Why Google is NOT a Reputation Management Solution

I’ve seen several linkedIn discussions and more than a few blog posts about using Google as a free reputation management system. Doing so could cost your business in a big way and result in failed engagement in social media engagement – the same goes for Yahoo! or Bing. Why?

1.) It’s A Search Engine: Google et al, are consumer search engines. They are NOT designed to search Social Networks, .alt networks, forums and 99% of newsgroups. That’s not what they do. Most issues regarding reputation and brand are in those semi-closed networks. Sadly 97% of the “online reputation management” services also only search Google and miss everything else.

2.) The Deep Web: Yes, it goes deeper than what Google, Yahoo! or Bing delivers. There are crackers and hackers and more in the subterranean depths of the Web. What they’re doing there can be critical to financial management firms, multi-nationals and more.

3.) Ecosystem Bias: Google owns “Blogger” the blogging platform, Microsoft owns “Live Spaces” their “blogging” platform. That means those platforms may be carrying their advertising – they inherently have a bias towards their own network of online properties. Therefore you may miss what’s critical.

4.) News Is Not All The News: Google News Alerts is very good. But. They only deliver news alerts for those news agencies with whom they have news distribution agreements. That means you again may miss what’s critical.

Only MediaBadger and 2 other companies go beyond Google, Yahoo! or Bing to explore the deep web and source the information that matters, one is in the U.S. and the other in France. If you’re truly concerned about online reputation management and seeing what’s happening online, relying on Google, Yahoo! or Bing may be the most costly mistake you make.