Reputation management

Reputation management, originally a public relations term, refers to the influencing, controlling, enhancing, or concealing of an individual’s or group’s reputation. The growth of the internet and social media led to the growth of reputation management companies, with search results as a core part of a client’s reputation. Online reputation management, sometimes abbreviated as ORM, focuses on the management of product and service search engine results. Ethical grey areas include mug-shot removal sites, astroturfing customer review sites, censoring complaints, and using search engine optimization tactics to influence results. In other cases, the ethical lines are clear; some reputation management companies are closely connected to websites that publish unverified and libelous statements about people. Such unethical companies charge thousands of dollars to remove these posts – temporarily – from their websites.