New Case Study Highlights Threats to Brand and Individual Reputations
There’s an old adage that if something isn’t broke, you shouldn’t fix it. Online reputation management (ORM) firms have been warning clients (and the general public) for years that this isn’t the case on the internet. This week one ORM firm has provided proof of this fallacy. “Brands Under Attack” is a powerful online reputation management case study that proves no one’s reputation is safe. It doesn’t matter if your business is squeaky clean, you can still be attacked.
Elixir Interactive has been targeted for over four months by someone engaging in a persist attack of their online reputation. The case study carefully outlines the tactics used by this anonymous attacker and, in doing so, provides a wake up call to anyone with a web presence – which in 2010 is pretty much every company and every individual. In Elixir’s case, they already had a strong presence in the search engine results for their branded terms. However, this prolonged campaign has forced them to spend valuable resources and time to defend and strengthen their online assets.
The case study demonstrates how the current climate on the web makes it easy for anyone to threaten or even destroy your reputation. It could be an unhappy client, a disgruntled employee, a psycho ex, or even a competitor who is jealous of your position. And it’s not just companies that are at risk. After revealing the first round of attacks, Elixir’s CEO, Fionn Downhill, was the target of a separate attack on her own brand. There is a separate Elixir Interactive CEO Case Study that exposes the fraudulent actions engaged in by the anonymous attacker(s) against Fionn’s stellar reputation.
All it takes is false reports, properly crafted, on the right websites, and what would be considered slander if it were in a print publication, can easily cause untold damage to your reputation. And that can result in loss of clients, potential clients, speaking engagements, advertisers, etc. Worse yet, you have little or no legal recourse on the web, because the justice system hasn’t caught up with the state of the internet.
There are steps you can take to protect yourself before something goes wrong. Elixir’s case study offers tips to follow. If you find yourself under attack, Elixir also provides recommendations on how to find a good ORM company to help you, if you can’t fix it yourself.