Online Reputation Management (ORM) · Research & Analysis

The reputation footprint AI reads before your buyer does.

AI reads your reputation footprint — your reviews, your mentions, what forums say — and most brands have no idea what it's telling buyers. PACT360 maps that footprint into a single ORM Trust Score, then shows you in dollars what your negative reviews are costing, and what to fix first.

ORM Trust Score SAMPLE MAPPING
0/100
Platform Coverage
What your platforms justify53.6
What AI shows today25.0
0.0 AI Citation Gap
Readiness − Observed
Illustrative figures from a House of Dunmore–style mapping · not live client data
Reddit is now among the most-cited domains by AI systems.
A single thread can shape the recommendation a buyer receives before they ever reach your boutique — and most luxury brands cannot see it. Your Trust Score makes it measurable.
Our Approach

Reputation is no longer a marketing problem.

When buyers — and the AI they ask first — judge your brand, the damage shows up in marketing. But it rarely starts there. We find it, price it, and route it to the people who can actually fix it.

01

Find

The negative reviews shaping what your buyers and AI see.

02

Weigh

By how severe each one is, and how widely it's seen.

03

Price

What those negatives are costing you, in revenue.

04

Route

Who owns each issue — and which need the executive team, not a campaign.

Marketing owns the scoreboard, not the source

Only one of eight complaint categories is marketing's to fix.

Negative reviews cluster into root causes — product, distribution, authenticity, service, value, ESG, communications and digital. The rest belong to operations, product, legal and the executive team. We show you where each issue originates, and how high it needs to go.

AI READS EVERY
CHANNEL AT ONCE

Your reputation isn't one score per channel. AI blends your marketplace reviews, forum threads and owned reviews into a single answer — so we attribute the cost by channel and govern it centrally, not in silos.

The Deliverable

What a Trust Score map contains

Four research modules, one explainable score. Every figure is traced back to the actual evidence behind it — no black box, no dashboard to manage.

01 / Coverage

ORM Platform Coverage

Every platform AI systems read — Reddit, TikTok, Google Reviews, Trustpilot, editorial, Instagram, YouTube — scored and weighted by how heavily each one influences AI recommendations.

Weighted maturity score0–100
02 / Visibility

AI Citation Readiness

We test what ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Mode actually say about you, then compare it to what your platforms should earn. The gap between the two is the headline finding.

Readiness vs ObservedGap
03 / Risk

Category Severity & Ownership

Every negative review is tagged to one of eight categories, weighted by severity and visibility, and routed to the function that owns it — separating fast, response-driven issues from deep, cross-functional ones.

Severity & owner8 cats
04 / Value

Financial Impact

Your negative reviews, priced. We model the annual revenue they put at risk — so the board sees a cost it can act on, not an abstraction.

Revenue at risk$
The Evidence

Why reputation moves revenue

Buyers filter, trust and pay based on what other people say about a brand — and the effect is largest exactly where the stakes are highest. The research is consistent and independent.

It converts — most of all for premium goods

+270%
Higher purchase likelihood once a product shows five reviews, versus none.1,4
+380%
Conversion lift from displaying reviews on higher-priced items — against +190% for low-priced ones. Reviews matter more the more a purchase costs.1
4.0–4.7★
The rating band where purchase likelihood peaks; a flawless 5.0 reads as "too good to be true."1,5

Buyers check — and their standards are rising

98%
Of consumers read reviews for a business at least occasionally; 41% now say they always do.2
68%
Will only use a business rated four stars or higher — and 31% now require 4.5+.2
3%
Would even consider a business averaging two stars or below. A weak score removes you from the shortlist.2

It shapes big brands — and rewards those who manage it

91%
Say reviews of individual locations shape their overall perception of a big brand.3
88% vs 47%
Would use a business that replies to all of its reviews — versus one that never responds. Managing reviews nearly doubles consideration.3
6 → 45%
Rise in consumers using AI tools for recommendations in a single year — now a top-three discovery source. The same reviews are now read on the buyer's behalf.2

References & Citations

  • 1. Spiegel Research Center, Medill, Northwestern University. How Online Reviews Influence Sales, 2017. spiegel.medill.northwestern.edu
  • 2. BrightLocal. Local Consumer Review Survey, 2026 edition. brightlocal.com/research
  • 3. BrightLocal. Local Consumer Review Survey, 2024 edition. brightlocal.com/research/…-2024
  • 4. Askalidis, G. & Malthouse, E. C. (2016). The Value of Online Customer Reviews. Proceedings of the 10th ACM Conference on Recommender Systems (RecSys '16), 155–158.
  • 5. Maslowska, E., Malthouse, E. C. & Bernritter, S. F. (2017). Too Good to Be True: The Role of Online Reviews' Features in Probability to Buy. International Journal of Advertising, 36(1), 142–163.

Figures are drawn from the sources above as published; survey figures (2, 3) are refreshed annually and may shift year to year, so cite the edition. Conversion figures (1) come from controlled analyses of ~5M+ page views and 100k+ reviews; the underlying methods are peer-reviewed in sources 4 and 5.

Free Tool · No Sign-Up

Estimate your exposure

A 30-second indicative read on your Trust Score, your AI suppression risk, and the revenue your unanswered negative reviews may be costing. A full mapping replaces these estimates with measured figures.

Indicative ORM Trust Score
AI suppression risk
Est. annual revenue at risk
Recommended response SLA
Indicative estimates from PACT360 sector models. A full Trust Score mapping replaces every figure here with measured, evidence-traced results. · akhil@pact360consulting.com
Methodology

How the mapping works

A five-stage research process, run once and re-run on a schedule. Each stage produces evidence the next one builds on.

1 Audit Every negative readindividually 2 Score One weighted TrustScore, 0–100 3 Map the gap What AI shows vs.what you’ve earned 4 Price the gap The shortfall asrevenue at risk 5 Prioritise & route Ranked fixes, andwho owns each
Insights & Research

Insights & Research

Deep dives into ORM strategy, AI citation readiness, and brand reputation in the age of AI-mediated discovery.

How we work with you

A starting point, then a system

Begin with a point-in-time analysis you own. When you're ready, move to a continuous operating model that keeps every owner — across functions — accountable.

Trust Score Diagnostic
Single brand · the entry analysis
$6,000
per mapping · 2–3 week turnaround
  • Full ORM Platform Coverage score
  • AI Citation Readiness gap analysis
  • Category severity, with owner mapping
  • The cost of your negative reviews, priced
  • Board-ready PDF diagnostic
Start an analysis
The Operating System
Reputation Operating System
Ongoing · cross-functional
Bespoke
annual engagement
  • Continuous monitoring & re-scoring
  • Quarterly cross-functional Reputation Council
  • Competitive benchmarking
  • Owner accountability across every function
Talk to us
Executive Reputation Governance
Board & C-suite
Bespoke
advisory retainer
  • Board-level reputation reporting
  • Omnichannel reputation strategy (channel P&L)
  • Reputation due diligence on channels, partners & M&A
  • Reputation framed as enterprise risk & value
Talk to us
Flagship Sample

See a real Trust Score map

A full, redacted mapping — the House of Dunmore 360 Trust Index — showing every module, the AI citation gap, the financial model and the action plan, exactly as a client receives them.

PDF · 14 PAGES
ORM TRUST SCORE 54/100
AI CITATION GAP +28.6
Request the sample

What does your score say?

Book a 20-minute mapping call. We'll run a live AI-citation snapshot of your brand beforehand — so you arrive with a real finding, not a pitch.

Book a mapping call