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For Immediate Release
May 6, 2008

Media Contact:
Monica Kozak
888.275.6202, Ext.730
Direct: 203.545.1055
Monica@horizonmarketing.com

Protecting and Building Your Online Reputation with ePR

- Horizon Marketing Group Helps Clients Manage and Control Their Online Identity -

Rocky Hill, CT -When it comes to your brand, if you’re not talking about it online, someone else will be. In fact, managing your online identity (online reputation management) has become a critical component of brand management —and the impressions people form may be influenced from sources other than you. Today, influencers who readily offer both positive and negative commentary about your brand can be found all over the internet, in such places as competitors’ pay-per-click ads, blogs, social networks, forums, and review sites. This makes the need to control and manage your brand’s identity and reputation more essential than ever.

Horizon Marketing Group, a leading full-service interactive marketing agency, recognizes the value of managing your brand’s online identity, as well as, the need for ORM (Online Reputation Management). Horizon is quickly distinguishing itself as a pioneer in ePR (Electronic Public Relations), a new method for communicating with the media by distributing materials such as press releases and articles via online channels. ePR is the practice of building, maintaining and protecting online identity. By utilizing analytic tools it is now possible to monitor the effectiveness of PR efforts with far greater accuracy than ever before.

“Increasingly, Horizon is seeing how online identities are effecting brands’ success and profitability. We are now watching some of the world’s largest companies being maligned via their competitors’ pay-per-click ads, consumer blogs and online articles,” says Monica Kozak, Horizon Marketing Group Vice President of ePR / PR. “The results of an organization’s online identity effect everything from stock prices to overall performance. Companies failing to manage their corporate identities online are beginning to feel the very real consequences.”

Horizon’s team of ePR professionals aggressively monitor, track and report on areas that feature online mentions of their clients. By monitoring websites and developing specific, optimized content, Horizon can bury negative news while making positive news more visible. Additionally, Horizon creates and distributes proactive news items, provides rebuttal statements, and addresses non-factual material. The agency often works in conjunction with traditional PR to create search optimized content that is distributed to both online and offline media channels. The result is content with a far greater reach and lifespan accompanied by in-depth monitoring, tracking and reporting.

Horizon also has the capability of providing clients with a broader distribution of their brand content by strategically delivering information to where their target users are accessing it—not just where they think they will see it. By analyzing and understanding a client’s target market, Horizon develops a comprehensive plan that will reach their client’s audience directly via a multitude of channels, such as: search engines, blogs, RSS and syndication, podcasts, newsfeeds, eNewsletters, special interest media sites, social media sites, email (internal and external lists), viral marketing, SMS/Mobile and wikis.

“It is a well-known fact that a positive reputation brings confidence, trust and sales, which are ultimately reflected in a company’s profitability, while a tarnished reputation can lead to a decrease in consumer confidence which can adversely affect a company’s bottom line,” said Bryn Tindall, CEO, Horizon Marketing Group. “Horizon Marketing Group’s ePR team is well versed in helping clients effectively manage their online identity with measurable results.”

About Horizon Marketing Group

Horizon Marketing Group is a leading interactive marketing and communications agency, delivering services to clients around the world.  Based in Connecticut and Florida, HMG's network of branded companies provides advertising, email marketing, corporate communications, strategic media planning and buying, technology solutions, search marketing and public relations / ePR to clients in more than 30 countries.  Horizon Marketing Group's family of companies includes Horizon Interactive, Vanguard Financial Consulting, Peer360, Relationship Capital Group and Divide The Ride.

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