Having done my time in the online reputation management trenches, I would like to share some of what I've learned. I'm sure a lot of folks out there have insights to add to this discussion and I heartily invite you to do so!


Lesson 1: Research Before You Respond
I handled communications for a temp agency that was very selective. We only ended up representing about 10% of the people who applied for work through us and we had tens of thousands of applicants every month. Naturally, with those numbers, we had to disappoint a lot of people. Some of the disappointed would feel so put out that they would go into online forums and talk about how bad, unprofessional, rude, etc., we were. Though usually these comments were anonymous, I could generally figure out which office was being criticized so I would call them to find out what the deal was. There was always more to the story and knowing this "more" gave me confidence when it came to addressing the complaints and criticism.
Lesson 2: Respond with Humility
I always responded humbly. I apologized. I stressed that, even though we would not be able to work with everyone who contacted us and that we were bound to disappoint some people, this need not result in bad feelings. Even when my research had turned up things like, "Oh yeah, she left during the interview to put money in her meter and didn't came back," I never went on the attack and mentioned that stuff. I stuck to, "I'm sorry that you had this experience with us."
Lesson 3: Accept Responsibility
Although online critics seem to prefer anonymity, I always identified myself openly. Additionally, I offered to help resolve the problem. I provided several ways to contact me and said that I would contact the local office to find out more about the situation (which I had usually already done). While sometimes people would continue the conversation with me in the forum, I don't remember anyone ever contacting me directly.
Lesson 4: Provide a Forum for Criticism
We unleashed a storm of negativity in the design community when we ran a "design contest." Such contests are a hotly contested issue amongst designers who equate them with "spec" work. The design forums lit up with flaming discussions of this, which I waded into. Admittedly, I started out defending our decision and arguing with people but soon became conciliatory and eventually pulled the contest. More importantly, however, I used our blog as a kind of lightning rod to move the conversation there. I wrote a post about the issue and included a poll which got over 400 respondents. After we pulled the contest, I posted an apology. These posts got more comments than anything else I wrote and gave us the chance, not to control the discussion - I let even the harshest criticism stand - but at least to host it.
Lesson 5: Hang in There
Responding to negative comments about your organization can be challenging. It can become even more challenging when things get personal. In addition to blog posts and comments attacking me as an individual, thanks to my openness, during the contest debacle I also received some rather hostile emails disparaging me, my intelligence, and my sincerity. I always wrote back thanking the author for their message and apologizing for having offended them. Similarly, I showed up on blogs and forums as long as the discussion continued letting people know that I was still listening and learning.
Like I said, it ain't easy. But by following the approach sketched out above, an interesting thing happened. Specifically in the case of the contest gone terribly awry, people who had initially been critical began to defend me. They may have still disagreed with the original decision, but after I had apologized, invited responses, remained humble, actively engaged, and indeed withdrawn the contest, they became impatient with people who continued to criticize. They basically said, "What more do you want from this guy?"
In other words, by listening, inviting feedback, and responding with both words and deeds, I ultimately changed feelings and thus changed minds. It's not about being right online; it's about making sure people feel alright, even when things go wrong.