What Makes the Best ORM Company? SEO-Led Reputation Management with Scott Keever & Tim Schmidt

James Dooley: What makes the best online reputation management company? Today I'm joined with Scott Keever from Reputation Pros and also Tim Schmit, an absolute legend in the SEO industry, one of the OGs of the world. Um but Scott, let's jump straight in. Um what makes Reputation Pros better than other online reputation agencies out there?

Scott Keever: Yeah, that's a great question. I think Reputation Pros came from a SEO background where most of the other reputation management companies out there have a PR background. With Reputation Pros, we are constantly testing and really understanding how the algorithm works, what actually moves the needle, what websites rank well on Google, what websites actually stick, and how we can actually future-proof their results. I As I originally dug into the space, I I just noticed that there's a lot of good reputation companies out there and they're very PR focused. They're great at getting content out there for the client on nice publications, but they didn't always know how to make that content rank or to make it stick and future-proof the client's results.

James Dooley: Yeah, for sure. And Tim, to expand on this further, obviously you've been in the SEO industry for a long time and you've now partnered up with Scott with regards to reputation management services. What have you found since joining Reputation Pros and working within the team? What have you found that works? What why they make like why they are so I I've seen the results, I've seen the case studies, obviously they're an award-winning agency. I've seen the case studies how quick they're able to rank the images and stuff like that. What what have you found amazing from within the company that just makes you go, "Wow, this is the best reputation management company there is out there.

Tim Schmit: Yeah, so I've personally looked at a lot of the reputation management companies out there and I think the big separator for us is the SEO focus behind every campaign combined with the tech. We really think outside the box and do things that like Scott said, other agencies go out there and are really good at putting out positive press, but if you're not doing the little things behind that and not to spill all our secrets, but there's a lot of things that go on behind the scene to get every component of their campaign to rank and that's sending engagement, it's sending traffic, it's sending activity, backlinks, and that's where our SEO expert expertise, sorry, really separates us from anyone else out there. I mean, the SEO component puts us leaps and bounds ahead of everybody else by a landslide.

James Dooley: Yeah, so within that scope, like with regards to someone comes along and let's say they're a lawyer, let's role play that they're a lawyer and they come along and they're looking for the best online reputation management company and let's say there's a specific service where they've got a bad image that's ranking. Is Reputation Pros able to go and say, "Okay, we're able to sink that and image?" And how long cuz there's certain companies out there that say it's going to take at least three or four algorithm updates, so it's going to be like 18 months. How long would you say Reputation Pros would be to work to start sinking the image down so that obviously you you're starting getting new images above it that are positive sentiment, images that they like and moving that further down for image suppression?

Scott Keever: Yeah, that's definitely something we can help with and something we've been testing very thoroughly lately. Typically, I would say when we start a suppression campaign for images, we will start to see some sort of results and movement in the first 30 to 60 days and most of the campaigns we've been able to completely wipe out within about 6 to 12 months. I know that's kind of a wide window, but there's just so many variables that come into play. Um but I can't recall a campaign that has taken longer than six or 12 months. And I would say the majority of them fall within that 6 to 12 month window. Depending on how many images, the authority of the site, and all all those fun things that come into play.

James Dooley: Yeah, for sure. And then same, I want to kind of move away from images now and go on to articles. So, there's a bad article now. So, um a plumbing company, the CEO comes along and they've got a bad article. Let's say they've um they've gone through a divorce, and they want to sink this article now onto page two or page three of Google. But, obviously this is ranking high. It's on it's it's in the middle of page one, and they want to try and suppress it down. How important is it? There's certain online reputation management companies that are out there that we've spoke about that just do PR, that don't really put too much emphasis on the quality of the content or the backlinks that can go into it, or how powerful the article is on uh on the domain is where the article sits. How important is content and also backlinks when it comes to ranking to try and sink that existing article down?

Scott Keever: Well, they're huge because there's a proper way to do it, and that's with a proper SEO framework in mind. Uh number one, people that don't know the SEO component of this space are probably writing poor titles. They have poor keyword density. They're overusing the keyword, or they may even underusing the keyword that you want to use. And it really gets down to a technical expertise that I think our team has mastered very well. Images um obviously come into play when you have those in there and they're they have the proper file name and alt text. All those simple SEO tactics that are spread across the board do very well. And then the last thing you hammered on was backlinks. And you have to know what kind of backlinks you actually really want to build to those because it's important. If you build spammy backlinks, you're actually going to do more harm than good.

Tim Schmit: Yeah, one thing I would uh also add to that real quick is [snorts] the engagement piece. Um and that's the most overlooked piece I feel in the industry. When a person or a brand has negative content out there about themselves and someone searches them, people are nosy, they're curious, and they're going to be drawn to that negativity. And that engagement is what typically keeps that negative article remaining live on Google. And even if a company does push that down, say they push it down to page three, an algorithm update happens and it pushes back up, or the new stuff they're they're pushing out isn't getting the same engagement, eventually Google's going to want to retest that piece. And that's a lot of times where we get clients coming from other reputation management companies that they paid all this money, the content was suppressed, they were happy, but then months later it came right back up after an algorithm update or none of the current stuff they they pushed out, it was good, it was high quality, it outranked it, but it didn't get any engagement, so eventually Google wanted to retest something that was getting engagement and it went right back up and they're right back into the same boat where they started.

James Dooley: Yeah, for sure. I mean, on that, all right, so we we kind of going through here what makes the best online reputation management company. And what that what surprised me a lot, Scott, was what the last meet-up that we went to, several clients that you onboarded was clients that was using an existing ORM agency and wasn't able to even provide the results. So, on this example, you were saying they did sink it and in time it came back. There was so many times where you've ended up moving clients over to you and you've been able to quickly suppress and improve the the rankings. If someone was watching this and let's say they're an entrepreneur or they've got an existing corporate brand and they've got existing profile pieces that they're happy with. Are you able to rank existing pieces of content that is on page two and be able to do positive CTR or positive engagement and maybe tier two backlinks to those to rank those higher. Is that something that you could work on as an agency and existing articles to get outranking the negative sentiment articles?

Scott Keever: Yeah, we actually have a internal software we're developing that helps us with identifying existing content, the sentiment of the content, and then if it's going to be powerful or relevant enough to use within our campaign. So, when we onboard a client, we have really good insights internally as far as where the negative content lies, how authoritative it is, and then what existing positive assets are out there that can be utilized within the campaign. So, going right into a campaign, we have these um insights most other agencies don't have, and we can focus on existing stuff and get some quick wins with that while we're working on building out new content and putting it into authoritative places to to push up as well.

James Dooley: Yeah, for sure. I mean, for me with regards to someone's looking for the best online reputation management company, make sure you go and check out Reputation Pros. They're an award-winning agency. They've got consistent reviews of being able to wipe out negative sentiment, be able to remove images that people don't want on the internet. They're a great company. I'm very good friends with Tim and very good friends with Scott. I know they're doing great jobs. Make sure you go and check out the link in the description. This is the first episode of several where we're going through what different services that they offer and why I genuinely believe that they are the best ORM agency in the world. Scott, Tim, it's been an absolute pleasure.

Scott Keever: Thanks, James.

Tim Schmit: Thank you, James.