Fill More Seats With These 3 Pillars of Online Reputation Management

These days, online reputation management (ORM) is an essential part of running any successful business. ORM is more than just managing your business’s online appearance. It’s about maintaining and improving your brand’s credibility.

Let’s say you own the Dynasty Theater. It has a beautiful neon marquee, but the first two letters on it have been out for three weeks. That means every passerby will identify you as the nasty Theater even if you have the cleanest, most luxurious auditoriums in the state. Not long ago, the only thing theater owners had to worry about was their cinema’s in-person experience. But with a majority of consumers now discovering in-person experiences online, theaters can’t afford to neglect their digital presence either.

When we say ORM, we’re talking about a combination of a few things: digital marketing, SEO, and public relations strategies, all of which promote and maintain your online image. And with Black Panther and Avatar just around the corner, now is the time to make sure these elements are in tip-top shape.

You might be wondering which channels your online reputation includes. The answer is: Google, Facebook, Instagram, and your website of course. But really any image, information, review, interaction, or event that is public ultimately reflects your business and brand. What exactly are the benefits of a quality online reputation? Here are seven:

So, what three things could you be doing to take charge of your online reputation right now?

1. Make sure you’ve claimed your Google Business Profile.

Have one already? Share it with us. We’d love to see it!

Setting a profile up is just the beginning. With so much commerce now happening online, customers expect to get a feel of your theater before they even arrive. Be sure to add images — and not just any images. Highlight what’s special about your theater, whether it’s luxury recliners, a glitzy bar, or a landmark-worthy marquee from 1933. Then, round it all out with a thorough description.

Another piece of info customers want to know is your hours. It’s important that these are up-to-date, particularly during the holidays. Any discrepancy between the hours on your site and those a customer might find on a search engine, like Google, gives them the wrong impression about your theater.

Next, is a simple yet key component of your online reputation. We call it, NAP, or Name, Address, and Phone number. Though seemingly small, Google cross references these three pieces of data on websites like Yelp, TripAdvisor, Yellowpages, and more to make sure they’re consistent everywhere. If they’re not, Google will rank your theater lower than other nearby theaters, meaning less potential visibility. If your theater has multiple locations, make sure that the URL you add to your Google Business Profile will take the customer to the proper theater location web page rather than a generic homepage or movies page.

2. Respond to your ratings & reviews

Yes, ratings and reviews matter; they influence what current and potential customers think about your theater. But what a lot of cinema operators don’t know is that how you respond to them matters too.

53% of customers expect a response on review sites. 84% of negative reviewers expect a response and, of those negative reviewers, more than half of them expect a response from the business within one day.

That might sound like a lot, but think of it like this. If a customer orders popcorn at your counter, finds there’s not enough butter, and comes back to complain, would you ignore them? Probably not. It’s the same with reviews. When you don’t respond, it actually sends a message that you don’t care. It could cost you more too. Attracting a new customer costs six to seven times more than it does to retain a current one. Find out the best way to respond to reviews here.

From a technical standpoint, ratings matter because they inform how high your theater ranks on search engines. A business with a 4 to 5-star rating is positioned 9% higher in its location than one with a 2 to 3-star rating. In that sense, search engines aren’t complicated. They’re designed to give customers what they want. Which would you rather visit, the 4.5-star restaurant or the 2-star one? Exactly.

3. Bolster your SEO & PPC Strategies

SEO is incredibly important to making sure your website is getting as much organic traffic as possible. Basically, the more strategic your keyword usage is across your site, the more people will discover your theater online. What’s necessary to remember, however, is that SEO is a long-term strategy and that’s where PPC, or pay per click, picks up the slack. Because there’s so much market competition (especially in regions like Texas), PPC helps you increase your visibility for keywords and searches that would be pretty much impossible to rank for organically. Google’s Keyword Planner or SEMrush are great options for developing a PPC strategy, but you might have too much on your plate to actually sit down and do that work. That’s where finding the right partner at a good price becomes an invaluable asset.

All of this info can be a lot to digest at once. That’s why we’ve compiled some best practices you can start right now to make your online reputation stellar. Get it here!