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Reputation Matters, Inaccurate Online Listings Can Hurt Businesses

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We’ve been hearing about fake news a lot lately, but, what about fake business listings? These can be almost, if not more so, dangerous than fake news for a business. Current customers and potential alike can encounter a fake business listing and think you’ve moved, or worse-think you’ve closed. Do you have something in place to fix these issues so you aren’t worrying?
This is precisely what happened to Finnbar’s Pub in Troy. A fake Facebook page was made that said they were closed. The owners were not aware until they received quite a few phone calls asking if they were open. After searching Facebook, Megan Costello found a fake listing that said: “permanently closed”. There’s no way to tell exactly how much business they lost due to this. Weeks later, she and her husband were able to have the fake listing removed. This is a prime example of how inaccurate online listings can be detrimental to businesses and why they need to monitor their online footprint.
Smartphones have fundamentally changed the way customers interact with local businesses. Since 2011, “near me” searches have increased by 34x! You know that your business relies on customers, current and new, in order to survive. Inconsistent or inaccurate online listings results in low confidence, which decreases search ranking and risks lost business. We’re not the only ones who know how important monitoring is for you and your business. The Better Business Bureau thinks so too. Melanie McGovern, Communications Director for the Better Business Bureau of Upstate New York, recently had this to say “We always tell our accredited businesses if they have a Facebook page, if they have a Twitter profile, if they have anything on social media, you have to monitor it.”
Monitoring the online footprint of a business can be daunting if you’re trying to tackle it on your own, after all, you do have a business to run! Our online reputation management tool – BrawnGuard – is here to help! In addition to making sure your business’ NAP info is correct online, BrawnGuard has the ability to add photos, links, enticing call-to-actions, offers and longer business descriptions. All of this is done so that your business stands out above the rest. BrawnGuard not only corrects listing information where it exists but also creates a new enhanced listing for your business on over 70 online directories. Think of this as 70 small ads in newspaper business directory pages! The difference is these ads run 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year and can show up when someone searches specifically for your product or service!
And that’s not all….in addition to correcting online listings, BrawnGuard has a strong Duplicate Suppression Tool that allows you to get rid of any duplicate listings that may exist for your business. Online review monitoring is yet another feature of the product. You will be notified within 24 hours of new reviews from major review sites such as Google, Facebook, Yelp, CitySearch and more, so you can be aware of what consumers are saying about your business and respond to those reviews in a timely fashion.
Even if you’re well versed in the online world, this is a lot to take in; BrawnGuard is the solution to your online footprint problem. Let us do the work so you’re able to focus on the bigger picture-your business flourishing!

To learn more and hear how we do it, contact us today!