Remember in high school, it was always some huge deal if people were talking about you—no matter if it was good or bad. And no matter what sort of gossip it might have been, you wanted to keep tabs on what was being said about you.

Yeah…your brand should be sort of like that.

It’s crucial that you know what sorts of things are being said about your brand, especially online. There are basic tolls you can use to monitor this (we suggest Google Alerts and simple Facebook settings from the admin page) but the best thing you can really do is to properly manage your brand’s online reputation.

For instance, if you’re a marketing firm in Richmond, Virginia, a simple Google search for marketing firm Richmond VA will show you what the most popular names and topics in your industry are. You need to be in this list—somewhere on the first page that comes up. Then throw the name of your business in there to see if there are any conversations going on that you are unaware of.

Don’t forget to do the same thing with a Google Image search. You might be surprised with some of the things that pop up on Google images.

Another thing you can do to keep tabs on your reputation is to find out what your competitors are up to as well. From time to time, keep an eye on their reputation as well as your own. If there is anything negative in conversations or reviews in regards to a competitor, work towards using their weaknesses as one of your strengths. This is also a great way of looking for the pet peeves of customers within your industry without experiencing it for yourself.

Tomorrow we’ll take a look at a few other ways to keep tabs on what’s being said about your brand and how to manage your online reputation. Until then, look over these tips and strategies to see if your brand can improve on any of them.