Beyond Monitoring

ORM can be divided into proactive and reactive actions.

Proactive

* SEO – One of the most important aspects of OEM is getting your voice heard, use search engine optimisation techniques to get your website pages to the top of the SERP.
* Getting involved – register with social networking and micro blogging sites and contribute to build a positive reputation. Comment on blogs and in forums as an expert in the field not as a blatant marketing campaign.

Reactive

* This is dealing with negative content as and when it happens.
* A speedy response is essential to minimise potential damage.
* Identify content as either:
* True – a genuine mistake on behalf of the company or concern of an individual.
* False – someone just attacking with no basis in fact
* Determine how far the damaging content has spread.

A genuine concern or complaint should be addressed openly and honestly.

Prioritise all the areas where the criticism is occurring based on popularity and address them in order by responding calmly and sincerely.

If the thread continues determine if it is the same individual or whether others are included.  If it does not continue, keep monitoring without further input.

When it is the same individual agree to disagree and be sure to let the individual know that their opinion has been heard. Where changes have been put in place make sure that this has been communicated. When it is others that are continuing the thread is it genuine concern or is it simply ‘jumping on the bandwagon’? With the latter do not provide more fuel for the fire. However, when it is genuine, respond to each unique concern individually and let participants know that anything learned has been incorporated in to the business and that the changes were due to there efforts. It may also be worth considering engaging some of the individuals as a ‘sounding board’ for the future.

In cases of online attack that has no merit or basis in truth privately refute the claim and provide proof that what is being stated is misleading. Ask for a formal recant and be sure to be involved in drafting it. If this is done leave it there but continue to monitor. If it is not retracted consider legal action.

Najm Clayton

What and How to Monitor.

When monitoring the following should be considered the minimum:

* Brand names
* Product names
* Company names
* Key executive names

Some sites and ORM companies also recommend monitoring competing brands and organisations, industry terms, and general industry news.

All of the following are free methods of monitoring what people are saying about you and your company.

Google:
Set up a Google Alert for a particular keyword and be notified whenever it is mentioned in a news item/blog/website. http://www.google.com/alerts

There is more to Google search than the default page, select News from the top menu to see news specific results which can be filtered by time. From here it is also possible to access the blog search.  http://news.google.co.uk    http://blogsearch.google.co.uk

Both of these areas have RSS and I would recommend that a feed is subscribed to for each of the keywords you wish to monitor.

Twitter Search

A useful site that aggregates tweets being made for a keyword and again an RSS feed is available which will keep you informed without having to keep carrying out the search. http://search.twitter.com

Another site for twitter is http://monitter.com which shows tweets in real time for three keywords.

Blogs & Forums

Technorati http://technorati.com is a blog monitor that also provides a nice little graph showing blog post mentions per day for a keyword phrase. NB as with most searches putting the phrase in quotes will give an exact search – for example family law will return results with family, law and family law whereas “family law” will only return posts with the whole phrase. An RSS feed is available.

Social Mention www.socialmention.com has alerts like Google but for social networking sites and has the addition of a sentiment measure for searches. Sentiment is give as positive, neutral and negative ratings.

Blogpulse www.blogpulse.com is another online tool for monitoring the blogosphere with a few extras that may not be required but the conversation tracker is a good addition to the regular search.

Boardtracker www.boardtracker.com (discussion search) is a search engine for forums and message boards. It has RSS feeds by category and search term and can be accessed directly through the Firefox browser with a plug-in.

In addition to these free tools there are a number of companies that offer commercial solutions. These include: Market Sentinel www.marketsentinel.com; The Sayre Group http://sayreonline.com; Tiger Two www.tigertwo.co.uk and TruReputation www.trureputation.com.

@najmc

By the Grace of Almighty Allah we have completed another project and it is now live.

3 Men 1 Mission is a dawah website dedicated to explain that the Prophets’ Moses, Jesus and Muhammad (peace and blessing be upon them all) all came with the same message to their people.

It has been a pleasure to work with these brothers and to be part of their mission in establishing truth.  May Allah bless them and reward them with success.  Amin

Take a peek at a screenhot of their front page.  We would love to read your views and opinions

Hat tip Najm Clayton @najmc who has written an article for us about online reputation management.  We will be over three posts inshallah

Part 1

What is ORM?

There was once a time when a company, organisation or individual could place a website on line and it would represent what they wanted people to know about them.

Sometimes a disgruntled hacker could gain access to a site and deface it but this was rare and generally aimed at large corporations.

With the development of the web 2.0 environment this is no longer the case. Web 2.0 has seen a revolution in web chatter. Interactivity is the key with blogging, micro-blogging, social networking, online bookmarking and sharing taking the place of the old ‘my homepage’ that came free with ISP accounts and rarely received more than a dozen hits. What’s more search engines love these types of sites. They are regularly updated, are keyword rich and quite often packed with authoritative content. They also have lots of inbound and outbound links without being link exchanges or link farms. Inevitably they perform well in the SERP’s (search engine results page).

Your company may be number two in the search results but what if number one is a blog saying how rubbish your customer service was or that your products are overpriced?

A reputation that has been built over years can be destroyed, or at least significantly damaged, within days (if not hours) of an initial comment attacking your company, brand, product or even key executives.

To minimise any risk it is important that online chatter is monitored and that any negative publicity managed. This, along with SEO, is  Online Reputation Management.

Allah says:

Deal not unjustly, and you shall not be dealt with unjustly. [Al Qur'an 2:279]

O you who believe! When you deal with each other in transactions involving future obligations in a fixed period of time, reduce them to writing. Let him who incurs the liability dictate, but let him fear his Lord God, and not diminish aught of what he owes.”

So, Allah tells us that the most important rule when it comes to transactions is that it should be writen down in a contract.  Allah speaks about loans in this ayah and by having a contract it will, Inshallah, allow us to avioid many of the disputes and conflicts that may occur between one another.

By the grace of Allah we have completed another project for a client.  Abacus Reclaims are a Muslim finance company based in Leicester, UK that specialises in Islamic Wills and working on their clients behalf in any financial claim they may have.

They are a very popular and well respected company, one client said of them:

“I’ve never known a company to care so much about their clients from start to finish”

Here is a screenshot of their front page

May Allah bless them and their business

Wa Alhamulillah wa shukrullah

Do you ever go on dodgy websites, controversial blogs or wish you could leave no trail when buying and selling online?  You may even go to completely acceptable websites and blogs but just dont want people to be able to trace your movements, enter QtWeb 2.0.

The QtWeb 2.0 is an open source browser built on the Nokia Qt framework…a rare thing indeed for browsers…and it seems that it can offer you the kind of safe haven you need.

Here area few privacy and security features you may like

• Turn on Private Browsing mode to avoid leaving traces of browsing, even UserAgent which is being sent to the web server is masked
• Full Reset feature - clears all caches and restores all local settings to the state just after installation, as it was never run on the machine
• Supported SSL to access secure sites.

Other than the impressive safety features on QtWEB 2.0 it has a Firefox type appearance and is a compact and portable web browser. It has a customizable user interface, its lightweight, fast and portable.

QtWeb 2.0 includes customizable menus, hot keys, keyboard shortcuts, toolbar buttons and search providers.

It won’t change the world and people will not be jumping all over it but for those who want security when online and want to stop your information being leaked this is a good option for you.

Download it here

Taken from the book entitled: Entering into a partnership with a person who deals with bribes and riba by Muhammad Salih Al-Munajjid

If a person earns money in haraam ways such as riba, bribes, stealing and cheating, etc., and his wealth is a combination of halaal and haraam, then it is valid to do business with him, buying and selling and entering into partnerships, but it is makrooh. If it is known that the product in which the trade is to be done is haraam in and of itself, then it is not permissible to enter into a partnership with him or work with him in that business.

Ibn Qudaamah said in al-Mughni (4/180):

“If he buys from someone whose wealth includes both haraam and halaal, such as an unjust ruler or someone who deals in riba, if it is known that the item sold is from the halaal portion of his wealth, then it is halaal, but if it is known that (the item) is from the haraam portion, then it is haraam.

If it is not known which it is, then we regard it as makrooh, because of the possibility that it may be haraam, but the sale is not invalid, because of the possibility that it may be halaal, whether the haraam element is small or great. In this case it is a doubtful matter. The lesser or greater the haraam element, the greater or lesser the doubt.”

It says in Haashiyat Qalyoobi wa ‘Umayrah (2/418):

“Partnerships are valid even if they are makrooh, such as a partnership with a dhimmi (a non-Muslim living under Muslim ruler), one who consumes riba and one whose wealth is mostly haraam.”

In Haashiyat al-Dasooqi (3/277) it says:

“Know that if a person’s wealth is mostly halaal and a small part of it is haraam, the correct view is that it is permissible to deal with him, lend money to him and eat from his wealth as Ibn al-Qaasim said, contrary to the view of Usbugh who says that that is haraam. But if a person’s wealth is mostly haraam and a small part of it is halaal, the view of Ibn al-Qaasim is that it is makrooh to deal with him, lend money to him and eat from his wealth. This is the correct view, contrary to the view of Usbugh who says that that is haraam. But if a person’s wealth is all haraam, this means that it is not allowed to deal with him, lend money to him or have any dealings with him, financial or otherwise.”

Download here

Buying and selling is undoubtedly permissible in Islam however, Allah and His Prophet (saw) have told us to be mindful and honest in our dealings:

Allah say in The Glorious Qur’an

And Allah has made business transactions permissible (Quran 2.275)

And take witnesses when you buy and sell  (Quran 2.282)

Except transactions done based on mutual agreement between you (Quran 4.29)

There is no harm upon you to seek after the bounties from your Lord (Quran 2.198)

A transaction between Muslims and between Muslims and non Muslims are an extremely important part of Deen and as such, requires our full attention lest we fall into error.

Buying and selling on eBay and other ecommerce websites should not remove the obligation of honesty and taqwa from our actions.  It is a lot easier to fool or be fooled online because transactions do not occur face to face and many of us have unfortunately fallen into this trap.

Our beloved Prophet Muhammad said:

Whosoever sells a defective product without disclosing its defect to the purchaser, shall earn the permanent anger of Almighty Allah and the angels continuously curse such a person

Muhammad Sayed Adly has spoken on this subject in a really interesting talk on the fiqh of business transactions.  Listen Here

After learning about Google Squared I thought what else could Google possibly do in with “search?” At first glance Google Squared looks typically basic for a Google app, Google are great at minimalist design and this is no different.

What they are trying to do with this new feature is grab all those pieces of data that are swimming along the internet, like space debris, and present relevant information to you in a very “excel spread sheet” type arrangement.

I had a go and entered the search term “Prophet Muhammad ” and it turned out these results:

Generally the search results are ok; I believe that it needs more work so that it presents more relevant results.

Google Squared has the potential to be a very important part of the Google App Empire with massive take up; for now, I’ll just wait for the updates before I begin using it.

Take a peek at their YouTube promo