Thanks for the hat-tip, we’re obviously very big on online reputation management over at Distilled and I think we’ll see more and more companies straying into the level 2 and level 3 over the next 12 months or so. Currently only a very small percentage strays outside of level 1 – and a lot of companies don’t even manage that!

I’d also welcome a more in-depth discussion about what you’ve called the ‘black-hat reputation management’. It’s a neat term and one which I think is appropriate.

When I buy products (both offline and online) 99% of the time I will do my research online, reading reviews and comments about the products in various locations. When you realise that some of these comments may be ‘less-than-genuine’ then you realise that this is going to become a much bigger issue in the coming months/years. It will be interesting to see how this develops and what systems develop to try and minimise the impact of the fake UGC.

I look forward to your in-depth posts on each level.

I think you are right about the riskiness of what you call black hat reputation management. Online promotion always falls somewhere on a scale from white to black, but particularly when you are trying to protect your reputation, it seems silly to me to go down high-risk routes that could be counter-productive.