Title:
Paying Someone Else to Worry About Your Online Image
Description: This is
a VOA Special English Economics Report.
See text below
Text:
A reputation -- what people think of you, good or
bad -- is built one message at a time. The
difference today is that people can get their
messages out to lots of other people at lightning
speed through websites and social media. So, not
surprisingly, an industry is fast developing around
managing online reputations for individuals and
businesses. Ken Wisnefski is chief executive of
Webimax, a company he started in two thousand eight.
He says, "Up to eighty percent of people have been
influenced in a purchasing decision by what they've
read or seen online." Webimax is a search engine
optimization, or SEO, company. Search engine
optimization involves different ways to improve the
results of online searches. Webimax offers several
different services, but Ken Wisnefski says
reputation management is growing the fastest. Some
of his customers need help with urgent publicity
problems. Others are seeking long-term management of
their online image. Mr. Wisnefski says about
one-fifth of his business is with companies and
individuals outside the United States. How does
reputation management work? Webimax has two sides to
its business. The company can organize online
publicity campaigns to try to limit the harm done by
negative comments or bad news. Mr. Wisnefski says
when a client gets in the news for the wrong
reasons, his company does not try to hide what
happened. Instead, it develops a campaign to show
that the client is dealing with the problem in a
productive and positive way, he says.In that way the
work seems a lot like old-fashioned public
relations, but in cyberspace.But what if clients are
the target of lies or maybe an organized effort to
harm their reputation? Then Webimax would use its
legal team to try to have the comments removed. Ken
Wisnefski thinks the legal side of reputation
management is only going to grow. In the United
States, not all speech is protected by the
Constitution. And even if the comments are true, the
threat of a costly legal fight may be enough to get
them removed.Clients of companies that manage
reputations can pay thousands of dollars a month or
as little as a hundred a year. But here is some free
advice from Ken Wisnefski: "If you're not paying
attention or at least monitoring what's being said
about you online, you're making a mistake because
other people are paying attention to that."For VOA
Special English, I'm Carolyn Presutti.
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Hi. I
personally reviewed this video and found it appropriate for
the news section of English Global Group. This
is a Voice of America video which covers an interesting
topic in Special English. I would appreciate some feedback from both
students and teachers about this video. You can comment in
the window below using any of a number of different services
including Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, and Hotmail.
