Introduction
It is important for business owners to have a mobile presence for their business because it works as an extension of their brand. Mobile channels impact the overall reputation of a brand in a lot of ways. In today's day and age, it is normally expected that a brand will provide the same customer experience across all of its channels. Hence this piece has been put together to shed more light on how one can better manage their brand's reputation through mobile channels. Let's get started!
Mobile apps are an extension of your brand
Mobile apps are an extension of a brand but sometimes business owners are guilty of ignoring them or not giving them as much importance as they give to other channels. It is common knowledge that a good mobile experience impacts customer loyalty yet a lot of business owners and mobile marketers have no mobile marketing strategy. Given the expectations of consumers, it won't be prudent to ignore mobile channels for marketing purposes.
The same goes for content in app stores. If it is not monitored then it can have a negative impact on your brand. On app stores consumers leave their opinions about apps through ratings and reviews. People read reviews before downloading free and paid apps and if they read negative reviews, then there is a high chance that they might not go ahead with downloading the app.
Five Tips for Mobile App Reputation Management
Now that we have established the importance of mobile app reputation management for brands, it is time to move on to the tips that can help you with mobile app reputation management.
- Set up listening tools: - You don't need to wait until after launch to start listening about the experiences of customers and hence you need to set up listening tools before you go about improving your app. A listening tool will help you in avoiding situations that can get out of hand. If and when you use listening tools, you will be able to improve your app along with protecting your brand's reputation. Your focus should be getting feedback in-app because if people leave a public rating and review after negative experiences, it can be damaging to your brand.
- Encouraging ratings and reviews: - If and when you segment your audience, you will be able to exercise some control over how many reviews make it to the public forum. For this purpose, you can use a segmenting tool which will help you in segmenting your audience so that you are able to capture negative feedback directly. You need to understand your goals before you begin segmenting your customers. It is important you do so because only after knowing your goals beyond all ambiguity will you be able to determine the right audience to target.
- Implement feedback from your customers: - To meet the expectations of your customers, you need to ask for feedback and then implement it. If and when you implement the feedback of your customers, you will go a long way in making them loyal patrons to your company. By implementing suggestions from the customers you will make people feel that their opinion is valued will foster a sense of trust and loyalty in them. Mobile has made customer feedback more accessible than it has ever been in the past and you are advised to respond to it effectively because mobile customer feedback can have an immediate and lasting impact on several areas of your business.
- Seek feedback at the right time: - You need to figure out the right moment to ask customers for feedback. Don't pick a time which comes off as disruptive to the experience of the customer. If your prompt seeking feedback interrupts a customer when he or she is trying to accomplish something in your app, then all your efforts will be futile and frustrated. One way of figuring out the right moment to ask for feedback is by looking at actions within your app when the customers may have had a positive experience. The right moment differs for every company as it is majorly dependent on the purpose that the app serves. You need to explore the customers' journey to figure out the best time to ask for feedback.
- Reply to reviews in real-time:- Before your app is launched, you need to have a solid team in place to answer app reviews in real-time. If and when you do so, it will ensure that no bad review goes unaddressed. There is no surefire way of being immune to negative reviews all the time, but there are certain things you can do to minimize the effects and addressing bad reviews effectively, is one such way. Make sure that your team doesn't leave any review unaddressed. If you are in the wrong, then accept the wrongdoing and apologize for it. Communicate the steps you have taken to fix the issues that have been raised by the reviewer. Even if the issues raised are too complex or technical, you need to be very quick in your response and not make any reviewer feel abandoned as that can lead to more frustration.
The Bottom Line
It might not be easy to protect the image of your brand, but you can make some progress if you use the right kind of tools. Regardless of who you are and what you have to offer, app store content will always have a profound impact on your brand. The ratings and reviews you get will color people's perception of your brand and that's why it is so important to manage the mobile reputation of your brand.
The aforementioned tips will surely help you in managing your brand's mobile reputation and you can always call in the experts for a better outcome. You can hire online reputation management services of an online reputation management company to maintain your brand across all channels, including and especially mobile platforms.
