There is every reason to believe Toyota will fix its technical and management problems. The question is whether, panicking in the very un-Japanese glare of the American media and political spotlight, it will dig a deeper hole by losing the air of trust and reputation for competence among customers it has spent so long building up. That would be bad for Toyota and for America.

If Toyota wants to rebuild trust with consumers, and its reputation, it will have to do two things. 1.) Put out safer vehicles. 2.) Launch a comprehensive online reputation campaign.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/oped/bal-op.toyota02mar02,0,6420503.story

Some students worried about how their online presence will be perceived by a potential employer are taking the extraordinary security step of changing their names on the social network Facebook.

In this down economy, with heavy competition for jobs, Maryland students and new graduates are joining an emerging national trend of modifying account names to elude snooping recruiters.

It is good that students are starting to realize this, because businessmen have long used Google to identify less-than-professional applicants. If students have done irreparable damage to their reputations, they might want to consider a search reputation management campaign.

http://somd.com/news/headlines/2010/11328.shtml

When it comes to social media, your husband is what you’d call a classic oversharer. He tweets the details of a disastrous dinner you made and posts less-than-flattering vacation pictures of you on Facebook. In your estimation, he has no sense of boundaries. His view is that this newfound form self-expression is all in good fun.

The story, and the solution of the author, goes on at the link. It’s a very useful story–and hopefully one with which you have no personal experience.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/jan/30/spouse-is-being-a-little-too-open-with-his-tweets/

These three-hour workshops are provided through the Redwood Empire Small Business Development Center (SBDC). Instructor Janet Wentworth is an SBDC business advisor and technology consultant, with expertise in branding, product marketing, internet marketing, product introductions and partner relationships. In addition to a degree from the UC Davis, she holds a master certificate in internet marketing from USF and is a certified guerrilla marketing coach.

The article I’ll paste below is more of a event-notice than a proper article,  but it is indicative of how small businesses all over the world are learning about the importance of their image online.

http://www.sonomanews.com/articles/2010/02/15/news/doc4b79d8a30f37d731410415.txt

A strong corporate reputation generates confidence, in the present as well as in the future. It generates a feeling that the corporation is in the hands of safe and responsible leaders. And that is what matters.

The author is obviously right. Reputation matters, that is why companies spend billions on advertising each year. However, online reputation is becoming increasingly important relative to all other ways of creating or maintaining the company’s reputation.

http://www.ameinfo.com/56895.html

“By expanding the sites from which reviews are gathered and expanding the pools of reviews, Google will be able to aggregate this sort of information about many more places. It could very well portend a shift in the review landscape, moving power way from centralized review sites towards active and aggressive hyperlocal sites,” Blumenthal concludes.

The reputation management industry experiences shifts in the search formula and review process constantly, but this could be a dramatic change to how reputations are maintained online.

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Google-Now-Includes-Place-Pages-Reviews-from-Non-Traditional-Sources-132411.shtml

http://www.themeasurementstandard.com/issues/11-1-09/repsaved11-1-09.asp

There is a lot of content on the Internet that is laughable, that is fun, that is silly. Like all pranks, though, there is a point at which it stops being funny and becomes quite serious. This is true online too. When pranksters decide to take aim at companies and individual’s reputations, by gaming search engines, it is much more serious. A man or woman’s reputation is something that they must live with, whether it has been acquired fairly or unfairly, through lies or truth.

Companies can lose hundreds or thousands of possible clients from vicious lies spread on the web that find their way into search results. This can directly counteract the hundreds, thousands, or even millions of dollars that these companies spend on advertising to attract additional clients.

The only way to defend against this sort of anonymous online slander is to hire an online reputation management firm. ReputationHawk.com is the website of a company that helps to repair the injured reputations of individuals and companies. They do this by de-emphasizing the negative comments and replacing those links with more positive articles or blog postings.

Everything that I have read about this company says that they are very successful at what they do. Customer reviews, interviews, blog posts—all have sung the praises of Reputation Hawk. The Chicago Tribune, NewsWeek, Businessweek, and Time have all featured the innovative company in profiles of the industry or direct interviews.