Online Reputation Management Services

Argent Media has long provided Online Reputation Management services for both individuals as well as for organizations. While we also have long provided Search Engine Optimization (SEO) services as well as Pay-Per-Click Search Ad Management (SEM) — the two staples of Internet Marketing — even from our beginning we have provided Online Reputation Management as well (sometimes referred to as “ORM”).

Don’t get us wrong! SEO is fun, and we will never lose our DNA as SEO consultants. Online Reputation Management is a niche specialization under the broad SEO umbrella, and it is our philosophy that good Reputation improvement work needs to be informed by a deep understanding of SEO. But, over time we have focused more and more upon Online Reputation Management, and less on mere SEO gigs.

Reputation Management in the new millennium is something we find deeply rewarding. While helping companies make more money by optimizing their product webpages to climb higher in Google and Bing definitely gives one a thrill, we really love helping distressed individuals and companies to improve the impressions made when people search for their names on the web!

Very simply, there is not a lot of recourse for people when their name gets maligned in the search results. The internet here in 2020 is a mess of interlocking laws, policies, technology and other factors which create a very complicated puzzle for people who have been defamed. The U.S. legislature essentially gave a huge degree of latitude to internet companies when they enacted the Communications Decency Act and included Section 230, which roughly stated says that online publishers are not responsible for content provided by third parties through their platforms. Anyone may post fraudulent representations about people on Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Instagram, Yelp, Parler, Ripoff Report, or on webpages spidered by Google and Bing — and those companies are not liable for it. They oftend do not have to remove anything they don’t want to remove, and you cannot legally compel them to do so!

Lawsuits can definitely get one relief in some instances. If you win a defamation case in court, you can get a court order that specifies the defamatory URLs, and Google will voluntarily honor the court order by agreeing to remove the URLs from appearing in search results when your name is searched upon. This can sometimes unwind the negative content to the point where you once more make a good impression upon the people who may search for your name.

But, there are also a lot of pitfalls with the litigation path to repairing your online reputation. First, there is the cost, which can start at $10,000 for initiating a lawsuit. Second, making your case may be difficult if you cannot absolutely prove who published defamatory content, and statutes of limitations are very short-term. Finally, it can take a couple of years to complete the court process to reach a favorable determination — all the while the defaming content continues to appear for your name.

This is why we know that Search Engine Optimization can often provide a path to improve the situation. It can be the total solution, because displacing negative content to the second page of search results or futher makes the content largely invisible to most people. SEO can also be an interim solution, providing a measure of relief as one pursues a court order — waiting for the slow wheels of justice to turn is not a great option for those who want to clear their names or make money sooner than the judgment endgame allows.

At Argent Media, we provide both consulting and development, assisting clients to the level that they need help. We have assisted numerous types of clients, including multiple CEOs, people affected by mugshots and arrest records, companies attacked by negative press or crazy bloggers, companies maligned by fake or exagerrated user reviews, celebrities and prominient individuals in the public eye, noted billionaires and philanthropists, Fortune 500 companies, and more. We have also helped by way of providing expert witness services, testifying in court as an SEO expert witnesss, or defamation expert witness. We also help clients out with proactive online reputation management, helping to strengthen their position online, and developing out their social media presence as insurance against any future reputation-damaging event.

There are definitely a number of larger and better-known companies that have specialized in the Reputation Management industry along with us. Perceiving a deep need, and desiring to help alleviate human suffering, we have long worked to try to provide Online Reputation Management at a very affordable rate for individuals and companies. Doing this is very challenging because good service in this arena is often very labor-intensive. We believe that we can effectively focus on the lower-end price range of the reputation management market because we do very good quality work, and we are differentiated in ethics and sensitivity to the larger players in the industry.

Compared with some of the larger companies and other small agencies, we are further differentiated by our ethics. We have provided discounted and free services to porn revenge victims, for instance. We do not trick clients by offering guarantees or by having “guarantee” in our business name. We also do not try to retain clients through locking them in by lengthy contract terms, and we do not try to mislead clients about the activities conducted on their behalf by sending them barrages of emails and unnecessary reports. Many firms add on largely unnecessary monitoring and complicated, confusing reports in order to bamboozle clients into thinking more is going on, and to cloud the waters with little ineffective activities designed to rationalize their high, ongoing fees. We keep pricing lower because we are not undertaking costly television and radio advertising across the nation — it is obvious that a company doing that must charge higher fees in order to be able to purchase major media.

We also know what we are doing. We have had a number of clients come to us that were previously served by these larger, uncaring firms. And, we have laughed to ourselves when we hear questions at SEO conferences by their novice practicioner employees that reveal ineptitude. (In one case, we heard an employee of one of the big firms ask a conference speaker how they might be able to get their Facebook page to resume rankings after some of their competitors apparently conducted a negative SEO campaign against it! Did it not occur to the employee that publicly asking such a question would negatively impact attendees’ opinions of their company’s reputation as experts in SEO?!?)

Are specialized areas of focus have included:

• Google search results
• Bing search results
• Google reviews
• Yelp reviews
• Autocomplete / Autosuggest results
• “People also search for” and “Searches related to” suggestions
• Domain names and cybersquatting
• Fashion knockoffs and counterfeits
• Wikipedia articles
• Negative blog posts
• Mugshots and arrest reports
• National and local news articles
• Youtube videos
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Reddit
• Instagram
• MyLife.com
• Ripoff Report
• Social Media impersonation
• Trademark Infringement via SEO and PPC Ads
• Online reputation extortion
• Sexting and Sextortion

We have been operating as something of a boutique Reputation Management agency for some time now, since we have only accepted clients on a very exclusive basis. However, we likely will soon launch a new service we have been developing under a separate brand name which will offer a type of assisted do-it-yourself reputation management service.

Read more about our Online Reputation Management.

If you have something appearing in Google search results or elsewhere on the internet that is damaging your good name, visit with us to explore the options for repairing your online reputation. Making the negativity disappear is well worth the peace of mind and the freedom to operate without constantly carrying harmful baggage around!

Contact Argent Media