Potentially Destructive Power of the Web to your Company's Reputation

[Tom Snyder]

Just read a great article in an industry publication about how badly businesses can be hurt by Web sites that cater to groups of people who are enraged by their lack of service, quality, integrity, etc.

The truly great companies know that by finding every opportunity they can to be in touch with their clientele and target market. So they scour the Web to find out what the market is saying about them, positively and negatively, and they respond by initiating market driven improvements.

The companies that don't get it, or simply don't care, leave themselves open to incredibly destructive "market buzz." While moderated sites (like MilwaukeeHDTV) and chatrooms facilitate particularly damaging market perception, sites that are developed for the sole purpose of dissing a company (Lowesblows.com, deltasucks.com), are even more damaging. They are damaging because 1.) they will come up in the search engines directly behind the company they criticize and 2.) The company has virtually no recourse. The courts have ruled that, because they represent free speech, and do not attempt to use the trademark owner's brand to sell merchandise, that critics are within their legal right to register a domain name.

Again, the companies that "get it" make sure they register all dismissive variations of their company name (pepsisucks.net, pepsiblows.org, etc.). in case their service or product ever drops to a level that a market segment would be angry enough to mount an organized critical attack.

I mention all this as prelude to the fact that after I read the article, I discovered that foxsux.com is an available domain name. At least at the moment. I'm thinking about what we want to do with that.