How to push negative product review sites down.

[Uds]

Hi Guys,

One of my respected clients have some issues with negative product review sites coming up when they search their brand name on google. So for an exmaple, when I search for Company Name on google, the 3rd and 4th results are angry customer reviews. This is harming my clients brand so bad.

My questions are,

1. What should I do to push these results down. I am happy to do pretty much ANYTHING to push these sites down.

2. I'm also thinking of doing a blog for this client for SEO purposes and wondering the pros and cons of having the blog as a subdomain vs subfolder. Which will help me to again, push the negative site links down.

Thanks

[skehoe]

Hi There,

I have work on a lot of reputation management for my clients and negative reviews is an on-going battle.  There are a few things you can do to improve things for your client.

The quickest and easiest way is to published fresh, relevant and current news about the brand.  If you are distributing press releases or news stories through the right channels you will get great coverage.  If possible ty to avoid the free publishing sites as many of them are are associated with other negative attributes.  If you have a budget to work with I would recommend PRWeb, Marketwire or 24/7PressRelease wire.

I have successfully pushed negative reviews off page 1 in Google by using well writen, relevant and news-worthy press releases.

I have also had some good results with Google+, by linking google plus into the brands exposure Google will give a high ranking position for the Google+ brand page and even display images.  I have found this diverts people away from negative reviews.

Has your client responded to the negative review? Offered a refund, apologised etc etc. Often a reviewer will remove the complaint etc if handled in the right way

Also, depending on your location (and local laws) some review sites will amend the title tag that shows up in a Google result to make is less 'nasty' to avoid a legal battle with the brand.

There are a lot of things that can assist with negative reviews - hope you find some of the above helpful

[intSchools]

You should also grow your social media activity. Sites like Twitter, YouTube, Google+, Facebook and others will often have a higher authority than review sites. If you build your community up then these sites will often appear high on the results page when branded searches are performed. This will in turn push the negative reviews down.

Plus, it will help build up your online brand. Win-Win, right?

[SEOAndy]

Sounds easier said than done but look at the reviews and try and build from them. Interact with the people who write the reviews and tell them you are looking to improve and you have done XY and Z to put things right.

It doesn't necessarily help get them moved down the rankings but if people click onto them they will see that you are being proactive about negative reviews and trying to build and learn from them and may give potential customers who look at these reviews a different mindset.

[Uds]

Thanks Stacey. I should start with Social media sites. Good point you got there. And Im gonna get the marketing department to come up with some valuable press releases. Thanks again.

[Uds]

Thanks dan. True. Im gonna dig into social media.