Emergence of Business Reputation in India

Ever since Shri Narendra Modi, The Prime minister of India set out the “Make in India” and “Digital India” initiatives, it has raised hopes among many business owners to promote their business online and thrive in national and international markets. However while doing so; making a good online presence has its own importance. With more and more businesses looking towards having a presence in the internet, conducting and delivering online becomes critical. It is not just the entire nation, but the world is looking at you. Hence having a good reputation becomes significant to any business.

The Past

In late 1900s or the beginning of the new millennium, building reputation was the luxury of big conglomerates or large businesses alone They used to hire Personal Relations (PR) or Advertising firms to manage their reputation. Small businesses showed less or no interest, as it was a costly affair. They used to work on their reputation only when necessary.

In the new millennium (2000-2010), the Indian businessman’s perception elevated and many businesses upgraded themselves to have an online presence. Though they had a website, it was just a brochure or an information website. These websites were not much in use either to identify leads or to convert opportunities into sales. They were not capable of building the trust or to engage with the prospect.

The Present

In this decennium (2010 – 2020), the rules of the game have changed and the websites of the previous decennium have become obsolete. Businesses, are investing online not only to make their website more trusted, but also to acquire more customers. Simple websites have become more enduring and well-found in Search Engines such as Google.

Now, Online Businesses are the latest trend. Brick & Mortar businesses have evolved themselves into e-commerce businesses and a variety of online services have come into existence to support various industries. Also with thriving social networking websites, businesses are looking into all new ways of creating their presence and improving customer engagement. They discover new approaches to acquire new customers by keeping existing ones.

With all these, the Internet drives even a small company to have a better online reputation and it becomes far more important for a business to present themselves as a trusted entity. It makes the business to have its own distinct existence and stay ahead of the competition. So, building online reputation becomes critical for the business. Nowadays, building reputation is not a costly affair. It has become more affordable and, anyone can manage an online reputation sitting in a room with a computer and internet. Why not make the best use of it!!!

The Future

So what is the future? The future (2020 onwards) will be more mobile driven or via augmented virtual reality. The system will become more virtual and disconnected. More businesses will exist in the virtual world than as brick and mortar businesses. Though they are virtual and have the possibility of catering to global customers, due to high competitions even in the virtual world, businesses will turn back to offer more localized solutions such as limiting themselves to boundaries and market segments. Further niche expertise will prevail than being one large conglomerate. Hence safeguarding the reputation becomes far more important for businesses and the need to gain better reputation will be on high demand.

Conclusion

Finally to conclude, with the country like India diversifying and turning digital at an enormous rate, the old business methodologies will transform. Hence, the concept of word-of-mouth will diminish and will be replaced with broadcasting solutions along with reverse recommendation mechanisms. When things go virtual; trust descends and at that point of time it is the good reputation that shall save the day.