https://reputcon.com/briefings Reputation and business intelligence, written for the people who run the business. en-GB Sat, 12 Sep 2026 16:50:09 GMT https://reputcon.com/briefings/nobody-reviewing-your-garage-can-judge-the-work https://reputcon.com/briefings/nobody-reviewing-your-garage-can-judge-the-work Sat, 12 Sep 2026 16:50:09 GMT A driver has no way of telling whether the discs really needed replacing. So when they leave you three stars, they are rating something else entirely, and it is worth knowing what. https://reputcon.com/briefings/most-people-decide-about-you-without-clicking-anything https://reputcon.com/briefings/most-people-decide-about-you-without-clicking-anything Wed, 09 Sep 2026 18:20:03 GMT Your rating, your hours, your photos and a summary of your reviews now appear in the search result itself. The customer reads all of it, makes their decision, and arrives without ever having visited anything you built. https://reputcon.com/briefings/how-to-handle-a-complaint-that-never-becomes-a-review https://reputcon.com/briefings/how-to-handle-a-complaint-that-never-becomes-a-review Tue, 08 Sep 2026 18:39:35 GMT Someone tells you to your face that something was wrong. No review, no rating, just a quiet word. That is the most valuable feedback your business will get all month, and most of us handle it as a threat instead. https://reputcon.com/briefings/how-to-find-out-what-people-actually-typed-to-find-you https://reputcon.com/briefings/how-to-find-out-what-people-actually-typed-to-find-you Sat, 05 Sep 2026 19:14:23 GMT Google records the exact words strangers used before they found you, and hands the list back to you for free. Almost nobody opens it. Here is how to read it, and what to change once you have. https://reputcon.com/briefings/how-to-audit-your-google-business-profile-in-20-minutes https://reputcon.com/briefings/how-to-audit-your-google-business-profile-in-20-minutes Tue, 01 Sep 2026 20:51:31 GMT Most people spend hours on their website and have never once read their Google profile properly. It is the page far more customers actually see. Here is a step by step check you can finish before your coffee goes cold. https://reputcon.com/briefings/how-to-reply-to-a-one-star-review https://reputcon.com/briefings/how-to-reply-to-a-one-star-review Tue, 25 Aug 2026 20:42:17 GMT A one star review is the only feedback that arrives with an audience already attached. Here is the method: who you are actually writing to, the four parts of a reply that works, the traps that make it worse, and when not to reply at all. https://reputcon.com/briefings/how-to-find-out-why-your-busiest-day-makes-the-fewest-reviews https://reputcon.com/briefings/how-to-find-out-why-your-busiest-day-makes-the-fewest-reviews Tue, 18 Aug 2026 22:25:54 GMT Saturday brings three hundred customers and four reviews. Tuesday brings ninety and eleven. Most owners conclude something about Saturday customers. It is almost never the customers. https://reputcon.com/briefings/last-month-was-not-worse-it-had-fewer-saturdays https://reputcon.com/briefings/last-month-was-not-worse-it-had-fewer-saturdays Sun, 16 Aug 2026 13:55:57 GMT Every month you compare the last one to the one before and go looking for a reason. Often there isn't one. The calendar changed shape and took your numbers with it. https://reputcon.com/briefings/ai-does-not-read-your-star-rating-it-reads-your-reviews https://reputcon.com/briefings/ai-does-not-read-your-star-rating-it-reads-your-reviews Thu, 13 Aug 2026 21:11:23 GMT For twenty years the average was the whole game. Now the systems your customers actually ask are reading the sentences underneath it, and describing you in their own words. That changes which number is worth managing. https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-world-does-not-update-once-a-quarter https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-world-does-not-update-once-a-quarter Sun, 09 Aug 2026 21:59:22 GMT Most business intelligence is a photograph of last Tuesday. Project Argus is an instrument showing the planet right now: aircraft, shipping, hazards, cables, markets and news, live on one map. Free, no login, built because nobody would sell us one. https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-best-automation-is-the-one-nobody-notices https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-best-automation-is-the-one-nobody-notices Sat, 08 Aug 2026 19:24:52 GMT The distance between something happening and somebody dealing with it is where reputation is won and lost. Most businesses close that gap with a person. The better ones close it with a decision they already made, and good automation is mostly about what it refuses to do. https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-hour-nobody-else-opens-using-competitors-trading-hours-as-business-intelligence https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-hour-nobody-else-opens-using-competitors-trading-hours-as-business-intelligence Mon, 03 Aug 2026 21:06:20 GMT Every competitor publishes their opening hours, publicly, in a structured format, and almost nobody reads them. Laid out across a week they show you something your own till never can: the hours when there is demand in your area and nothing open to serve it. https://reputcon.com/briefings/why-did-my-google-reviews-disappear-the-real-reasons-and-what-you-can-do https://reputcon.com/briefings/why-did-my-google-reviews-disappear-the-real-reasons-and-what-you-can-do Thu, 30 Jul 2026 21:44:49 GMT Reviews rarely vanish at random. They are removed, filtered, merged away or taken down with the person who wrote them, and each cause has a different fix. Here is what actually happens, how to tell which one hit you, and why most owners only notice weeks after the fact. https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-science-of-negativity-bias-why-one-bad-review-drowns-out-ten-good-ones https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-science-of-negativity-bias-why-one-bad-review-drowns-out-ten-good-ones Thu, 30 Jul 2026 21:31:31 GMT It is not that your customers are unfair. It is that the human brain processes bad information more thoroughly, remembers it longer, and weights it heavier than good information of exactly the same size. That asymmetry is one of the most replicated findings in psychology, and it is sitting in your star rating right now. https://reputcon.com/briefings/your-reply-is-not-for-the-person-who-complained https://reputcon.com/briefings/your-reply-is-not-for-the-person-who-complained Mon, 27 Jul 2026 22:20:21 GMT Almost every business writes review replies aimed at the unhappy customer. That customer has already gone. The reply is being read by hundreds of people deciding whether to book, and most owners are writing it to the wrong audience entirely. https://reputcon.com/briefings/i-built-a-live-map-of-the-world-and-i-am-giving-it-away https://reputcon.com/briefings/i-built-a-live-map-of-the-world-and-i-am-giving-it-away Sat, 25 Jul 2026 21:10:35 GMT Project Argus went live today. Every aircraft in the air, every ship at sea, hazards, cameras, satellites, markets and the news wire, on one map, updating right now. It is free, and it is going to stay that way. Here is why I made it. https://reputcon.com/briefings/busy-is-not-the-same-thing-as-profitable https://reputcon.com/briefings/busy-is-not-the-same-thing-as-profitable Wed, 22 Jul 2026 22:14:29 GMT A packed diary feels like proof the business is working. Often it's proof of the opposite: you've built a machine that keeps you exhausted and broke at the same time, and busy is the thing hiding it from you. https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-most-dangerous-number-in-your-business-is-the-average https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-most-dangerous-number-in-your-business-is-the-average Tue, 21 Jul 2026 21:50:37 GMT There's an old line about the statistician who drowned crossing a river that was, on average, waist-deep. Every local owner is doing the same thing with their numbers and doesn't know it. https://reputcon.com/briefings/nobody-quits-you-in-a-big-dramatic-scene https://reputcon.com/briefings/nobody-quits-you-in-a-big-dramatic-scene Mon, 20 Jul 2026 21:20:01 GMT The customers who cost you the most never complain, never leave a review, never tell you they're unhappy. They just stop coming, and most owners genuinely don't notice for months. Here's how to catch it. https://reputcon.com/briefings/you-are-probably-charging-about-15-too-little https://reputcon.com/briefings/you-are-probably-charging-about-15-too-little Sun, 19 Jul 2026 21:13:24 GMT Most local owners set their price once, years ago, based on a nervous guess and what the shop down the road was doing. Here's the arithmetic on what that's actually costing you, and why the customers you're scared of losing are the ones you want gone. https://reputcon.com/briefings/your-biggest-competitor-isn-t-a-business https://reputcon.com/briefings/your-biggest-competitor-isn-t-a-business Fri, 17 Jul 2026 23:54:30 GMT Every local owner I meet can name their rival down the road. Almost none of them can name the thing that actually takes most of their money, because it doesn’t have a shopfront, a logo, or a Google listing. https://reputcon.com/briefings/they-smiled-said-thanks-and-left-you-two-stars https://reputcon.com/briefings/they-smiled-said-thanks-and-left-you-two-stars Wed, 15 Jul 2026 21:18:51 GMT The couple by the window told you everything was lovely. They meant it, sort of. Then they got in the car and gave you two stars and a paragraph about the cold chips. This is not them being fake. This is the single biggest shift in how customers behave, and most owners still haven’t clocked it. https://reputcon.com/briefings/people-judge-your-photos-before-they-read-a-word-you-ve-written https://reputcon.com/briefings/people-judge-your-photos-before-they-read-a-word-you-ve-written Tue, 14 Jul 2026 22:30:33 GMT Everyone frets over their reviews. Meanwhile the thing customers actually look at first, the photos on your Google listing, is often three blurry shots from 2019 and, I promise you, a picture of the car park. You're losing people before they've read a single star. https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-employee-who-s-costing-you-stars-and-the-one-earning-them https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-employee-who-s-costing-you-stars-and-the-one-earning-them Mon, 13 Jul 2026 21:45:21 GMT Your reviews are full of names. "Maya was brilliant." "The tall bloke on Saturday couldn't care less." Almost no owner ever sits down and counts them, which is a shame, because it's the most honest staff appraisal you'll ever get, and it's sitting there for free. https://reputcon.com/briefings/qr-code-review-cards-worth-it-or-a-gimmick-and-google-s-rules-for-doing-them-right https://reputcon.com/briefings/qr-code-review-cards-worth-it-or-a-gimmick-and-google-s-rules-for-doing-them-right Sun, 12 Jul 2026 22:33:39 GMT Those little "scan to leave us a review" cards are everywhere now, on cafe counters, salon desks and takeaway bags. Do they actually work, or are they just clutter? Here's what the numbers say, the mistakes that make them useless, and the Google rules that can get you penalised if you ignore them. https://reputcon.com/briefings/can-you-delete-a-google-review-what-actually-works-in-2026 https://reputcon.com/briefings/can-you-delete-a-google-review-what-actually-works-in-2026 Sat, 11 Jul 2026 22:09:44 GMT Someone left your business a review that's unfair, fake, or just plain nasty, and now you're googling how to get rid of it. Here's the honest answer: you usually can't delete it. But there are four things that genuinely work, and one of them works far more often than people think. https://reputcon.com/briefings/put-it-on-the-wall-why-visible-tasks-get-done-and-hidden-ones-don-t https://reputcon.com/briefings/put-it-on-the-wall-why-visible-tasks-get-done-and-hidden-ones-don-t Fri, 10 Jul 2026 20:33:46 GMT Restaurants run on ticket rails and hospitals run on whiteboards for a reason. The way a task is displayed changes whether it gets done at all. Here is the operational psychology behind putting work where everyone can see it. https://reputcon.com/briefings/your-customers-won-t-remember-the-visit-they-ll-remember-two-seconds-of-it https://reputcon.com/briefings/your-customers-won-t-remember-the-visit-they-ll-remember-two-seconds-of-it Thu, 09 Jul 2026 21:39:55 GMT A Nobel Prize-winning discovery explains why customers forget an hour of great service and review you on a single moment, and why the last two minutes of every visit matter more than the first fifty-eight. https://reputcon.com/briefings/read-your-rival-s-reviews-like-a-spy https://reputcon.com/briefings/read-your-rival-s-reviews-like-a-spy Wed, 08 Jul 2026 22:10:33 GMT Your competitor spent years collecting the most honest market research you will ever find, and they left it in public where anyone can read it. Their reviews are a map of exactly where they are weak. Here is how to read that map and turn it into customers. https://reputcon.com/briefings/why-your-first-30-reviews-are-lying-to-you https://reputcon.com/briefings/why-your-first-30-reviews-are-lying-to-you Tue, 07 Jul 2026 20:20:49 GMT Small numbers are seductive and dishonest. A 4.9 from 18 people and a 4.9 from 1,800 are not the same number, and treating them as if they are is one of the most expensive mistakes a business can make with its own data. https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-4-000-software-stack-nobody-audits https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-4-000-software-stack-nobody-audits Mon, 06 Jul 2026 23:22:15 GMT Most small businesses are quietly paying for five tools that do one job badly between them. Here is the maths nobody shows you, and the question to ask before your next renewal. https://reputcon.com/briefings/for-every-complaint-there-s-the-ones-who-just-left https://reputcon.com/briefings/for-every-complaint-there-s-the-ones-who-just-left Sun, 05 Jul 2026 17:44:14 GMT The angry review is the one you see. The bigger problem is the ten people who felt the same way and said nothing, they just didn't come back. Here's how to hear the customers who never speak up. https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-3am-problem-nobody-talks-about https://reputcon.com/briefings/the-3am-problem-nobody-talks-about Sat, 04 Jul 2026 17:32:31 GMT The thing that keeps a small business owner awake isn't the money. It's not knowing what people say about you when you're not in the room. Here's why that worry exists, and why you shouldn't have to carry it alone. https://reputcon.com/briefings/sentinel-radar-2-0-knowing-exactly-where-you-stand https://reputcon.com/briefings/sentinel-radar-2-0-knowing-exactly-where-you-stand Fri, 03 Jul 2026 22:41:18 GMT Most owners only find out a competitor pulled ahead when it is too late to matter. Sentinel Radar watches the whole field for you and, more importantly, tells you what to do about it before it costs you. https://reputcon.com/briefings/data-protection-is-part-of-your-reputation https://reputcon.com/briefings/data-protection-is-part-of-your-reputation Thu, 02 Jul 2026 21:13:24 GMT Most people treat data protection as a legal box to tick. I see it as part of your reputation, sitting right next to your reviews, and just as quiet to lose. https://reputcon.com/briefings/why-i-built-reputcon https://reputcon.com/briefings/why-i-built-reputcon Thu, 02 Jul 2026 19:40:28 GMT Your name is probably the most valuable thing your business owns, and the thing you have the least time to watch. This is the problem I set out to fix, and a bit of why it matters more than most people think.