How can I recover my business' reputation after someone was outed for stolen valor who has the same name?

I agree

SPC Paul Tillson - Actually, if you present it to the local television stations ‘properly,‘ and offer just one ‘local’ station the exclusive, the odds of getting on the television evening news just went up exponentially. There’s been a recent resurgence of sorts amongst reports advocating on stories with SV, especially when there’s a ‘twist’ involved, sound familiar?! Additionally, you’ve come to the right place, are you “verified” on RP? If not, do it **now**!!! There are enough brothers and sisters on here who could help in many ways, and (other verified) veteran(s) endorsements alone will go far! Once you build an ‘infrastructure of proof,’ you can utilize other resources like the press to redirect to your site as part of an exclusive on their online news. It would **have** to be a multifaceted approach. Take this as an example:

1) You get verified on RP (to show that you were independently verified).
2) You find few other vets on RP to endorse you (showing both proof and validity).
3) You will publish your DD Form 214, redacting any information that you really can’t show for one reason or another, Adobe Acrobat does a fine job at document redaction, and there are a few alternatives to keep the document looking good, but professionally redacted where needed.
4) You should already have a Blog section on your website, articles in blogs utilize keyboards to bring in traffic, and could be directly converted into sales. The actual methods use will vary by industry, but you get the idea. So, if no Blog, you need one ASAP!
5) You will need a proof and endorsement section on your website, the copy of your DD Form 214 as well as any copy that you could add, along with verified endorsements from other veterans will most definitely “pull on the strings of the heart,” and marketing is **all about story telling**, this is like Day 1 of MBA Marketing class.
6) You must setup a veterans discount program with well designed rules, you want vets to come to your site, and vets will tell more vets this way!
7) You will write a minimum of three (3) articles per month, utilizing highly specific keywords to draw in targeting traffic, with many more to start, you will need your **story** heard, and you will retell it in different ways in the blog to include how you were punished by someone ignorant for your honorable service. See how the pages and posts are starting to tie together now?
8) The “natural” utilization of keywords getting you onto the first page or two of Google could very well take up to a year given their current algorithm, however paid inclusions will get you traffic sooner, and yes it will ‘cost per click,’ but if you follow my advice the increase in sales will compensate for it while clearing your name.
9) We will need to speak by phone for me to go into more detail, and again I am happy to help a bother out for the purpose of the cause alone, see my comment to your original post for details!

OK. So, you should get the idea by now that it’s a marketing game, period. It’s 80% psychology and 20% sales. This is also why they teach about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs at the very beginning of advanced level marketing classes. It’s all about human intuition, figuring out the force behind the needs of your customers, and playing on it! This is how marketing has been done since the world started, and is by no means a ‘new concept,’ however it’s more refined now, and taught at business school this way. The factors involve get ‘crazy,’ as there are so many paths to bringing in “clicks,” but all the more so want the “click” to turn into a “conversion” (sale)! By the way, none of this is hard, it’s all common sense really, and I would be happy to share a couple hours of my time to help you out of this slump, something that I believe could easily be done. If you had a digital marketing professional helping you, this would have been long over with by now, but how would you know that? Most people don’t, and feel trapped, and anxious, and it burns them personally as well as professionally. Well, my friend, contact me as I’m intrigued after reading your story. I’d want nothing more for you, but to show the world that you and your business are the ‘rock stars’ that they are. Period. Plain and simple. Be well, brother!

Best regards,

Jay

P.S. I just **know** that you **can** do it!!!

P.P.S. I’m sharing a write-up about me in my old local paper, so (1) you could see a bit about my background, and (2) see that it was easy for me to get it published in the first place feature spot of the Business page, yup, free advertising!

https://www.timesherald.com/business/your-business-minute-with-the-montgomery-county-chamber-of-commerce/article_eff28953-42c7-5fa9-b31a-f5e1849dba01.html

I did it on the radio.

SPC Paul Tillson - radio is good, but offers less exposure than the newspapers because the papers are digitally archived and could immediately be retrieved using relevant searches on Google. That was back in 2015, and still up today, believe me I love the radio, but remember what I said about a multifaceted approach? It’s like a literal ‘web’ of events and keywords that all tie together online, and with the right ‘bait’ you can utilize those keywords on your site to direct relevant traffic (and hopefully convert some sales!) Google loves links back and forth between sites, and then the use of proper keywords, e.g. put into structured pages like blogs that point to shopping carts with the same keywords, but also “back links” to other pages such as those affording you advertising. While on the subject, ‘meta’ is not dead, but on life support and not worth spending an inordinate amount of time on. The television news is king, but that alone may have an impact for days, weeks, maybe a month if really lucky, but that impact will be huge (it just dies off at an exponential level)!!! There’s so much more to digital marketing than most even **want** to realize, but once given the ‘keys to the kingdom,’ you could utilize it to your advantage very quickly. One last example, once I started commenting on RP, and really got serious, the way that I write is just second nature to me now. I almost write for blogging as weird as that may sound. The bottom line is that within about 2-weeks, I already was in the top 1% of veterans and still moving upward in rank on the site. This wasn’t even intentional, it’s just that once you learn how to write for online, getting influence will only come naturally... and quickly if I may add. Please don’t forget, my ‘door‘ is always open for you, brother, feel free to message me literally anytime!

All my best!

~ Jay

CPT Zarin N., great point. Do you know of any of the search engine optimization companies? I was trying to recall the ads for this that I have heard about but am drawing a blank.

CPT Zarin N. , Thank You for your response, yes SEO/SEM works, but is a constant endeavor, I have placed myself on the top by doing my own SEO, creating links and so on, to hire someone to do the SEO, I presently do not have the funds to do, but I do have it in my plans as soon as it dies down, otherwise it is a constant battle to reach the rankings.

Agreed that is what my lawyer said, by the time the Gov is done with him there will be nothing left, Thank you for your response.

Thank You MSG Brad Sand, many of the people who use stole valor don't think about the repercussions of their actions, and in many cases it is just the tip of the iceberg, their actions escalate to other crimes.

SPC Paul Tillson
I think EVERYONE who are in the class of stolen valor, not only do not think about the repercussions of their actions, but just would not care if they did. They are dog $hit and it is only because our Nation and culture has been so emasculated that they are not taken out and beaten when they are caught. I think if a couple of these douche bags were sent tarred and feathered, there would be a lot less of them walking around in the future.

MSG Brad Sand - Agreed, it is sad, do you think that these people have entitlement issues too? I went to a reunion at Ft Polk June 2014, almost got my a$$ kicked by SF, had to prove I was the one from Oregon, was given a survival bracelet that toured in the sandbox the night before I left for home, good thing that they had a iPhone to look me up, otherwise I would of gotten the NJ's Tillson's a$$ whooping.