REMOVE NEGATIVE CONTENT FROM GOOGLE
The internet has given us much, but it has made running and managing businesses even more complex. As more and more companies take to the web for marketing, competition grows and online reputations become fragile and all the more important. Today, a potential customer will almost always google your company’s name before contacting you. So, if negative links and reviews are the first links that they see, it can lead to you losing valuable business opportunities.
While it may take years to build a stellar reputation, it can be jeopardized within a few days. Negative press is a threat to your professional and personal reputation and can lead to questions regarding your skill and expertise. A single post can lead to another and then hundreds, making it essential to remove negative content from Google searches early. The problem is, removing negative links completely is virtually impossible. It is easy to remove such links only if you own or directly or indirectly control the website that these are posted on. Otherwise, you may try reaching out to the writer, or owner of the site and try to convince them to remove the content. You can also try approaching the search engine showing these links. Some like Google may remove the negative content from searches if it violates their terms of services. Alternatively, you may seek legal help, if the content is defamatory or inaccurate, though that is always a risky option.
However, none of these options are completely full proof. Fully removing such content is a difficult and involved process, and might even adversely affect the crisis at hand. What a top reputation management firm would advise you to do in such a situation, is to push down these links with positive content. If you are successful in moving negative links to the third or fourth page of google searches, they become almost invisible to an average viewer. According to searches, a viewer usually will not go past the second page of search results, and your mission is successful. This technique, known as Reverse SEO, is the best way to remove negative content from Google searches.
This method involves consistently posting positive content related to your business and your area of expertise on social media platforms such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. The platform you choose depends on your target audience, and where they are most active. Search Engines such as Google rank links from such social platforms high, and hence it is wise to create optimized public profiles under your businesses’ or your full name. Similarly, being active on these profiles by posting regularly and commenting on other appropriate and related accounts will make you visible and may even result in your business reaching more people.
Another option is to write and post regular blogs or open a question-answer forum where you post content to showcase your expertise. Because google showcases fresh content on top, this will help remove negative links from the first few pages of google searches. Also, putting out positive content focusing on your skills will aid your personal reputation management.
Reverse SEO may sound easy in theory but is not so in reality. It takes patience and careful planning. Hence, it is advisable to talk to experts with experience and knowledge, who will guide you through the process.
