How To: Manage Your Categories

Tracking your reputation, or that of a specific brand, and the way it changes over time is the main reason  for using ORM software like BrandsEye. In previous posts we have found out how phrases work and discussed how to get the most out of your reputation score. In this 'How To' I will take a closer look at how you can use categories to break up the phrases you are tracking and thus create more meaningful data from which you can pull information about your reputation.

Categories basically allow you to split phrases into groups that each hold a reputation score of their own, and depending on how theses individual categories are constructed can collectively contribute to an overall reputation score. This is best explained by taking a look at a specific brand - to make this easy to follow I will be using a fictitious brand to explain how categories are structured. 

Ronnie's Pro Golf Shop wants to track what consumers are saying about them online. Ronnie particularly wants to know if the reputation of all three his stores across the country are living up to the same standards. The first thing Ronnie does is to set up a Root Category (marked in Red) called 'Ronnie's Pro Golf Shop.' Underneath this he adds two Subcategories 'Store Locations' and 'Employees' (marked in Blue).


The reputation of the Root Category 'Ronnie's Pro Golf Shop' is now influenced by the reputation of the two Subcategories 'Store Locations' and 'Employees'. It is into these two Subcategories that you will add the phrases associated with your brand that BrandsEye will track. For example, under store location Ronnie adds the following phrases;


This means that every time BrandsEye receives a mention that has to do with one of Ronnie's three stores it will influence the reputation of the Subcategory 'Store Locations'. The same goes for the second Subcategory 'Employees', where any mention of an employee of Ronnie’s will influence the reputation score of the Subcategory 'Employees' - here we can see that Ronnie has added the names of his three store managers.

  
This means that Ronnie can see what the reputations of his stores are and compare these with the reputations of his employees. He can then see the overall reputation score of his golf shops because the sum of the reputation scores of the two Subcategories equal the reputation score for the Root Category 'Ronnie's Pro Golf Stores'.

Using this structuring for his BrandsEye account will allow Ronnie to see three things:
A) The collective reputation of his stores.
B) The collective reputation of his employees.
C) The overall reputation of his stores as informed by the collective reputation of his stores and employees.

There is no limit to the amount of Subcategories one can assign to a single Root Category. You can also have more than one Root Category assigned to an account.

However, Ronnie can get even more information out of his BrandsEye account if he were to add a tiny bit more structuring to his categories. BrandsEye allows one to add Secondary Subcategories (marked in Green) to already existing Subcategories. This refines the information one can pull from BrandsEye even more. For example, let’s look at what Ronnie could add to his category structuring. The first thing Ronnie can do is add three Secondary Subcategories to the Subcategory 'Store Locations' and into each of these Secondary Subcategories add the appropriate phrase;

       
This means that Ronnie can not only see the collective reputation of his stores, influenced by the reputation of each individual store, but that each store location now has its own category. He can thus see the reputation of each individual store location. The same can be done for employees - which will allow Ronnie to view the reputation for each individual store manager.


The above structuring of Ronnie's BrandsEye account will now allow him to see a number of things:
A) The individual reputation of each store location, as well as store mangers - made possible by the Secondary Subcategories marked in green.
B) The collective reputation score of his stores and employees - made possible by the Subcategories in blue.
C) The overall reputation score of his stores nationally - made possible by the Root Category in red.

Ronnie's BrandsEye account is now set up to fulfill his aim, which is to see if the reputation of all three of his stores is at an equal level. With the categories set up as I’ve described, Ronnie will be able to identify how his stores are doing collectively - by looking at the Subcategory. If there’s a problem he can then pin-point the store where it originated by looking deeper at the Secondary Subcategories. In addition to this Ronnie is able to see how each store manger is performing individually – through the Secondary Subcategory - as this might be affecting the store’s reputation. Ultimately Ronnie would be able to see the collective reputation of his stores nationally by viewing the reputation score attached to the Root Category 'Ronnie's Pro Golf Stores'.

Structuring your categories in BrandsEye strategically can go a long way towards determining the type of information you can access. It is always helpful to have your goals in mind before structuring the categories. Just remember that the more accurately defined your categories are the easier it will be to manage tracking multiple phrases. A good category structure will also allow you to pin-point weaknesses and potential problems for your personal and brand reputation efficiently and timeously.