How to Manage Your Brand on Employee Review Sites
In today’s online world, reviews of all kinds have become invaluable for businesses in building their reputation and attracting new employees and customers. While every business is aware of the power of customer reviews, feedback from your own employees on certain websites are an often overlooked resource. Sites like Glassdoor and Indeed have become increasingly popular, and prospective employees are increasingly relying on these sites when deciding where to apply.
Employees are intimately familiar with your organization and its values and their reviews can provide unique insights and add credibility to your online presence. However, asking employees to leave online reviews requires a delicate approach to ensure authenticity and avoid any perceived pay for play situation. In this article, Buckingham reviews some effective strategies to manage employee reviews and to successfully build your reputation on these sites.
How Employee Review Sites Work
While there are numerous websites on the internet that allow employees to leave reviews, the two main sites are Glassdoor and Indeed. These sites are not solely designed for employee reviews, but rather are designed for employers to interact with active job seekers. These platforms allow employers to create a profile, provide information about the company, post open job positions and to receive resumes and applications directly from active job seekers.
As part of providing information to active job seekers, these platforms also allow for the posting of reviews from current employees. Employees are allowed to post their reviews anonymously, which could lead to problems, but also provides the employee the ability to speak freely about their experience without the fear of consequences. These employee reviews are compiled into a ‘rating’ of the company and are easily viewable by active job seekers.
The Importance of Employee Reviews
Potential employees, current employees, and former employees often turn to Glassdoor and Indeed to get first-hand insights on what it’s like working with a company, as well as leave their thoughts from experience. Online reviews are a big part of online reputation for businesses, and should not be ignored.
These specific platforms draw huge amounts of traffic each month. In fact, The Small Business Blog reports that Glassdoor receives 55 million visitors to their site a month, and estimates that roughly 65% of those visitors are active job seekers. Indeed advertises that they have over 300 million unique visitors to their site a month and that they have over 850 million ratings and reviews on their site. It is clear from these numbers that employees and active job seekers are heavily relying on these types of sites when deciding whether to apply for a job.
How to Manage a Business Reputation on Review Sites
As Glassdoor, Indeed, and similar sites gain prominence, it is important to make sure you are aware of your profiles and are taking active steps to manage your reputation on these sites. You have worked hard to create a positive work environment for your employees, so taking these additional steps can help capitalize on that environment and build your reputation. Knowing how to respond to negative social media posts and managing reviews are a big part of this. Below are important steps in managing and improving your reputation on these sites.
- Claim Your Glassdoor and Indeed Profiles
Similar to other review sites, Glassdoor and Indeed can create listings for your business without your permission. Since you cannot control whether you appear on these sites, it is important to claim your profiles on these sites and make sure you are controlling the information that is presented is accurate and up to date. Claiming your profile will also let you be aware of reviews that are posted by employees. Additionally, you can also use these platforms to solicit new employees for open positions.
- Be Transparent with Your Employees
Make your employees aware of your company’s presence on Glassdoor and Indeed and explain the importance that these platforms can have on your company’s reputation. While this might encourage disgruntled employees to leave false and defamatory reviews, it will also encourage satisfied employees to leave positive reviews. This will not only help boost your rating on the site, but will help mitigate any effects of a negative review. Being up front with your employees about these platforms can lead to an immediate boost in ratings and reviews.
However, you should never make it mandatory to leave a review and should not incentivize positive reviews. Glassdoor and Indeed promote anonymity on their platform and can penalize a company for trying to coerce positive reviews from employees. This can lead to more problems. Satisfied employees will be willing and able to leave positive reviews without encouragement or incentives. If you feel that a negative review has crossed the line, then it is important to contact an attorney as soon as possible to discuss other options.
- Respond to All Reviews in a Timely Manner
You should take the time to respond to all reviews that are posted on your Glassdoor or Indeed pages. Claiming your profiles will help with this as you will be notified of any review that is posted to your page. Be sure to express gratitude for the positive reviews and highlight the strongest portions.
When responding to negative reviews, you should keep from being combative or arguing with the reviewer. Instead, focus on responding to the criticism constructively, and pointing out other strong suits that your company offers its employees. Responding to negative reviews quickly can help mitigate any negative impact on active job seekers.
Be Proactive to Stay Ahead
Sites like Glassdoor and Indeed can be terrifying for business owners. However, these sites also provide businesses an opportunity to showcase their strengths and improve their online reputation. By using the tools provided by these platforms properly, businesses can put their best foot forward for any potential new employee or customer.
