This article at the Telegraph is a wonderful exposition of the difficulties of online reputation. While people should not believe everything they read on the Internet, often they do. The article summarizes some of the most important parts very succinctly and gives people a glimpse into why reputation management services are so incredibly important.

Think about online recommendations and reputation: that is, checking out people you might like to hire and researching businesses you might like to build relationships with. If anything, hasn’t the internet made both tasks much more difficult?

Take Yelp. Even casual users of the web are by now familiar with the appalling reputation of Yelp’s anonymised business reviews, which have enabled bitter ex-employees, their identity shrouded by the reviews site, to destroy businesses. Anyone with a grudge can leave a nasty smear against a restaurant’s reputation. As for business services, there’s really nowhere to go besides expensive due diligence services like Kroll and nosing around credit agencies and Companies House.

The author points out that people widely recognize online reviewing websites as a place for individuals to take cheap shots at businesses. The general rule applies similarly to most review websites and to the idea that you can just Google someone and instantly know their reputation.