Video games

A form of digital media that is constantly is video games. These are often targeting by the media and reputation is constantly tested and questioned. This is mostly after disasters such as shootings the media looks to video games that are either violent or popular. The hugely popular Pokemon has been accused of being satanic, encouraging animal abuse, encouraging gambling and racial stereotyping. This is because it is often viewed as an easy target by many different groups as research into video game effects is relatively new with not many definite answers. A recent controversy that hit the headlines was one of the best selling call of duty games that featured a terrorist attack on attack on an airport. This was talked about for weeks globally, the designer of the level Mohammad Alavi told the press "It isn't really relevant whether that makes you enjoy the entertainment experience even more because you're being naughty (à la Grand Theft Auto) or it engrosses you further into the story and makes you resent your actions. What's relevant is that the level managed to make the player feel anything at all." This gave the Call of duty franchise and the whole video game industry a bad reputation and often gets blamed along with grand theft auto for violent news stories. However there is discussion that it is no worse than what is made in Hollywood and that in counties with high violent video game content there is no rise.

Redbull

One company in particular that performs very well on digital media is Redbull. As Redbull is often identified as a youth energetic brand so a strong digital media presence is vital to win youth customers over with 100% of the younger generation have been on the internet in their lifetime. With their heavy sponsorship of many sporting events it lead them to create an advertisement that included both these elements and achieved 19 million views. This was passed around social media as less of an advertisement but more of a 'cool' video that seemed less the company trying to force its brand and energetic reputation on people but rather making them do it themselves. In January alone last year Redbull's Youtube channel achieved an extra 250,000 subscriber's. They are usually considered one of the best if not the best at online campaigns, especially when it comes to online videos with around 7 videos a week posted. Another event that gained Redbull a huge amount of exposure was the Felix Baumgartner world record free-fall. This was seen all over the world with a large amount of news coverage that furthered Redbull's reputation in digital media.

Tesco Horsemeat

A scandal that we all remember from last year was the horse meat scandal. This was when it was found that products in Tesco had contained horsemeat but was being sold as beef, specifically there burgers on sale were 29% horse meat. This whole story was handled very badly on Tesco's twitter page.

This tweet went out after the horse meat scandal had been exposed it had been scheduled to go out so even with the extreme circumstances it still went out. This was Tesco not being reactive to the situation, the next few hours after this was spent by Tesco apologies to what seemed all of twitter.

This was very unprofessional by Tesco's digital media team as it gave the image that they had no coordination with the rest of the organisation and no clear idea of how to run their social media. This flaw in digital media gave Tesco bad press in a time that its reputation was tested. It also led to this video that was passed around the internet that kept appearing to haunt Tesco. As well as this many jokes and parodies were passed around in the week that involved Tesco all over twitter of which Tesco did not handle to the best of its ability. With digital media developing more and more is needed to be successful.

Creating a reputation

The last post discussed the importance of a company's reputation and ways to monitor and measure reputation to become more reactive. As soon as a company begins it is important to establish it self and its reputation. Business in focus magazine again explains? 1.Establish trust – Keeping your word no matter what in terms of providing services, paying vendors when they are due, and keeping promises to customers. This will help solidify and build credibility with customers. 2.Be responsive – Return calls and answer emails promptly, letting the customer know their importance to you and your organization. 3.Resolve errors and mistakes – Never make excuses or place blame on the customer if it is an issue that is the fault of you or the company. An irate customer can become your biggest ally if you make an effort to resolve errors or mistakes as quickly as possible. 4.Offer value – Offering free services to loyal customers and paying attention to details and preferences of the customer can go a long way towards establishing your company’s reputation in the market. 5.Be sensitive to privacy – With rampant identity theft and hacking, being aware of the sensitive nature of financial information is more important than ever. 6.Become technologically savvy – Demonstrating a proficiency in technology can add to the reputation of a company and is critical to being perceived as a competent and capable business. Computers, software, voicemail, websites, and social media sites must be kept up to date. 7.Communicate effectively and transparently – Correspondence such as letters, emails, voicemails and other methods of communication should be direct and to the point. Use correct spelling and grammar and leave contact information for the customer and company information such as full name, address, phone, fax, website URL, toll-free number, hours and other vital information – is displayed in prominent location. 8.Maintain a polished and professional website – Having a clean, up-to-date, professional website is absolutely vital today, regardless of the type or size of business. 9.Community Service – Generosity to local organizations such as non-profits can go a long way toward building and establishing the reputation of your organization. Community service can include providing a service pro bono or donating money, time or food for an event or fundraiser.



There is extra needed to create an online reputation in the form of-
 Assigning responsibility – As a business leader, you must trust someone to have the ability to become the “face” for the organization on a social networking website. Choose someone who will have the time to dedicate toward updating and maintaining the social networking site as well as responding to customer inquiries or complaints.Keep your staff informed and educated – Give your staff an idea of what can and cannot be said on social networking sites as well as keeping them aware of the latest marketing and communication campaigns or any sort of company policy that will be implemented that will have an impact on the customers. Keep each division and all staff members aware of each other so the message that will be disseminated will be consistent to the mission and “voice” of the company. Be responsive in times of crisis – As Gemma Craven, EVP of Ogilvy PR’s 360 Digital Influence team says, “It’s no longer the Golden Hour, but the Golden Minute. Lack of a well-crafted, well-meaning response could cost you.” Creating numerous social media sites has given customers multiple options to voice their opinions – either negative or positive – about your company. Taking ownership of your social media sites will give you the control you need to manage the conversation and quickly respond to feedback. Monitoring and responding to customers and resolving issues quickly will go a long way toward establishing a positive reputation for your organization.
Establish your online reputation – When a potential customer searches online for the name of your company, your business should be on the first page. In addition, social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn should also be on there once those sites are created and established. Creating a strong online presence is essential for an organization to establish its brand and maintain its reputation.



http://www.businessinfocusmagazine.com/2012/10/the-importance-of-business-reputation/

Reputation Management

As reputation is becoming increasingly important and with its volatile nature there has been a rise in awareness in its management. There are now specific companies that can be paid to manage reputation or rebuild from a scandal and prevent it from happening in the future. As reputation is an intangible it is difficult to judge its importance and with the internet and digital media information flows very quick, what would take hours to pass around can be done in a blink of an eye to thousands. Bad feedback and word of mouth, react poorly to scandal and a company being viewed as "shady" or attempting to hide or twist the truth. to measure the importance of reputation business in focus magazine tells us 1.Ethics: the organization behaves ethically, is admirable, is worthy of respect, and is trustworthy. 2.Employees/workplace: the organization has talented employees, treats its people well, and is an appealing workplace. 3.Financial performance: the organization is financially strong, has a record of profitability, and has growth prospects. 4.Leadership: the organization is a leader rather than a follower, and is innovative. 5.Management: the organization is well managed, has high quality management, and has a clear vision for the future. 6.Social responsibility: the organization recognizes social responsibilities, and supports good causes. 7.Customer focus: the organization cares about and is strongly committed to customers. 8.Quality: the organization offers high quality products and services. 9.Reliability: the organization stands behind its products and services, and provides consistent service. 10.Emotional appeal: it is an organization I feel good about, is kind, and is fun. This has to be measured to see in which areas can be improved to hopefully improve reputation and therefore have this lead to increased profit. Digital media has again changed how reputation management, a very popular and useful tool is Google alerts. This informs the company when they are mentioned online , this means the company can see what is being said about them both positively and negatively so reaction can be quicker- this is especially important with digital media speeding the process up. Social media pages for the specific company can be used in the same way. This has become more and more important as there is far more purchasing online in this day and age and this is likely to be reduced if the company has a reputation of for example not delivering on time or not delivering at all then the person e-mails or enters a live chat and receives poor customer service. The individual then posts this on Facebook for a large audience which in turn convinces them not to choose that company in future purchases.


http://www.businessinfocusmagazine.com/2012/10/the-importance-of-business-reputation/

Heartbleed

A very recent issue that has had an effect on almost all websites even giants such as google and Facebook. It has been described as "the worst vulnerability found (at least in terms of its potential impact) since commercial traffic began to flow on the Internet." by Joseph Steinburg a Writer for Forbes. The problem arose when a piece of software known as OpenSSL that encrypts data from a computer to a website to keep information getting passed safe. It means that information can be stolen such as passwords and usernames that are still on the website server without anyone even knowing it was taken. Jose Andrade explains the name "Heartbleed exploits a built-in feature of OpenSSL called heartbeat. When your computer accesses a website, the website will respond back to let your computer know that it is active and listening for your requests: This is the heartbeat."This didn't damage a specific companies reputation but rather all company's as faith has been lost on purchasing online due to panic that details are not safe. This was particularly dangerous as anyone with a bit of reading could access data from websites with OpenSSL. Many people are already cautious about purchasing online and even giving any form of details so this recent news story telling the public that it was relatively easy to steal details through this OpenSSL gave people more reason to be cautious.


http://www.forbes.com/sites/josephsteinberg/2014/04/10/massive-internet-security-vulnerability-you-are-at-risk-what-you-need-to-do/

http://www.engadget.com/2014/04/12/heartbleed-explained/

Moving successfully with the digital age

Now that a large amount of companies are now online according to pew research it makes it extremely difficult to survive as an organisation without the edge of the digital community. Companies that initially refused to accept digitally as the way forward have now seen sense or are now not existent. A prime example of  this is the video rental company Blockbuster which filed bankruptcy in 2010. This was due to the fact that they kept their videos offline when other companies allowed live steaming and more convenience by ordering online or online rental. As there was more availability getting films online on demand it defeated the point of going all the way down to a shop to rent out. This meant that customers quickly stopped going to the traditional store leading to Blockbusters bankruptcy.

As there is so many businesses online it makes it more difficult for a company to get itself out there and run a successfully digital media campaign. This was done very successfully by Starbucks in a campaign to promote itself through its consumers by giving free coffees in return for one person gifting it to another meaning that at least 2 people are effected by the promotion with more if they see the tweet when scrolling. This campaign was highly successful even though it is only a beta there has already been 180,000 dollars in purchases and with more than 54,000 people have now linked their mobile phones to their twitter and customer IDs meaning there is an opening for research. As well as this the online reputation of Starbucks is improved and the identity online is also established. It gives Starbucks a modern image by the use of different forms of technology as well as promoting itself to a mass audience as a high quality product that gives 'freebies'. It has built this successful reputation by using the 5 objective when developing the campaign. The 5 objectives are sell, serve, speak, save and sizzle. Furthermore they have made it sticky and shareable.