond great schools, they also have an unbreakable reputation that could make a superhero jealous. “It’s German engineered, it must be good.”
Generally, German products are quite nice – like German cars, for instance – I drive one and am quite pleased, but there was a time, now just a faint memory, but there was a time when some German automakers mailed-in the quality control. Yes, it’s true – ever wonder where Audi’s lifetime warranty came from? Yet, even with these lapses in quality, the superior reputation of German engineering is pervasive in North America. It is fair to say that German products have reached the Shangri-la of reputation management, a fairy-tale place where the streets are paved with accolades and the bells ring with winning customer reviews before the item hits the showroom floor. And to some degree, every business, no matter how small, needs a drop of the legendary German engineering reputation – this is, in my opinion, the apex of reputation, an elite designation held by a select few housed in the reputation pantheon where luminaries like Swiss clocks and Wedgewood china have lifetime memberships.
Up next, it’s an example of the management portion at work.
Have a question and need quick answers? 
