Reputation Management & Crisis Communication

Reputation management is the process of tracking, maintaining, and defending a consistent message and positive image across all media. It applies to corporations and individuals, to billion-dollar brands and grassroots causes. Today’s reputation management integrates public relations, search engine optimization (SEO), content marketing, and social media management. It requires constant monitoring and participation in the dialogues that comprise modern media as the traditional roles of sender and receiver merge and evolve. As digital presence has become the front lines of reputation management, systems use various predefined criteria for processing complex data to report behavior and activity surrounding a reputation, thereby automating the process of determining positive sentiment, influence, and trustworthiness. While reputation management is an ongoing proactive effort, PR professionals also need to be prepared to react in a crisis. Crisis communication planning and management strategies are an important subset of this field. Through the study of proactive and reactive programs, students will learn how to apply reputation and crisis management principles in times of quiet and chaos all while monitoring, positioning, and measuring a brand's presence online.